I've been asked by several clients over the past year to help them find senior software engineering talent. You need to play down the "AI" rhetoric if you want to attract people who genuinely care about the work and who really know what they're doing.
Advertising that you intend to install them into some kind of "reverse centaur" role will pretty much guarantee they won't be applying.
@jasongorman I wonder if the companies that might not lean heavily into "AI" or "Agentic" - if they find their employees via network or more direct because everything I see in jobs are very heavily LLM driven roles.
@svelmoe Yup
@jasongorman +1 to that. Any mention of AI and I reject the job pitch. So that’s roughly 100% of LinkedIn adverts.
I’m patient. I can wait. But obviously if anyone has an opportunity for a senior ‘been there, done that, builds teams* that can deliver 20-30 drops/day without needing AI’ guy, then do get in touch. Contract preferred, but will consider full time for something interesting.
* the usual 7+/- 2. My record was an 8-person XP team delivering live 40 times/day regularly
@jasongorman did any of them listen?
@dysfun Nope
I can attest to that from being a colleague in exactly this demographic. Also the "reverse centaur" role telegraphs very clearly that the future employer doesn't value the skill a senior SE has build up over years, if not decades. Generally we avoid roles (also part of the experience) where your skills and insights are obviously misplaced. It's bad enough, if we have to discuss fundamentals for good software engineering with management and product owners over and again and again.
@jasongorman yep. I wish job search sites offered a filter to exclude LLM-using jobs.