A Message from the CEO of Mozilla: You are overqualified | Hacker News Reader

A Message from the CEO of Mozilla: You are overqualified

damon.sicore.com

44 pointsfabrice_d22 comments

From the previous post on his blog [1]:

> Since I’m not rich, and I’ve never achieved any significant financial success , I’m living hand to mouth with my family of six. Even then, I knew I couldn’t afford a six month job loss. Also, I didn’t want to hurt WMF. I didn’t want a scandal. So, I just signed. I decided that we’d make the best of things and I’d just get another job as quickly as possible and try to put this behind us. I asked for four months and they agreed immediately. It took me five months to find another job when I lost it before, so I thought I could pull it off. I was wrong.

> It’s been almost three years now. By working at WMF, it feels as if I destroyed my career as a VP of Engineering anywhere.

That's incredibly sad. It seems like he's burned too many bridges, despite a brilliant career and being highly qualified. Corporate undertone aside, his friend at Mozilla offered genuine help, and his response is public shaming. This doesn't look healthy. Maybe all he needs is a place where he can focus on engineering without any politics involved. Hoping someone will be able to step in to help.

[1] https://damon.sicore.com/support-the-people-of-wikipedia/

"..his friend at Mozilla offered genuine help, and his response is public shaming"

I really can't get over this. Who acts this way?

Someone who has been put through the wringer.

You have been a Director and above for 18 years now. You should know that it's a dog-eat-dog world out there for these roles. Your qualifications matter much less than your connections/alliances.

I think going public is not a wise move, as I have a feeling it will make more damage to your public image than that of Mozilla or its CEO

> rejecting my application because I have too much experience is illegal

Is that true? Being overqualified has always been a thing, since companies are afraid you'll leave too quickly. I thought it was only illegal to discriminate on age, not experience.

This probably didn't help: https://damon.sicore.com/declaration.pdf

I'd imagine Mozilla is pretty gunshy about hiring people with opinions these days.

Why is this person playing the victim here? Too bad if his fragile ego couldn't handle rejection, like that millions of others face everyday with grace. Giant ego, couldn't sell himself on what was useful or relevant, and instead sold himself on how "great" he was, no thanks.

And, he comes across to me like an individual who spends an inordinate amount of time around the water-cooler than working. Gossip behavior creates and spreads drama that's so unnecessary, it undermines the morale of everyone.

Two big signals of someone not worth hiring, even for free, because they signal being a massive liability. I consider this Mozilla un/intentionally dodging an exploding bullet.

This is a private spat spilling into a public spat innuendo. It should have been published, shouldn't have been posted here, and should have been upvoted, and should be flagged away.

i think your final point is the most crucial. If you know someone it is just easier. I recently sent a few job applications, but for one company I went through a contact. Within a week, i got an interview with the CTO, without even having a role specified. The other applications? No response or not even prompted for an interview.

He used to work previously at Mozilla as VP of engineering. He happens to know many people there already including the CEO However he seems to want to apply for a lower level position but they are rejecting him because they feel he is overqualified.

I've been facing this issue lately. Same company rejected my application twice. Knew someone from inside, got an interview in 1 day.

Dude has a personality problem if you ask me. The reason he was rejected as overqualified is that there's no way he'd happily work as a junior member of staff. He'd just cause massive amounts of friction.

> I have a family to support. I can't let them starve

This is a bit over the top. Ppl who are not senior tech professionals manage to feed their family.

He doesn't have a fulltime job. He applied to Mozilla to get a fulltime job. They rejected him even though they knew his reputation and that he is in desperate need to get one to avoid eviction and starving to death because his savings account ran out of money (which, given his post, will probably be soon-ish).

Still over the top?

How is that the company's fault?

Wendy's would probably hire anyone. Just saying that even flipping burgers is better than ranting on the internet wrt feeding your family.

This is a false argument. Wendy's will not hire a SysAdmin who is out of work and needs to feed his family.

Why? They want someone who is going to stay longer than 6 weeks (or 6 months).

Stop using this false argument.

Turnover at fast-food places is high, and very seasonal; high-school kids who have their first job.

My point was that working anywhere, even one that is on the level of 'my first job,' is better than ranting on the internet.

Huh? People from well paid positions often end up in a strange situation and having more trouble navigating welfare options they qualify for. They also aren't first picks for fields that don't require their skill set.

What is Gary doing in Mozilla?

please change the title to lowercase, thanks.

Done now. It's on my list to write software to catch these.

(Submitted title was "A MESSAGE FROM THE CEO OF MOZILLA: YOU ARE OVERQUALIFIED".)

From his blog, this guy sounds like he has a major lack of self-awareness, and sounds like he'd be a major pain to work with.

The fact that he airs out his drama & disagreements publicly shows a major lack of professionalism.

The over "qualified" & the offer to work w/ a career coach sounds like they didn't want to have a direct conversation with him.

I wish him luck, but my guess is he's got a long journey of self-reflection before he gets anywhere.

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