Badly written job ads

A

Ancalagon

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Since we havent had a thread bitching about either employers or recruitment agents in a while, I thought I'd start this thread to point out terrible job adverts, of which there seem to be a lot.

Take this one:
Title: Back end Developer
......

Skill Requirements:
• PHP
• Magento
• MySQL
• HTML, XML, XHTML and CSS
• Accessibility to WCAG 2 or equivalent
• Knowledge of JQUERY, MOOTOOLS AND PROTOTYPE JS FRAMEWORKS
• Knowledge of content management systems such as WordPress, Joomla or Drupal
• Able to slice layered graphics into robust, light-weight web pages
• Understanding of interaction and usability of traditional websites, internet applications & mobile apps
Click to expand...

Only one of those skills mentioned above is a backend skill. (Hint: its not PHP, its not HTML, its not XHTML, its not CSS, its not wordpress or joomla, and not jquery. and not web pages.) EDIT: Okay counting XML there are potentially 2 skills that are not strictly front end. But I wouldnt call XML a backend skill either, its more of an intermediary usually)

The other thing about the advert is that the salary is listed as negotiable. These are usually the ads I dont respond to. They will probably ask what you currently earn - your offer will then be current salary +10%, not your actual market rate.

And this one:

Minimum Requirements
- Good knowledge of HTML, CSS
- Good understanding of the workings of the internet (DNS, FTP, Mail, Apache, HTTP)

Ideal requirements
- Software Development Diploma
- Experience with the open-source web development LAMP stack (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP)
- Javascript
- Knowledge of PHP beneficial
- Knowledge of Ruby on Rails beneficial, but not required.
Click to expand...

This is a frikken intern! You know what I would expect of an intern? A good attitude, willingness to work and learn, and basic programming knowledge.

The Intern advert, admittedly, is much better than the "back end developer" advert, which is atrocious.

I thought about emailing the poster of the back end developer to tell him to change his advert's title and put a salary figure up, but I know it would be a waste of time.

Anyone else care to share funny and/or otherwise terrible adverts?
 
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I absolutely agree! They expect interns to be as experienced as intermediate and seniors. Crazy. Every job I search for is basically the same thing.
 
i know what you mean . somehow i support what cosatu wants to do and get rid of these labour brokers , or atleast just regulate them , being a junior myself +- 16 months exp in development.

And if you have no experience and didn't study at a major university you cant get into things like .Net/C# because junior roles require 2 years exp according to these people. so where do you start? Its a pity , then they complain about skills shortage
 
I have to agree, back in the day I normally checked these out

At the bottom of the skills set they should ad

Make coffee
Answer the phone

Blah blah

They expect the world and pay peanuts

I try to keep job adverts straight to the point the problem is these recruitment agencies have no idea what any development language is and they normally make up ads out of nothing so I blame both the employer as well as the agency
 
Yup. had lots of experience with these recruiting agents. They literally find any advert about IT , add every single line in the advert as a requirement and then say they are only willing to pay up to R25K.

The number of recruiting agents that I have met , that have absolutely no idea what I am about, what I can do, what my skills mean. Its pathetic. When I tried to interview a few years ago for a Java position, I wasn't even asked to prove my skills, not even so much as a "can you do what you say" I'm pretty sure if THAT was the first thing that a recruiting agent asked, "Please provide a link to demonstrate you software development skills" , they would weed out about 80% of the people that apply for positions.
 
ozziej said:
they would weed out about 80% of the people that apply for positions.
Click to expand...

Including a lot of skilled developers. Many companies have systems that do not have public web-sites. Especially in Gauteng where a lot of companies have complex business that needs software. Unless you are an employee, there is no way you get to see the system.

Recruiters have asked me for source code of such systems, needless to say I declined and cancelled the interview. Nothing says complete lack of ethics like trying to ask for source code. WTF...
 
Recruitment agency is the same as the direct marketing guys.

Direct marketing: It is not about the product they sell it is about recruiting more people to pay membership fees.
Recruitment agency: not about any skill set, it is about filling the position with anything they can find.
 
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hedgehog said:
Call me thick, but explain to me why PHP is not a backend skill ?
Click to expand...

PHP is used for your presenter. Using it as a back-end system would make 0 sense.

If you don't have a back-end system, eg. your controller connects directly to your DB or you have a DAO used in your controller then you don't really have a back-end system. Maybe you have an extra layer between the controller and your model but in reality it is all running in the same "servlet" (or whatever PHP calls it).

Back-end implies -> application that communicates with a front-end presenter with web-services (WSDL, REST, whatever), EJBs, etc.
 
Gnome said:
PHP is used for your presenter. Using it as a back-end system would make 0 sense.

If you don't have a back-end system, eg. your controller connects directly to your DB or you have a DAO used in your controller then you don't really have a back-end system. Maybe you have an extra layer between the controller and your model but in reality it is all running in the same "servlet" (or whatever PHP calls it).

Back-end implies -> application that communicates with a front-end presenter with web-services (WSDL, REST, whatever), EJBs, etc.
Click to expand...

SOAP and PHP for backend, PHP for Front End. I would say that PHP pretty much does both
 
Fair enough, PHP could be used for the backend, but in this context, its highly unlikely that that is what they meant.

LEE COLIN said:
i know what you mean . somehow i support what cosatu wants to do and get rid of these labour brokers , or atleast just regulate them , being a junior myself +- 16 months exp in development.

And if you have no experience and didn't study at a major university you cant get into things like .Net/C# because junior roles require 2 years exp according to these people. so where do you start? Its a pity , then they complain about skills shortage
Click to expand...

They arent really labour brokers though. What they are is middlemen. You have to ask yourself, what value do they add to their clients (the companies)? I dont think they add much. Most of them are so incompetent they either discourage good developers, or filter them out because they dont conform to certain silly requirements. Never mind they dont understand those requirements. The problem is the massive knowledge gap that exists. Job candidates know their stuff, and the people hiring know their stuff, but the recruiters know nothing. Hence the problem.

Yeah thats another thing. I find it so ironic that companies moan about a lack of skilled developers, then refuse to hire junior devs or graduates. Where exactly do you expect these skilled senior devs to come from? Just appear out of thin air? And they dont get it either. They will moan about the risk that one takes with a junior developer, because he might leave immediately after becoming skilled up. He will only leave after becoming skilled up if you dont adjust his pay and treat him badly, which, surprise surprise, is what normally happens.

Gnome said:
Including a lot of skilled developers. Many companies have systems that do not have public web-sites. Especially in Gauteng where a lot of companies have complex business that needs software. Unless you are an employee, there is no way you get to see the system.

Recruiters have asked me for source code of such systems, needless to say I declined and cancelled the interview. Nothing says complete lack of ethics like trying to ask for source code. WTF...
Click to expand...

They just dont understand. I think I've been asked for such code once, I said I'd put together a demo rather. I cant even remember what job that was for now.
 
ozziej said:
Yup. had lots of experience with these recruiting agents. They literally find any advert about IT , add every single line in the advert as a requirement and then say they are only willing to pay up to R25K.

The number of recruiting agents that I have met , that have absolutely no idea what I am about, what I can do, what my skills mean. Its pathetic. When I tried to interview a few years ago for a Java position, I wasn't even asked to prove my skills, not even so much as a "can you do what you say" I'm pretty sure if THAT was the first thing that a recruiting agent asked, "Please provide a link to demonstrate you software development skills" , they would weed out about 80% of the people that apply for positions.
Click to expand...
+1 I have good java skill , good logic thinking and problem solving but I don't find job. Sad
 
some ads seem like the copy and pasted the stuff. then you get the idiots that send you for an interview for something that's not even on your cv.
 
Possible business idea to come from this - a recruitment site for programmers by programmers?
 
There are so many recruiters out of there, the best of which are actually ex programmers. Very competitive market I think.
 
Considering they get 20-30% of your yearly CTC for recruiting you, it is heavily competitive. Wouldn't do it even if it doubled my income.
 
when i graduated last year I used a recruiter to get my current job, but I don't think I will ever use recruiters again - they really are incompetent. My boyfriend also graduated last year and he used the same recruiter as me and he explicitly said he wants to do C#/.net, she literally forced him to do a java technical test, she just wouldn't take no for an answer. And I hated all the questions she asked afterwards, it felt like an interrogation. She would ask me how it went and I would tell her exactly what happened and then she would ask exactly what i just answered all over again, i ended up repeating myself over and over.
 
Roxi_B4b3 said:
when i graduated last year I used a recruiter to get my current job, but I don't think I will ever use recruiters again - they really are incompetent. My boyfriend also graduated last year and he used the same recruiter as me and he explicitly said he wants to do C#/.net, she literally forced him to do a java technical test, she just wouldn't take no for an answer. And I hated all the questions she asked afterwards, it felt like an interrogation. She would ask me how it went and I would tell her exactly what happened and then she would ask exactly what i just answered all over again, i ended up repeating myself over and over.
Click to expand...

Why did your BF put up with that? There are LOADS of recruiters out there, I would have told whoever that was to get stuffed.

If you can put together a for loop, you can get a job. There is a huge shortage of skills. Never let recruiters bully you into anything.
 
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