Ask HN: Who's hiring non-developer/designer positions? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Who's hiring non-developer/designer positions?

16 pointstalbina30 comments

There's always some people like me who love technology and work at start-ups, but have no programming or design skills.

thanks

Obviously, at a tech startup, the primary street cred comes from being able to do something technical. This doesn't necessarily mean coding or sysadminning, but it DOES mean that you have to produce something in order to even get any credibility.

My biggest issue with non-technical people is so much of what they do doesn't produce deliverables. Sales/marketing? Might produce some brochures. Sure produces money. But they don't actually build anything, making it hard for my brain to properly evaluate their skills.

So if you're a non-technical person, what will you produce that can be evaluated? Soft deliverables, such as reports, sales figures, etc., are more difficult for a technical person to evaluate -- so we tend to discount them (rightly, or wrongly) because the underlying knowledge of "how much talent / time / effort did this require" isn't inherent in the work.

Sure you can. It's called revenue dollars. Most positions, whether we like it or not, can be evaluated on a quantitative basis.

Sales/marketing ---> brochures? How about sales/marketing ---> money.

That's your problem that you tend to discount sales reports.

Sure you can. It's called revenue dollars. Most positions, whether we like it or not, can be evaluated on a quantitative basis.

To who, exactly, do you ascribe those revenue dollars?

The UX designer that came up with the feature the critical customer wanted?

The developers who collaborated and created it?

The QA team that made sure it actually works?

The sales person that sold what was there?

The salesperson's value isn't particularly clear in this equation. Could we replace them with another sales person? What did they bring to the table that was actually unique to them and not easily replaced? Would we have made the sale anyway?

It's an incredible relative, subjective judgement to have to make.

All sales are the result of sales people, just ask a sales person, they'll tell you.

I suggest you look at internships. Most startups don't really have the room for someone whose skills aren't among the first steps towards revenue (sales guys physically can't do anything that directly produces revenue until the product is done regardless of how you split up importance etc).

A UX guy doing untrained sales is a lot more valuable in the beginning than a sales guy doing untrained UX (or nothing). The idea that you'd even have one single responsibility is kind of missing the point. Startups that are successful tend to be people who are really knowledgeable and at the top of the game in their field, and on top of that bring in other outside skills (like sales) to the table. Bridging the gap between two industries etc.

Reddit is not really a startup anymore, I think maybe you are thinking of "tech companies" in general, who may have more slack and so the ability to hire full time sales people (or whatever it is you are looking for).

What ARE you looking for if not programming/design in a startup? How would you help lead the company towards a process that produces revenue/profit?

Sure, sales and marketing people are valuable, but your not either, so why bring it up?

So, if you aren't making the product, and you aren't selling the product, maybe you can do support? You've made it clear that's your strong point, so you can be a customer service rep.

I don't disagree that there are ways of doing it.

I just think the prevailing attitude of (founder level) engineers and coders is that you're not really building anything. It's the typical dismissal that non-tech people get from tech people.

FWIW, I'm definitely a tech person, and even though I'm aware of this bias, I still suffer from it.

Further, there's the problem of assignment of responsibility/credit to the sales person that's brought up in other threads.

In my company, the single most useful non-tech, non-sales/marketing person would be a company mom. Laundry, grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning. Every hour I spend doing that (which I hate) prevents me from working on company stuff.

Seek management jobs... Har. In order to work at a tech company, you should be as knowledgeable about tech as possible, otherwise you'll end up being another out of touch employee who can't pull their own weight in a desk job. If you have writing skills, you can seek employment as a tech writer or in administration.

[1] Reddit is run by four developers, who are not out of touch, who can't make enough revenue despite their enormous size.

[2] Management jobs =/= non-developer jobs.

[3] What do you mean knowledgeable about tech as possible? Code, trends, ideas...?

[4] How can an out of touch employee not pull their own weight in a desk job? Nick Denton, Heather Harde, Eric Hippeau..guess all of these "can't pull their own weight in a desk job"

[1] Reddit is run by four developers, who are not out of touch, who can't make enough revenue despite their enormous size.

Reddit is owned by Conde Nast. They don't have business people?

" Whenever this topic comes up on the site, someone always posts a comment about how reddit is owned by Conde Nast, a billion-dollar corporation like Time Warner or Cobra, and how if they wanted to they could hire a thousand engineers and purchase a million dollars worth of heavy iron. But here's the thing: corporations aren't run like charities. They keep separate budgets for each business line, and usually allocate resources proportionate to revenue. And reddit's revenue isn't great. "

http://blog.reddit.com/

That quote has absolutely nothing to do with anything we were just discussing.

Reddit's revenue isn't great, and company's maintain distinct budgets for different properties, but exactly what does that actually have to do with Conde Nast having business people that should be paying attention to this?

Yes, but that doesn't mean "non-developer" is sufficient to come up with working business models. You need to have and demonstrate some kind of useful and relevant skillset.

From the jobs page: Justin.tv is looking for a Head of Communications - http://www.justin.tv/jobs#communications

[I don't work there, just remembered seeing it on the front-page a couple of days ago]

Do you have some marketable skill? That's what you need to focus on. Just being enthusiastic is usually not enough.

Are you good at sales? Do you have demonstrated ability as a product manager? Or maybe a background in technical writing? Etc.

As a product manager I face this dilemma as well. I work on side projects but I'm not a great coder and not a great designer.

The following areas have helped me become more 'active' in the early development process:

-Learn an analytics engine (I like Google Analytics) like the back of your hand. Help engineers build great testing tools that work well w/ your analytics engine, then segment + comb the data for patterns that shape the direction of the company. (see: http://www.kaushik.net/avinash/ and buy "Web Analytics 2.0" from Amazon for more info)

-Become very familiar with A/B split testing and other forms of automated online testing. Try to gain an understanding of adwords as well so you can send targetted users to your offerings and help developers make informed decisions about whether or not the product will have interested users that are cheap to acquire off the bat. (see: http://visualwebsiteoptimizer.com/split-testing-blog/ for expertise/more info)

-Buy Silverback (http://silverbackapp.com/) and conduct user tests CONSTANTLY as in every day. Continously analyze the product, summarize user input, and pass that info off to development.

-Buy Balsamiq Mockups (http://www.balsamiq.com/products/mockups) and start prototyping pages with improvements or new features for existing apps. This can filter into User Experience/Information Architecture and I find that it's the best way for a 'product manager' to bridge the gap between design and development.

Sorry I know that these won't get you hired right away, but they will give you the skillsets to work at a small (5-10 person) startup that is hiring people who can 'contribute.'

Can you contact me at the address in my profile? Sorry to pollute the thread, but you don't have any contact info in your profile :(

I'm in a similar situation, and would love to break into the product management area.

Sorry I didn't realize the e-mail field didn't show up publicly! I'll send you a quick note and updated my profile to include my personal e-mail going forward :)

What about technical support and customer service? Are you willing to do that? You could then get into customer development or something like that.

But I can't answer your question as to who is looking.

I launched startupshiring.com a week or two ago. It show cases positions at startups that are programming and non programming oriented. Take a look. Love to hear your feedback as well.

Really nice! I'm looking to possibly relocate in the next year, so this will be helpful in determining any jobs that might exist in other cities.

I really like your site. I was on it for quite awhile the other week and it felt like a nice change from other boards.

I'm a marketing/technical writer, and I've been wondering this too. A lot of startups do the writing themselves, it seems, and it can suffer as a result.

Do people at startups ask their buddies for recommendations? I haven't seen many posts on Craigslist from startups, and nothing on job search sites like Monster.com.

I currently work with a guy who is a master of monetization - and he's completely tech-braindead. Startups chase him down with countless lucrative hiring offers every day.

You get good at monetization and you become worth more than your weight in gold.

http://www.builditwith.me/

Very cool, did you make that? Is it Sproutcore or Cappuccino?

No, author is http://www.drewwilson.com/, it's Titan.

Thanks.

So what do you do, exactly?

We've talked about contracting a professional writer to help get our blog and website into shape, ride us to blog about what we're doing, and help edit what we do write.

I'm not a "professional" writer, but I do write fairly often, and am working on my own startup. I am looking for some part-time work sort of along the lines you are mentioning.

What's your site/blog? You can check out my writing at http://aflanagan.com and http://blog.lenguajero.com

Contact me if you want to talk more.

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