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Comment by cornholio | Hacker News Reader

> We don't want job applications from people who are looking for a job. We're looking for people who actually want to do work

> We're not offering you a job. We offer you the opportunity

This gem right here sums up what an employers market means. Every employer thinks they are special and wants an employee who's entire life's journey was only a preparation for the singular great moment of meeting you and building your vision, all for the a great compensation package of 65k/year and dental.

But guess what: you are not special, you are just a workplace and you compete in the marketplace for talent just like everybody else. For economic reasons that have nothing to do with you, you have more negotiating power for a limited time. That is all.

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> But guess what: you are not special, you are just a workplace and you compete in the marketplace for talent just like everybody else. For economic reasons that have nothing to do with you, you have more negotiating power for a limited time. That is all.

I think it’s perfectly legitimate to not want to hire people with this attitude. Just a few people with this attitude can completely ruin an early stage company.

And the same goes in the other direction: I don’t want to work for anybody who sees me as a commodity they’ve bought in a market. I’m sorry, but I am special: there is only one of me on this planet.

How did you infer the "early stage company" thing? That's an assumption.

It's worst for early stage, but applies to all companies except one-man-shows.

I believe in this entire thread the attitude of "just do your job well and exceed expectations a few times a year" is very under-represented. And I've met many employers who have it.

That's a fair retort, especially on HN. But I hope we agree an early stage startup is a very very particular organization that is looking for partners, not employees, because the efforts of each has a compounding impact on the capital gains of all.

So while it might be true for GP's company, it's not true for the vast number of available jobs. If you are not in the cap table (or have only unfavorable terms), then by definition you are something the company has bought on the market and that's exactly how the company is thinking about you - else the ownership situation would reflect it. It's a business, not a social club, you either own the capital or you are the capital. Expecting anything else in exchange for you unique snowflakiness is self-delusional and the road to abject bitterness, as many ex a googler and twitterer found out.

> I’m sorry, but I am special: there is only one of me on this planet.

There may be only one person exactly like you, although with 9 billion people it remains to be proven. But you sure are replaceable by many others with approximately the same set of skills.

Sure. And my general attitude is that if my employer can replace me then they should, so I can do something more productive (where I will be harder to replace). And to state the obvious: when you run your work life like this for 20 years you get pretty hard to replace.

The graveyard is full of the previously irreplaceable.

"...20 years"

Ohh sorry, we can't hire you. It's a "culture fit" issue. (We aren't allowed to say it's an age filter! It's "culture"- we aren't ageist!)

The grave yards are full of irreplaceable people.

Look: It’s not that we disagree about how the world works, it’s that we give it a different emotional coloring. Yours sounds bitter and resentful to me.

If the hiring pool for this job is global, I think it's entirely reasonable to expect to hear from people that are uniquely suited to the role.

And it goes both ways. These days I pick a job based on whether the work is going to help me learn what I need to make progress on my side projects. If I was searching locally that would be an entirely unreasonable filter, but so far it's been win-win.

You are indirectly making a great case for requiring that applicants consider the company more that "just a job". If my coworkers ranted like that, I'd not have fun at my work and you'd be dragging morale down.

I spend 8-10 hours a day at my job. That's far more than with any of my friends and typically more than even with my spouse in the average week. My coworkers, at least a significant fraction, better be amazing. If somebody comes and basically says, dude, it's just a job, leave me alone, I leave them to their misery. If I am forced to work with them any significant amount of time, I quit an go work somewhere else where I can build meaningful connections with people around me. Cause let's face it, co-workers are a friends substitute in this day and age.

> dude, it's just a job, leave me alone, I leave them to their misery.

If you really believed what you were saying you wouldn’t have to rationalize it to yourself by claiming that people who don’t think like you must be miserable.

> Cause let's face it, co-workers are a friends substitute in this day and age.

That’s on you. If you’re using coworkers as a friends substitute it’s not surprising you get people who want you to leave them alone.

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