Show HN: The Five Year Itch

by josh_fyi • 14 years ago

86 28 14 years ago

Show HN: Experienced software engineers who want to change jobs after a few years need a service targeted at them, that won't make them chase ads nor swamp them with recruiter spam. We built FiveYearItch.com We're wondering: Does this meet a need for the stable, experienced, skilled, but non-rockstar programmers?

stuaxo• 14 years ago

Wow, five years is quite a long time to be in any job these days!

Perceptes• 14 years ago

I think "The One Year Itch" might be more accurate.

kami8845• 14 years ago

Yeah, calling it "The Five Year Itch" is a great way to alienate anyone who hasn't worked in the same job for 5 years.

Also who, when bored with their current job, asks themselves "oh how could I scratch this Five Year Itch that I'm having"? I'd venture to say anyone who has worked that long in software development would either reach out to their network or simply stop ignoring the requests from recruiters they're getting.

msabalau• 14 years ago

The other side of their market is employers--even if accurate, I'm not certain that pointing to a inch after one year is helpful.

More generally, a name of with this sort of specificity gives people a chance to paint themselves out of the picture. Regardless of the duration references, some of the relevant audience is likely to say "that's not about me".

_djo_• 14 years ago

It is? I'm coming up on five years in Jan, can feel the itch already but I feel I needed the stability to grow for a bit. Hard to move on though, the company is filled with lifers who've been here for 10-15 years.

_pferreir_• 14 years ago

I guess it depends, in some parts of the world that seems to be the case, in others not that much.

michaelochurch• 14 years ago

Yeah, that was my complaint: the name is misleading.

thejteam• 14 years ago

Depends on the location and industry probably. In a company of 25 software engineers, I am coming up on 5 years in a few months and I'd say about 3/4 of them have been with the company longer than me. That said, I probably will be leaving soon, because 5 years is a long time.

xxpor• 14 years ago

This is an advantage of working at a big company. If you work at Google, Amazon or Microsoft, they do so much stuff that you can do an internal transfer to another team and it's like moving to a whole different company (if you move far enough).

josh_fyi5• 14 years ago

You've got a good point. The itch does start earlier than 5 years. Maybe we'll put that into our branding soon. In any case, our 'years in job' field lets you sign up from Year 3.

user242• 14 years ago

This is a really nice approach to job finding. I wonder if the same could be applied to dating websites?

riffraff• 14 years ago

you mean "I have a partner now but I'm looking for someone better" ? Seems like a strong disincentive to dating you.

But then again, I know there are dating sites which only focus on cheating so surely there is a market for this too.

user242• 14 years ago

I was thinking more in terms of the way candidates are anonymously matched.

NB: I don't know anything about dating or dating sites.

redguava2• 14 years ago

I like the design of the website aesthetically and at first it's what kept my attention.

After reading through the site though, I am not sure the tone/feeling of your site suits your purpose. Looking for a job is a very serious thing, I wonder if your site is a little too comical for your audience/purpose.

For me, it doesn't have the feel of a site I would want to use for job hunting.

josh_fyi5• 14 years ago

Thanks, appreciate the feedback. We designed it to be simple, fun and funny. It's not intended for job hunting so much as for relaxing and letting the high-quality offers come in.

DigitalSea• 14 years ago

The one thing that annoys me about this, it doesn't work for other countries. It's quite limited in its use, not everyone is from the US and I don't see why it would be that hard to open it up to other parts of the globe. Believe it or not there are software engineers and web developers in Australia as well.

redguava2• 14 years ago

I am in Australia and I often find this frustrating, I do completely understand why though. The United States has a population of 311 Million. In Australia we have a population of 22 Million.

When you consider the complications in making software global, I can see why our potential customer base doesn't make it worthwhile.

Even the simple things are tougher than they seem (post code vs. zip code). It seems easy enough to detect their location and display the right wording... but then your help documentation is going to be wrong for some, or will you create multiple versions of that too.

I wish it were different, but I suspect until we have the same needs/laws, it's going to continue like this.

josh_fyi5• 14 years ago

Thanks for the feedback, everyone. Yes, we plan to go global, but have to start building relationships with employers in the US first. Please sign up at this feature request http://fiveyearitch.uservoice.com/forums/172768-five-year-it... and we'll let you know as soon as we step out of the US.

wccrawford• 14 years ago

Actually, it is that hard. While the programming would be fairly trivial, actually making the service useful (attracting employers, for instance) is a whole other story. Gaining traction is not easy and if you go too big at the start, your whole system could implode before you really get started.

KiwiCoder• 14 years ago

Great concept and nice execution, if I was looking for a job I would give this a try.

One thing to consider; I spent about a minute looking on your site (and on Laudits) for information about you and didn't find anything. So you seem kind of anonymous. You could be a bunch of sniggering recruiters, I don't know.

lysol• 14 years ago

I think you need a remote employment option.

S_A_P• 14 years ago

I can see this being a sort of "glassdoor.com" as well. It also seems that many people are content making well below market value. Money isnt everything, but being compensated fairly goes a long way with making me feel valued as an employee.

efbenson• 14 years ago

Your confirmation email ended up in my gmail spam box. Not sure if its me or gmail.

Other than that I really like the low traction.

josh_fyi5• 14 years ago

Thanks for that feedback! We'll look into getting a better email service.

By 'low traction' I presume you mean the ease of signing up. Thanks, yes, we made it super-easy on purpose. Our target market is busy people who don't feel like chasing down new jobs.

rheide• 14 years ago

Really like the implementation, but I really don't like the name. Maybe you should think about renaming it to something less focused on the 'five year' bit.

eranation• 14 years ago

Very nice, I think reversing the job marketplace for tech jobs is a viable need (will only work as long as demand is higher than supply)

however, what really worries me is that you use sendgrid, but still your confirmation email got to my spam folder.

Does this mean that sendgrid.me (what was used in that case) reputation is down?

I strongly suggest that you get your own email IP, you will have low bounce / unsubscribes anyway as you send only transactional emails

(I'm not affiliated or have any relatives in sendgrid)

josh_fyi5• 14 years ago

Thanks for the feedback, we are looking into upgrading our SendGrid service or else switching to another provider.

mesozoic• 14 years ago

This is pretty cool I'd like to see more useful filters when searching for candidates. If you just search python it shows both learners and experts. Also no salary filter and other stuff it seems like.

Show HN: The Five Year Itch

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