Laid-Off California Tech Workers Are Sick To Death of LinkedIn (sfgate.com) 161
An anonymous reader quotes a report from SFGATE: Over the past few years, scores of California tech workers have ended up in the exact same position: laid-off, looking for work on LinkedIn and sick of it. LinkedIn, part job site and part social network, has become an all but necessary tool for the office-job-seeking masses in the Bay Area and beyond. As tech companies gut their workforces, people who would otherwise give the blue-and-white site a wide berth feel compelled to scroll for hours every day for job opportunities. LinkedIn is a dominant force in the professional world, with more than 1 billion users and 67 million weekly job searchers. That scale, plus the torrent of self-promotion and corporate platitudes fueling the platform, has long made it a symbol of modern capitalism. Now, in the age of tech's layoffs, it's also a symbol of dread.
The platform's specter looms so large because it does exactly what it needs to. Tech workers are stuck on Linkedin: In a competitive job market rife with spam listings, the free platform's networking-focused features set it a peg above competitors like Indeed, Dice and Levels.fyi in the search for full-time work. Since February, SFGATE has spoken with 10 recently laid-off tech workers; most of them see LinkedIn as painful but necessary and have locked up new jobs in part thanks to the platform. Tech worker Kyle Kohlheyer told SFGATE that returning to LinkedIn after losing his job at Cruise in December felt like "salt in the wound" and called the job site a "cesspool" of wannabe thought leaders and "temporarily embarrassed millionaires."
"I found success on their platform, but I f-king hate LinkedIn," Kohlheyer said. "It sucks. It is a terrible place to exist every day and depend on a job for. [...] There's just such a capitalist-centric mindset on there that is so annoying as a worker who has been fundamentally screwed by companies," he said. "Wading" through LinkedIn, he said, it's hard to tell if people feel like an alternative to the top-heavy, precarious tech economy is even possible.
Another tech worker, Mark Harris, added: "Is [LinkedIn] a terrible sign that we live in a capitalist hellscape? Hell yes! But we do live in a capitalist hellscape, and girl's gotta eat."
The platform's specter looms so large because it does exactly what it needs to. Tech workers are stuck on Linkedin: In a competitive job market rife with spam listings, the free platform's networking-focused features set it a peg above competitors like Indeed, Dice and Levels.fyi in the search for full-time work. Since February, SFGATE has spoken with 10 recently laid-off tech workers; most of them see LinkedIn as painful but necessary and have locked up new jobs in part thanks to the platform. Tech worker Kyle Kohlheyer told SFGATE that returning to LinkedIn after losing his job at Cruise in December felt like "salt in the wound" and called the job site a "cesspool" of wannabe thought leaders and "temporarily embarrassed millionaires."
"I found success on their platform, but I f-king hate LinkedIn," Kohlheyer said. "It sucks. It is a terrible place to exist every day and depend on a job for. [...] There's just such a capitalist-centric mindset on there that is so annoying as a worker who has been fundamentally screwed by companies," he said. "Wading" through LinkedIn, he said, it's hard to tell if people feel like an alternative to the top-heavy, precarious tech economy is even possible.
Another tech worker, Mark Harris, added: "Is [LinkedIn] a terrible sign that we live in a capitalist hellscape? Hell yes! But we do live in a capitalist hellscape, and girl's gotta eat."
All supply and no demand (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:All supply and no demand (Score:5, Insightful)
It's not that, it's just that so much of the content on there is insufferable. The idea of combining a job site with social media was a terrible one.
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Yeah, the feed is pretty terrible. I swear to God I saw a poem on there one day. It wasn't even about, like, systems analysis or anything. It seemed like it came directly from an Emo kid's college-ruled notebook.
But then again, you don't have to read it! I don't. Unless there's a viral video only stiltedly related to the subject of the post. Even then, looking at a cat unsuccessfully doing a thing three times and then successfully doing it is kind of fun, and I still don't read the actual text.
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Showing off their emotional intelligence. Because what makes an organization run more smoothly than angsty teenagers?
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That makes it great for writing about things that people are afraid to write about: how GenAI sucks, why you'll vote for Trump over Biden/whoever, why the US is fighting a proxy war in Ukraine, etc. etc. Everybody reads but very few write and so you stick out easily.
Re:All supply and no demand (Score:4)
It's not that, it's just that so much of the content on there is insufferable. The idea of combining a job site with social media was a terrible one.
Agreed. You would think LinkedIn would be a site that should eschew political debates and focus on professional connections... which it kind of did way back when. I'm not there looking for political activism. I'm there looking for job-related things: potential career moves, continuing professional education, and focus groups relating to specific technologies. Most of the time when I even bother to check the site all I am doing is scrolling past stuff that is little more than fluff with the occasional tech-related questions/information. Don't even get me started on all of the irrelevant ads that seem to be about 25-35% of the feed.
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Actually, to me, it makes perfect sense.
After all, we all know that "who you know" is a key component in finding work.
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No it was not.
As the "social media part" is still tech centered and relevant for jobs.
Terrible is the idea that the recruiters use the "phone app" and the developers seeking jobs use the web interface.
So instead of sending an email if they see a match, they use the app to "sent a message".
I for my part do not use apps - if I can avoid it - and my I do not publish my phone number.
So, the recruiters lose, if they are to stupid to sent an email.
Regarding the "social media part" you are free to completely ignor
Re:All supply and no demand (Score:4, Insightful)
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As workers we were happy when remote work became acceptable and even the norm in many places. Employers became comfortable with the idea. And once they did, they realized that workers could be really remote. My company came to this realization and has hired more people from other countries.
US based workers may have shot their own feet with the demands for remote work.
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There is, but there's also a lot of semi-remote work. For example, I'm now on a schedule with 1 day/week plus the occasional full week (a bit less often than monthly) in office. I have to live within commute distance and I couldn't have gotten the job remotely.
Re:All supply and no demand (Score:4, Insightful)
No, LinkedIn turned to shit even before MS bought it. So many garbage accounts and so much recruiter spam. It really has negative value.
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The recruiters need to fix their spam algorithms, they suck. After 16 years in the physical security realm engineering for four of the five largest integrated access/video/alarm systems on the planet and with over a dozen hardware and software certifications I keep getting offers of work as:
A security guard.
Really people? After making six figures for a decade and working worldwide you're going to offer me a job making $17/hr walking a guard patrol? How can I resist?
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That's everywhere unfortunately.
Got a resume / work experience up on ANY of the big sites? You get the shit spam that makes no sense.
"Oh, you've got X years of IT experience, but stopped doing it 15+ years ago? Want to work a Hell Desk job for $12 / hour? Never mind that you've been a laboratory manager for the last 10+ years, we think this is a GREAT fit!"
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The problem with linked in is: there are fake profiles.
For some reason, I do not remember, I googled my GFs name. A completely empty linkedin profile popped up. No photo, nothing. Only given name and family name is correct, and work place. Which is surprising, as she is a police officer.
Her title and rank is wrong.
She never set up that profile.
Re:All supply and no demand (Score:4, Interesting)
Don't forget the economic and political turmoil, especially the US "silly season". This is causing a lot of companies to just freeze all hiring because if the US elects one candidate, the political climate will be completely and utterly different than if the other one is elected, to the point where some nations may not even exist a year from now. This is similar to what happened in 2000-2001 timeframe, where 9/11 made employers not want to hire anyone for at least a year, maybe two, until things were sorted out in some way.
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This is similar to what happened in 2000-2001 timeframe, where 9/11 made employers not want to hire anyone for at least a year, maybe two, until things were sorted out in some way.
To be fair it's worth pointing out that 2000 - 2001 was the NASDAQ crash.
I'm sure that 9/11 didn't help, but at least in the tech industry things were in a state of complete turmoil due to the dot-com bubble bursting. And while it was focused on tech, any kind of recession has effects on other industries as well. I had coder friends who were taking jobs at Walmart - so at the very least there was increased competition for a lot of jobs due to all the laid off tech works looking for *anything* to be able to
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This is what exactly happened in my neck of the woods. Everyone went into hiring freezes, contracts expired, and none of this really picked back up for a long while, oftentimes not until well into 2002, if not 2003-2004 did hiring actually even start to pick up. I remember people who already were hired at places who had a start date were told to not come in, because their job req was cancelled.
Re: All supply and no demand (Score:2)
The lasting impact from 9/11 was more in the banking/finance sector, not IT.
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Symptom (Score:3, Insightful)
All of the cheerleading bullshit (and it is obviously bullshit) on LinkedIn is a symptom of our corporate-dominated culture.
If you don't suck corporate cock, your betters (as defined by having more money than you, and deciding whether you will be allowed to have money) will turn your life into a smoking crater. And as it gets worse, it gets harder to improve, because of your credit score. These days even some prospective employers are checking credit scores as part of the hiring process, which really ought to be illegal. I need money to fix my goddamn credit score! Which, by the way, is broken because of identity theft, not because I went out and lived large. Someone ELSE broke my life and now I have to fix it. I am at least now at the point where I have no score instead of a hole in the ground. Maybe someday I will be allowed to do things like find a new rental again.
Why do you defend this system? (Score:2, Insightful)
Did the person who modded me down really think that having the credit score system be a social credit system but not regulating it as one is a good idea?
Re: (Score:2)
Probably they just objected to your use of what must be considered, at this point in history, mild profanity. There's a surprising number of single-issue voters with the same hangup, in this and other forums.
To be fair, I don't like to be graphically reminded of what I'm actually doing, either. I prefer to think of it as "the workpiece".
Re:Symptom (Score:5, Insightful)
All of the cheerleading bullshit (and it is obviously bullshit) on LinkedIn is a symptom of our corporate-dominated culture.
If you don't suck corporate cock, your betters (as defined by having more money than you, and deciding whether you will be allowed to have money) will turn your life into a smoking crater. And as it gets worse, it gets harder to improve, because of your credit score. These days even some prospective employers are checking credit scores as part of the hiring process, which really ought to be illegal. I need money to fix my goddamn credit score! Which, by the way, is broken because of identity theft, not because I went out and lived large. Someone ELSE broke my life and now I have to fix it. I am at least now at the point where I have no score instead of a hole in the ground. Maybe someday I will be allowed to do things like find a new rental again.
Ah, man, that Credit score disaster is terrible. But now, I have a bit of something that isn't intended to anger you, but perhaps some good information. Not to put too fine a point on it, is there a non-zero chance that your attitude as expressed might have some relationship to your situation?
Believing that the people who have work "suck corporate cock" is perhaps a bit of a negative outlook, and quite counterproductive. Does that attitude present itself in interviews?
I mean, what is the goal here? If it is to be employed and pay your bills, then there has to be some give and take. And cultivating some adaptability is a positive thing as well. I've always followed the concept of value added, and a part of that is in addition to doing a lot more than the bare minimum, I network. It isn't sucking up, it is interacting with people and allowing them to see that I'm a good hire. I never suck up.
Networking also allows us to understand that from top to bottom of the ladder, we're all just people. I interact much the same way with the Maintenance guy as well as the CEO. A different language quite often, but it's always a positive thing. A skill well worth cultivating.
This isn't just the typical Slashdot business of busting other's chops. It's just that you sound really bitter, and maybe a few adjustments could help with that.
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Woohoo, two of the resident retards are in the ring together! Fight, Fight, Fight!
I fight nothing - only try to offer some advice - drinkypoo is very happy with his situation, and he has no intention of changing. He's living his best life according to his principles and intimate knowledge of how things work. He needs no advice.
So I probably won't give you the hardon you desire. I only offer advice once.
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With that placid empty positivity and lack of identifying how people might speak differently on slashdot and in reality, you sound like an AI, brother.
Meh - I've been here long before AI was a thing.
Anyhow, allow me to throw a little more of that empty positivity at ya. If you share his attitude, then have it and adopt it as your own.
Let's get non-positive here. I've worked a long time and have worked with people who utterly hate all those above them. They believe that evil and psychopathy only increases with the position.
Ya know what they are? The people who get shitcanned whenever the next downturn happens. They are virtually worthless, and n
Re: Symptom (Score:2)
It is already illegal in California for employers to check employee's credit scores for the majority of positions.
For rentals, of course, it's still allowed. When I moved to California in 1997, I had no issue landing a job in a matter of days. I had no credit score, and finding a rental was harder, but I did. I still couldn't qualify for a credit card, but 6 months later I was able to get a mortgage to buy my first home. Turns out since the loan is secured, it is easier to qualify for without a score.
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Maybe it was "-1 Unnecessary and sad reference to oral sex."
Maybe you puritans should go fuck yourselves instead of policing how people talk.
Stop embarrassing yourself.
Your ideas are so embarrassing you won't associate them even with a disposable identity based on a free email address.
Speaking of death (Score:5, Funny)
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We have some higher ups that retired from the company but still show in LI as being with the company.
It makes spotting phishing attempts pretty easy though since the scammers just use LI as their sole data source for who to impersonate.
LinkedIn was always poison (Score:5, Insightful)
"Desperate for work and need a list of leads? Give us all your contact info and let us spam your address book and we'll let you look at other desperate people's contact information". Oh, and we're probably reselling that harvested data, too.
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"Desperate for work and need a list of leads? Give us all your contact info and let us spam your address book and we'll let you look at other desperate people's contact information". Oh, and we're probably reselling that harvested data, too.
At one point I got an invitation to join LinkedIn, and thought "Okay, why not?"
Then we got to the point where they asked me for my email password. Presumably so they could access my mailing address book and send out invites to all those people. Ummm, seriously? Nothing sketchy or ToS violating about that. So I issued a very polite "Sod off" to them.
LinkedIn is crap (Score:4, Interesting)
I get a job notification this morning for a remote position to do PCB design work, I click the link "we are no longer accepting applications". That's kind of the crux of it, its a bunch of zombie listings for the same very small handful of jobs endlessly recycled and vomited back up by useless temp and recruiting agencies and its rather obvious. Like seriously how many "clients" are looking for a remote PCB designer located in Syracuse NY, yea there was 1 company like a year ago but there's still 30 listings on the site for it though different leech agencies
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Haha I know the exact listing and even applied for it on Indeed.
LinkedIn is a mess (Score:5, Interesting)
When LinkedIn lied to me I was done with them. They said my sister requested a connection (or whatever they call it). She is in a completely unrelated field. I asked her if she asked for a connection and she said no. After that I don't believe LinkedIn and I don't make any connections there. I use it as a resume listing service only, have zero connections, and login maybe once every 5 or 10 years.
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I haven't been on LinkedIn in years (Score:5, Interesting)
I look forward to completely deleting my account when I retire in a few years.
Re:I haven't been on LinkedIn in years (Score:4, Insightful)
I just changed my job title to "Lazy Bastard" and my employer to "At Home".
Best takeaways from this? (Score:3)
"Capitalist hellscape". I am so going to steal that phrase. Also, "precarious tech economy" - simply because tech work has been a great place to be for the vast majority of my life, and the phrase is a reminder that all good things come to an end.
I do feel badly for the folks who have to play suck-up, and do possibly permanent damage to their souls by engaging with StinkedIn, in order make a living. It sucks that tech has become so extremely top-heavy, clique-y, and brown-nose oriented. Every field has its personality cults, but tech seems to have gone over the top in that regard.
As an aside, has anybody else here become allergic to the phrase "thought leader"? I cringe whenever I hear or read it.
Linkedin (Score:2)
...it is what it wanted to be: the Facebook of business.
With all the vapid self-promotion, worthless posts, attention-seeking, and utter lack of value that entails.
No, it's not ENTIRELY worthless; if you have a new hire it's a decent basic double-check on their facts and background as well as useful when you don't have contact info for someone. The worthlessness of the CONTENT people post there is facebook-level, for sure.
Their external spam level is awful too as well as my understanding their data sharing
LinkedIn can be kinda funny (Score:2)
The site has been kinda funny w/ the Crowdstrike fiasco because of all of the wannabe thought leaders that have been unironically applying testing and CI/CD practices that work for user-space apps to kernel level C code.
Personally, I find LinkedIn to be the opposite of Facebook. Where Facebook promotes envy, LinkedIn can make you genuinely feel better about yourself because of all of the loud mouthed thought leader wannabes.
LinkedIn is full of garbage (Score:5, Interesting)
It's just a job board. Ignore the feed (Score:5, Interesting)
The chatter on LinkedIn has always been worthless but you don't have to read it or use it. It is just a job board no worse than others. Sure, there are ghost jobs and a cycle of reposted jobs that are never filled but that is the state of market right now. The same thing happens on Glassdoor and Laddrers.
Fun Fact (Score:2)
Thank you LinkedIn... (Score:4, Informative)
FFS, we don't want to hear you talk about how wonderful you are over & over again.
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But if we don't tell you over and over then you might forget!
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Hahaha, I've seen you post nonsense like this before, what a basement dwelling troll you are. Tell me, where did the American touch you that caused you to take on your bigoted stance against Americans? Did it make you feel bad?
LinkedIn has enshittified (Score:2)
I've been on LinkedIn for ages, but in my 33-year SW dev career, I never once found a job using LinkedIn.
I'm now retired, so I mostly go on LinkedIn to make mocking posts about "thought leaders" and write sarcastic comments on LinkedIn's bullshit AI-generated "collaborative articles" in an attempt to poison the AI input.
Retirement is quite fun.
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I got one job through LinkedIn, one of the few personally-written emails from a recruiter that I've gotten through that system sent me to the only job interview that I've had in the back room of a bar. Turned out to be a good match. Most of what they send me is job postings for which I would be grossly overqualified and which pay a fraction of what I would require. The recruiters need to fix their algorithms, with 17 years engineering some of the largest security systems in the world they should be able
People use LinkedIn for social media crap, why?? (Score:2)
Part job part social, also part scam site too (Score:2)
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If you have a Google account logged in it will automagically log you into LinkedIn as that account, creating an account in LinkedIn at the same time.
There is a very brief popup about this, but then it does it automatically. I haven't seen any other site that behaves this way.
So my Google account, which has a comical name, has a LinkedIn account linked to it. And it gets email notifications as you are mentioning.
I took the time to cancel the account, but low-and-behold, navigated there on a new computer an
On my last job... (Score:2)
I mean if capatalism is so bad, GTFO (Score:2)
World's tiniest violin solo?
Here's a thought, if it's such a capitalist hellhole, go to whatever socialist or other paradise better suits you. Last I checked nobody standing at the border saying you can't leave.
Life is hard. Always has been, always will be. Newsflash people, you're NOT the actual center of the world, and it is nonsensical to believe you're entitled to the life you want just because you want it. Sorry, not sorry.
I fundamentally do not ... (Score:2)
... understand how LinkedIn even has a Business case. I find it utterly unusable. AIways have. ... I _do_ use Xing, which often is quite a recruiter-bot ridden mess itself, but at least it's user interface wasn't built by a retarded monkey on crack.
Awww boo hooo (Score:3)
Worlds smallest violin is playing.
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It's worse than that. Seems pretty clear that Kohlheyer feels entitled to a job. That said, LinkedIn is as bad as Dun & Bradstreet.
LinkedIn or D&B: "Hey, people are looking at your information."
Me: "Cool. Who?"
LinkedIn or D&B: "That's going to cost you a bunch of money to find out."
Me: "But what if it turns out that I don't care about those people? Do I get my money back?"
LinkedIn or D&B: "STBY"
capitalist centric mindset? (Score:2)
that's pretty funny, complaining about a capitalist mindset on a business related website. That shows some serious tunnel vision, i wouldn't expect P/L statements to review from a farming commune in the woods. How could you not expect a capitalist mindset on a website specifically setup for corp professionals?
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Exactly.
Meanwhile, looking for work is generally probably considered more odious to Marx-minded folks who hate "capitalism".
Don't like the system? Go join a commune. That's a viable option, you don't have to be on the treadmill.
Want the body of someone who's been on a treadmill? Zip it and start running...
How about...leave the Bay Area! (Score:2)
It's the big tech companies that are laying people off, while in the rest of the country, programmers and IT talent is still in demand. And in those other places, the cost of living is far, far cheaper.
I don't think it's really LinkedIn the author has a problem with, but the process of hunting for a job in THE market that is slanted the most heavily towards employers. It's a modern gold rush. A few get rich, but most get screwed.
Not my experience (Score:2)
LinkedIn has connected me to at least three jobs in my career, including my current one, where I started 15 months ago. I find it to be a highly effective job site. People regularly come looking for *me* there, I have to decide which ones I even want to talk to. (If the message makes it clear that the recruiter didn't even read my resume to see if I was a good fit, I don't even reply.)
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Weird, I've never had anyone reach out to me like that through LinkedIn if it wasn't through a mutual connection who simply used the platform as convenience. Email would have worked, too.
What industry/vertical do you work in, or what do you do? I've only had irrelevant 'cold call' contacts.
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So far, I've gotten LinkedIn cold call jobs as a software development manager in:
- Car Insurance - 2016
- Mortgage servicing - 2020
- Software (SAAS) vendor - 2023
Capitalism? (Score:2)
Well of course! It's a website that's all about capitalism, matching job seekers with jobs. Oh, and the author wants a high-paying job, so he can live in a high-rent city. What is he expecting, exactly?
LI == M$ Facebook (Score:2)
Slack has ruined networking (Score:2)
In the past, when I left a company, I would have phone numbers and email addresses for all my coworkers.
With my most recent job, though, we used Slack. Once I was no longer at that place, I got cut off from 90% of my professional contacts, except by going to LinkedIn.
This is a tragedy.
Learn from my mistakes. Insist on text messaging your coworkers.
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Explain how Slack caused this problem? Did your company not use email or phones?
I've got contact information for all my coworkers and we use slack.
Re: Slack has ruined networking (Score:2)
We did not use email or phone. There was little reason to because everyone had to have Slack.
Summary makes no sense (Score:2)
It seems overwhelming obvious that the problem is not LinkedIn but rather people losing jobs. If I had lost my job, I would hate being back in job search mode again. However, job sites are a good thing, far better than trying to find a job without one. But it sucks to have to find a job, and LinkedIn and the posters who still have a job would be an unwelcome reminder of my unemployment.
Huh? (Score:2)
LI has always seemed like a Sales Organization circle jerk. I never used it for anything more than an address book before joining a Sales org (oops), and then everyone was posting the equivalent of #blessed wankery when talking about the opportunity they've had to do 60 hour weeks for ever-depreciating fiat. No, Susan, you didn't get a raise, you've been working at about -5% annually for the past 8 years...
The "platform" itself is horrible for finding jobs. I've never found one even remotely suitable for me
Learn to Weld (Score:2)
Really, scrolling LinkedIn is hard work?
Some people are so coddled they'll actually complain like this in public?
Don't hire those people, jeeze what a disaster waiting to happen.
I quit LinkedIn over 10 years (Score:2)
Um (Score:3)
There's just such a capitalist-centric mindset on there that is so annoying as a worker who has been fundamentally screwed by companies," he said
If by "capitalism" you mean "companies employing people to make and do things that people are willing to pay for", then ... why are you trying to work for one?
Oh, what's that? You do want to trade your labor for money?
Maybe they should... (Score:2)
Maybe all those highly-skilled "tech workers" who are sitting around looking for a new job could pool their efforts and create an alternative to LinkedIn? I mean, it seems like an obvious solution to their problem, doesn't it?
Re: (Score:3)
I am on LinkedIn, but have never used the site to find a job. Not directly, anyway.
I personally use LI as a work history storage site so that I can keep my resume short and sweet. I know very well that employers will check LI as a part of due diligence.
Re:I've never been on LinkedIn (Score:4, Interesting)
It's been kind of cool spending most of my career doing government work I can't talk about in detail; when I moved from one agency to another my lack of Facebook, Instagram, and other such accounts was me being security-conscious instead of a flag that caused some HR moron to pass me over because "he's hiding something".
Re:I've never been on LinkedIn (Score:5, Informative)
I found my most recent three jobs on LI; it *had* been a great place for finding new places to work. In the meantime, however, particularly after the MSFT takeover, it has been absolutely insufferable to use. The ads have gone up, the quality of postings have apparently gone down, and the qualIty of job listings have as well.
I found that if you unfollow EVERYONE in your contacts, it doesn't show ANYTHING to you, especially ads, but you still have access to find jobs--if they exist (I am not looking).
Re:I've never been on LinkedIn (Score:5, Interesting)
What bothers me most about LinkedIn is the notifications. "So and so posted something you might be interested in." No they didn't, because I'm not interested in anything that people post on LinkedIn. How do you turn that off? Tying to tweak the notification settings sends you through a labyrinth of fine-grained settings that seem designed to force you to spend so much time searching in vain for the thing you're trying to tweak that you just give up.
At least I figured out how to turn off email notifications (for most things).
But on the website they are so spammy that they've become useless. I just completely ignore them all together.
I get that they are trying to abuse notifications in order to drive more "engagement." My manager (who ironically used to work for Microsoft) would tell me that the data suggests that this actually works or they wouldn't do it. But it drives people like me away. At this point I only log in every so often to see if I have messages or network connection requests. If those things don't exist I leave immediately until another few weeks elapse and I remember that I haven't done that in a while.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:I've never been on LinkedIn (Score:4, Insightful)
I completely agree with you. I would add, in response to your manager, that it might increase "measured engagement" but the value of this engagement is reduced in the process.
Allowing this spammy attitude they might now get 1000 engagement actions when they used to get only 100, but your return per engagement (whatever the definition of "return" might be) is likely reduced by the same proportion. So no real gain is achieved. (But someone can go to their boss and say that they achieved the goal).
Re: I've never been on LinkedIn (Score:2)
Especially if you know the background story and what really happened. Reality usually is a lot more sober.
It actually reminds me of North Koreans talking about their great country and glorious leader.
Re: (Score:2)
I think we introverts forget how common the FoMo mind-set is, and that 'normal' people spend a lot of time searching for validation and ego-stroking: It makes them much easier to manipulate.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It could be that, I guess. On the other hand, I personally have multiple former coworkers whom I know to be (unlike me) industrious, capable workers with up-to-date skillsets, excellent problem-solving skills, clear communications styles, and sunny can-do attitudes. And some of them have been unemployed for more than a year now.
So maybe you're great! Or maybe you're lucky. Maybe you're both. I'm not sure that lording what you have over those who don't is ethical behavior in any case.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Beautiful. Look how naturally steered the conversation from a completely ethically-detached "I don't need LinkedIn" to "you're being unethical". Is attacking someone this completely unprovoked way ethical, eh?
Re: (Score:3)
Ontology of employees (Score:5, Interesting)
Starting at the beginning, as usual. Too bad Slashdot never figured out how to reorder so the good stuff rises to the top...
Pretty weak FP, but at least you deserve a Funny mod for starting out by admitting you know nothing about what you are talking about--but the moderators apparently regard a sincere confession of ignorance as insightful?
But I do have a ontological response, even though your imaginary description of the website you don't use has so little relationship to the problems of LinkedIn. (Maybe I'll include a bit here, or just scan the discussion some more...)
The ontology is that there are basically three kinds of employees. At the extreme top there are a few superstars. These are the stellar people who are actively recruited to the point of creating the jobs that fit what they are willing to do. Salary is usually a relatively minor consideration even though they usually get lots of money from the companies that win the competition for their special talents. (And no, I never got to this level, so maybe this is a sour grapes post? But I think I worked with a number of these folks over the years and we got along well enough.)
Then there's a large group of highly talented people who mostly get their best jobs via their personal networks. At least that is how worked for me before I retired many years ago. Some folks claim that LinkedIn is good for building those personal networks, but I cannot point at any evidence and never got a job via LinkedIn. But I can definitely say that my best jobs came via people who knew me and the worst jobs were via advertisements. (Though sometimes it takes a few years and some perspective to figure out "best" and "worst".)
Then there's the huge group of adequate people, the round pegs who will fit into the round holes. Microsoft will not reveal the financial model (anywhere that I can find it), but I think that most of the real revenue of of LinkedIn is based on finding the cheapest round peg for each hole. I think a "good" job website would have to have a financial model that is balanced between employees and employers, but I don't think that will ever happen because the relevant time periods don't match up properly.
Now you [devslash0] seem to be claiming you belong in one of the top two groups, but I'll admit that I know nothing about you. So does that mean the moderators will give me an insightful mod? Or maybe you want to URL a pointer at some evidence of your "above the scum of LinkedIn" status?
Butt kissing (Score:2)
I have an old co-worker. Have you ever woken up in the morning and find that someone had crawled up your arse to figure out what you had for dinner so that he can impress you with his inside knowledge? This guy would be the prime suspect.
Yesterday I saw a posting in linkedin where he was cheering the other team on because they made BURGERS for them and he was effusively praising the burgers. He also had a posting a few weeks ago about how privileged he is to be working for the customers (the same one who ca
Re: 2000 (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't know what it's like job hunting in 2024. Mostly because I spent a lot of years finding a job I like doing at a good company working for good bosses, and I work hard at it. Just got my 31 year certificate, and am planning to retire from here in a few more years.
The corollary to "people don't quite bad jobs, they quit bad bosses" is "people don't quite good bosses, and good bosses don't fire good employees."
Re: (Score:3)
The corollary to "people don't quite bad jobs, they quit bad bosses" is "people don't quite good bosses, and good bosses don't fire good employees."
I don't think you quite understand how to spell quit.
Re: (Score:2)
You should have stopped after the first three words.
Re: (Score:3)
good bosses don't fire good employees
That works fine until a bigger company gobbles up the one your work for, then fire your boss, then the new boss fires old employees to hire younger ones, to then gloat about how the company is "younger, more dynamic, future focused".
Thing is, your good boss is almost certainly someone who cares about providing a good service to the customer. That's a healthy mentality only old bosses have. Newer bosses believe their job is to provide one, and only one, service: increase share prices. Everything else is seco
Re: (Score:2)
It's a family owned business, and will remain so for far longer that I'll be around.
In the meantime, I'm well compensated, have excellent benefits, look forward to coming to work every day, and like and respect the people I work for and with.
How about you?
Re: (Score:3)
I've heard many times over many years about how LinkedIn is essential. When I started doing some freelance work, I did set up a profile on there, reasoning that it's somewhere credible to put a summary of what I offer and maybe collect a few personal recommendations to build up some trust with future clients.
As far as I can tell, I spent a significant amount of time on LinkedIn over the years maintaining that profile and discussing potential work with various clients or recruiters on there, but I have never
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
Right. I’m going to hire people who cosplay with diapers and ear bandages instead. You snowflakes reach for your heart pills if anyone criticizes the orange Qult leader.
https://www.dazeddigital.com/f... [dazeddigital.com]
https://uk.news.yahoo.com/fact... [yahoo.com]
Re: Let me translate that (Score:2)
Jesus. Someone's going to make a movie about MAGAts 20 years from now and people won't believe people acted like this.
Re: Let me translate that (Score:2)
Re: Linked In Horror is Globalism (Score:2)
Globalism is only bad if you're a nationalist. More people were lifted out of poverty in the last few decades than any time in history.