Ask HN: Worked for a failed startup, how to justify it existed in the past? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Worked for a failed startup, how to justify it existed in the past?

6 pointsTechasura8 comments

I have worked for many startups. One of the startups i worked for doesn't exist at all now. Being the internet startup, only proof that it ever existed was domain names and the application it hosted. Now that the domain name has a different owner and it has become a personal blog after it shut down[The owner sold the domain]. If you are applying for a BIG company in the future, obviously the recruiter would take a look at the company's profile of each every company i have mentioned in my resume. This would obviously hit the developers career very badly. What would a developer usually do in this weird situation?

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This Hacker News thread will likely be the most human thought ever expended on this portion of your resume, by a factor of lots. You're overestimating how much the recruiter cares about individual line items in your work history. (Heck, many of them will not even bother to check a single one of your references.)

In the highly unlikely event that it comes up in the interview, you simply say "<What I did and why this demonstrates my ability to increase your company's revenue or reduce its costs> The firm subsequently went out of business."

Many, many people in our industry have resume line items from organizations which are no longer going concerns. One would hope your recruiter has adjusted to this reality. If not, I might file that under "Dodged a bullet."

Maybe I'm wrong, but I think you're over-thinking the problem this will cause you. It's understood that most startups end up dying. Additionally, you have other companies listed on your resume, so I'm not sure what there is to worry about.

If you're concerned, I might add a note on your resume that this startup formally ceased operations on X date.

How will that help, do i know you?

"I might add..." is a colloquialism; it's something that is said less formally. He meant "you should add..." (or "I might add if I were in your place".) It's a way of saying the same thing, but for non-native speakers it is a bit unusual.

I don't think anyone will care. Most recruiters won't check out every company you ever worked for. Even if they did fail, so what? They're not all going to be successful.

If those recruiters do have a problem with it, they'll ask you about it, they won't just assume you are lying and throw your resume in the garbage. I'm sure you can dig up an old W-2 from your taxes or something (in the US) to prove you did work there.

This is how you deal with it.

whatever.com (1 year)

This one failed, this is what I learned from that.

1) something

2) something else

This isn't a real problem, don't worry about it.

No references, coworkers etc on LinkedIn? Press articles?

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