Refer an Engineer - Get $20K + Your Genome Sequenced | Hacker News Reader

Refer an Engineer - Get $20K + Your Genome Sequenced

dnanexus.com

34 pointsbproper18 comments

Am I correct in assuming that DNANexus does not bring anything new to the table in regards to full genome sequencing? It seems they are just offering better storage/analysis via cloud computing.

Yes, they are not a sequencing company, they are a post-sequencing analysis/storage company.

The alignment problem and downstream work is at least as hard as sequencing. I worked on a sequencer / aligner software package.

I see that prize just increasing the number of bad referrals that they receive.

It will increase all referrals... Especially now that engineers know that they are serious about hiring someone good. Maybe before they were on the wall and didn't know if the company valued employees, or how much... But now they have a number. It's worth $20k+ to them just to FIND a good employee.

Can you imagine the job security that brings? If they get rid of you, it's going to cost them another $20k just to get started! They aren't going to fire you on a whim, that's for sure.

A good engineer doesn't have to worry about job security.

Is anyone else much more excited about the DNA sequencing than the money? =\ As a person with 4 Tesla MRI images blown up into posters on my wall, I'd love to have my DNA sequenced.

I know 23andMe provides genotyping for relatively cheap, but that's a long way off from full genome sequencing. We still need to develop better browsers to parse and display the data meaningfully.

Wow, this is bound to backfire. Naively you'd think that this would be a win-win-win situation for company, employee and referrer alike. But emotional monkey-brain psychology intervenes. Frankly the idea of a friend of mine getting that kind of scratch for referring me to a job would put a bad taste in my mouth and poison the friendship. For whatever reason, if he were already working there and the company had an internal referral program (as many companies do), I'd feel fine about the arrangement, maybe because I'd assume his motivation in that case would not be mercenary.

One good thing about this offer is that it's an attention grabber and signals that they're willing to pay a very large multiple of that $20,000 to the prospective employee as wages. But it also signals a certain level of desperation and that they don't have enough hot shot, well connected software engineers on staff to attract others in adequate numbers, with all that implies about culture.

Or maybe it signals they're too stingy to pay a good professional recruiter's fee. Or that they despise that peculiar semi-sentient, parasitic life form as much as I do. :)

I think you should re-examine. Referrals for jobs (and many other things) only work if both parties are on-board. So he can't do it underhandedly.

He has provided a service for them (your name) and you (their name) and gets some kickback in return. He would have done it for your for free, because you're a friend, but the company is another matter.

His taking the money doesn't in any way alter your friendship. His finding you a good job should be a bonus for the relationship.

Do you think that your friendship is sullied by him taking the money? If someone offered me money to help one of my friends, I'd take it in every circumstance I can think of. There's just no downside.

Would your friends not split any referral fee they got with you? I thought that was standard practice.

The referral fee here is on the very high side of engineer referrals, but mid-high 4 figures aren't unusual at all. $8k is also a big deal. Would that poison your friendship?

Meanwhile, "too stingy" to pay a recruiter? How about, too savvy? Recruiters suck. I would be marginally more likely to want to work for a company that went out of their way to avoid recruiters.

Frankly the idea of a friend of mine getting that kind of scratch for referring me to a job would put a bad taste in my mouth and poison the friendship.

Why? I'd really be happy for them. I'd require them to take me out to dinner, but I'd be happy about it.

If your friend referred someone else to this job that you didn't know, would that be better? What if you would have liked to have been referred to this job (learning about it post mortem), but your friend referred someone else instead, would that be better?

>Frankly the idea of a friend of mine getting that kind of scratch for referring me to a job would put a bad taste in my mouth and poison the friendship.

I guess you need to do some introspection and (re)examine your friendships.

I think the most disruptive company in this space is Halcyon Molecular -- ex-PayPal guys, connected to Thiel/Founder's Fund, and working on making sequencing as cheap as other blood tests. (I know a few great computer people who have gone there; I don't really know the wet-side people.)

I wonder how close they are, they have been running for a while now. Apparently it takes several hours to read 2000 bases.

I will gladly split the 20k 50-50 in case anyone here is interested in joining dnanexus. Will the real engineers please stand up?

Could you maybe talk a little more about what the company is doing, either here for via my email?

Thanks

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