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Hi HN. We were tired of recruiters so we built this because it was something we wish existed. We had "satisfying" jobs and liked who we worked with but we were not naive and knew there could be a better job out there. Either building a product more aligned with our personal interests, making more doing something we enjoyed even more, or work with a team that challenged us further. It was too time consuming to actively look for jobs and the thought of dealing with incompetent recruiters turned us off so we built Pitchbox. We link to think of it as a talent agency for developers so only personally relevant jobs are pitched to you... think of it as "Here's what I'm looking for, if you can provide it then let's talk"

Is this something that you want?

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/s/link to think/like to think

What's your experience or background with finding jobs for other people? What you have is an idealistic approach to recruiting, which is great, but may not that easy to pull off, if possible at all. There are not just spammy recruiters, but also b/s applicants either with bloated self assessment, unrealistic expectations or just simply unpleasant and unprofessional people to deal with. What's your plan for handling such people? After all, the pool of sensible skilled developers with honest resumes and reasonable expectations is very limited. If you ever put a developer job positing out there, you probably saw that 95% of all inbound applications are worthy only of going straight to the shredder.

(edit) Not to put you down by any means. I would love to see this work, I'm just having trouble seeing how it would.

Good work! However, there is no mention of telecommuting/remote positions. Even as a US worker, I prefer remote work, and it baffles me that us "internet folk" are not working hard to fight the industrial-era assumption that software has to be written in a central office.

> it baffles me that us "internet folk" are not working hard to fight the industrial-era assumption that software has to be written in a central office

Have you considered that some of us LIKE working in an office?

.. Especially some of us who have children.

Of course, some people like working in offices; that was never disputed. However, there are an increasing number of organizations which have caught on that offices are not "software factories", but rather, an optional luxury.

I just think that we're not fighting for it because not that many of us really care.

Not that I would be opposed to the option of course.

Maybe it seems like not many care because when someone mentions including the option they are shouted down like they're saying all workers should WFH.

Some people like to work in the office, other want to work at home. In both cases it would be nice to have a checkbox to indicate our preference.

-1 for the strawman argument. The OP didn't dispute that some of us like the office. They only pointed out that some (others) of us don't like the office, and that the site didn't take this into account.

Yes, several of the teams we are hiring for have 100% telecommute roles if you are able to legally work for a US based company. Just let us know in the Goals of this when signing up.

If you can work from outside of the US (technically), what sort of requirements for working legally for a US based company are? As far as I understand, you can just send them an invoice as a contractor and be happy, no?

Surely (almost) anyone in the world can legally work for a US based company if they are offshore (maybe not Cubans).

I also found it odd at first that "remote" wasn't one of checkboxes in Step 2, but figured it was something I would type in a subsequent free-text box.

Well, given that the Agile cult demands colocation in a single office along with all sorts of other one size fits all cargo cultisms, what do you expect?

In my case, I prefer to not get in the way of my enemy while he's making mistakes.

Yep. Sure solves a huge problem, in a very nice, subtle way. Thank you for fixing this! :) Co-incidentally, someone today posted a link about how LinkedIn's recruiter spam is killing the quality of the product[1]. I think your timing is just perfect :)

EDIT: And your site is amazingly simple yet elegant! Keep it up guys :)

[1]http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5021744

How much does it cost? I assume this is going to be fee-based on the employer side? I'd feel more comfortable participating if the nature of the transaction were more transparent.

We'll be creating a FAQ from this HN discussion. We intend to be very transparent.

It is free for the developer. Even though it is different, we found it easiest when employers pay us similar to how they pay contingency recruiters, placement fees. Typically recruiters charge 25-35% of your first year salary, we charge a flat 25K fee to the employer that hires you. We also have a unique offering for startups where they can amortize the payments over 12 months. This pricing structure means more interesting companies can afford to be on our platform and therefore more interesting opportunities for developers.

Wow, that's pretty steep. Maybe that's just a west coast thing. Where I live (Ohio) that's 50% of the salary of a developer with 5 years of experience. I signed up for your service but... that seems like a good chunk of change I'd prefer to have in my pocket :)

Wow, that's pretty steep. Maybe that's just a west coast thing.

I don't think most developers realize how much recruiters are getting paid for placements. 25% is pretty standard across US, we're less then that with our flat rate.

Where I live (Ohio) that's 50% of the salary of a developer with 5 years of experience.

This is why we built this product - assuming you are even remotely decent at programming and write code in modern languages, a dev with 5 years of exp can easily be making more then 80K+.

We have several companies right now that are hiring and paying more then that for roles where the developer can telecommute 100% from anywhere in the country. Not only do they pay well but they have really awesome teams.

25% is pretty standard across US, we're less then that with our flat rate.

Fair comment however your flat fee equates to 25% of a $100k role. It doesn't become a viable economic alternative for employers until you reach the $150k mark. If your primary target is CTO level roles then great, otherwise your fee is ridiculous.

We haven't had any companies complain about our pricing. But oure real focus is on making a better experience.

I think you might be underestimating the level of pay for developers in a lot of the "big" areas. (SF, Silicon Valley, NYC) I've personally heard of friends (fresh college grads) getting offers anywhere from $70k to $150k.

Fresh college grads getting $150k? I find that incredibly hard to believe.

As a fresh college grad from a non-top tier school in Silicon Valley, many of my friends are making ~$100K/year right out of school. I'm sure people from top tier schools going to Google and Facebook can make double that.

> a dev with 5 years of exp can easily be making more then 80K+.

Are you assuming west-coast? Generally speaking, "easily" sounds like a stretch to me.

Have you considered the possibility that charging a flat fee instead of a percentage of annual salary makes your service inappropriate for most areas outside of silicon valley or NYC?

A recruiter who specializes and limits their scope sounds great to me.

I agree that charging a % would be better for example for companies hiring not in US,

Yeah, I go to school in Ohio and am going to be working on the west coast. Salaries on the west coast are >2x (close to 3x) what I would have made in Ohio (Cleveland).

I haven't seen anybody raise the point about the cost of living. The salaries are more because the cost of living is higher. With 50k you can afford a mortgage for a nice house in the midwest, but in NYC the equivalent monthly income will qualify you for a tiny studio or 1 BR apt.

What's payable in case when a hired candidate doesn't work out (doesn't make it through a 1-3 month probation period)?

As someone who is hiring, my problem is to also find developers who are not actively looking. Sometimes those are the best because they are talented but have an inertia to move anywhere and may not even be aware of interesting challenges in other areas that their skills are applicable to, such as Healthcare etc.

Also for a 80K salary, 25K is just too steep, given that we do not know how your screening process works.

developers who are not actively looking...are the best because they are talented but have an inertia to move anywhere and may not even be aware of interesting challenges in other areas that their skills are applicable to

Exactly. We couldn't agree more and that seems to be the majority of Pitchbox members. It's more of passive tool..."here are some things I'm looking for, don't contact me until you find it, in the meantime I'll enjoy what I'm currently working on."

Being contingency based, there is no cost to anyone until everyone is happy.

I'd definitely sign up if I was looking.

Kudos particularly on your landing page design. Very clean and easy to parse mentally. The long-form is beautifully done.

Yes, very! What about amending our profiles? I just signed up and have a github profile, but not a resume that's particularly up to date. Is there some way I can add it if I brought it up to date?

Yes. If you just signed up, you'll get an initial email package soon. We're full service though...so you can email us anytime with questions or updates, like a new resume, at support@trypitchbox.com and we'll do the updating for you. Whichever is easiest.

Very cool. I'll look forward to the email!

YES ! Beside the fact that ask for uploading a resume is not a good move. Resume can be very quickly outdated, why not asking to link a linkedin account instead ?

+1 i only update my resume when im planning to change position, since this tool is not to actively look for jobs i would care less to keep a resume updated

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