gumptionary

vor 2 Jahrendiscuss

This is a totally fair point. The incongruity arises for me in that if I said in a job interview process that I'd be continuing to hold another position while adding this one, I'd get laughed out of the room. If it's critical that rank and file guys don't have divided time or loyalties, why is the standard different for the single person most responsible for success or failure of the company?

gumptionary

vor 2 Jahrendiscuss

Tony Aquila is the CEO of both companies - Canoo and Aquila Family Ventures. I'll never understand why it's okay for CEOs to have multiple concurrent jobs, while one of the biggest fervors of the pandemic was when employees were found to have... multiple concurrent jobs.

gumptionary

vor 2 Jahrendiscuss

Interesting. Focus on the quality of the product and more people will want it and pay more for it. Someone should put this case study into a four sentence LinkedIn post so more startup CEOs will want to do it.

gumptionary

vor 2 Jahrendiscuss

I understand why you went for a product search engine (gotta monetize) but I think one of the reasons mining reddit for intel is so helpful is you aren't always being sold a product.

For example: I recently turned to reddit because I was looking for a foam roller to resolve some IT band issues from running, and ended up finding a stretching routine that has fixed my problem without buying anything.

Either way, I think this is really cool and bypassing the nonsense that google is becoming is a winning path.

gumptionary

vor 2 Jahrendiscuss

I've worked in startups and tech recruiting for startups and whether I was hiring, or hiring on behalf of someone else, I don't think I've ever heard of an entrepreneurial stint as a negative when considering employment history.

Often it's a huge plus as it tells you that the candidate has, at some point, had to think holistically about a business. Doesn't matter if it succeeded or failed so long as you can speak to the experience and the lessons learned.

gumptionary

vor 3 Jahrendiscuss

Love what you're trying to do. I recently moved most of the way off oil-based hydronic baseboard heating in my 1800's New England farmhouse through installing 3 ductless mini-splits with Mitsubishi Hyper Heat condensors. Just to help with your user research, my biggest decision points:

1. Cold weather operation. I get you're saying the units are good down to -15f, but there's nothing like the fact that I can talk to plenty of other people who have good experiences with Hyperheat at -15f to ensure that they'll actually work. Given I'm using these primarily for heat (the AC is a bonus), if they didn't heat well and efficiently at 0f then it was all pointless. 2. Repairability. Again, given I'm trying to use these as my primary heat, I need to know I'll have someone who will service the unit who can be here in a matter of hours. This is why I went away from the DIY route. Most installers around here (semi-rural New England) are super brand aligned and won't service the stuff they don't install.

Would be happy to help with user research if you're looking for folks to talk to.

gumptionary

vor 3 Jahrendiscuss

I've built one of these before and the devil is so very much in the details, but really even more in the context.

There's the easy stuff: "ninja" for example. Nobody, in the year 2023, should be using that word in a job post.

But then there's the hard stuff that really matters. If you want someone who has experience being a "white hat" hacker, that's perfectly alright, but if you want "white people only" well that's obviously bad. If you don't flag the latter you look like a joke, but if you flag every instance of the word "white" then it feels overbearing and like the tool isn't very smart.

I'm pretty sure these will never actually be useful on a superficial word-matching basis. They need to look at broader phrases and context.

And then there's the real problem that even if the tool helps the hiring manager / recruiter sweep their inbuilt biases under the rug to get better applicants, they're still the ones making the hiring decisions.

gumptionary

vor 4 Jahrendiscuss

Sure, identifying your inner critic is important, but there are far better strategies for overcoming it than just saying nice things to yourself.

The best I've found on the subject is Steven Pressfield's The War of Art https://blackirishbooks.com/product/the-war-of-art/

gumptionary

vor 4 Jahrendiscuss

As others have said, unlimited PTO ultimately means that it's up to the manager to determine if you can take days off. This places 100% of the burden on the manager to be the 'bad guy' who has to say no to a request, thus building in an unnecessary opportunity for conflict into that relationship. There's also a burden on the employee making the request to somehow know if they've taken the right amount of vacation.

PTO is one of those things where, to misuse the quote, 'good fences make good neighbors.' A reasonable set of requirements and limits can reduce the guesswork, preserve relationships, and make it so people actually use their PTO.

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