Sourcing Hack for Hacker News Site

Posted by Jonathan Kidder on January 13, 2020January 28, 2023

I will be starting a new series that highlights the latest Sourcing hacks. Our sourcing world is changing at a rapid pace and it’s hard to stay up to update on what’s trending within our recruiting community. I’m hoping that these hacks will help to improve your hiring and overall productivity whether you are a beginner or expert level Sourcer in the field.

I discovered a website called: Hacker News. It’s a news aggregator forum site similar to Reddit but it primarily focuses on start-ups, developers, and hacker related news. Topics include anything that “good hackers” would find interesting. Founded by Paul Graham he wanted to create a community that would recreate the way Reddit felt in the good old days when developers were the main focus.

While reviewing the site I found out that Hacker News created a sub specifically for developers actively looking for new opportunities. This sub is a month by month page called: Ask HN: Who wants to be hired?

The information included in this sub:

Name:
Location:
Remote:
Willing to relocate:
Technologies:
Résumé/CV:
Email:

You can create a Boolean string and search directly on Google:

Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (“October” OR “September” OR “November” OR “December” OR “January”) AND “2019”

You will find thousands of developers who are actively looking for openings across the globe! These subpages will give you a wealth of information on an active candidate: contact information, resume, portfolio, LinkedIn, & GitHub/Stack Overflow profiles.

Here’s some examples:

Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (October 2019) | Hacker News

Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (November 2019) | Hacker News

Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (December 2019) | Hacker News

Ask HN: Who wants to be hired? (January 2020) | Hacker News

Recruiter Template Email Example:

Hi {Name},

I was reviewing who wants to be hired on Hacker News recently and came across your posted message. I reviewed your Github profile and portfolio site and I was really impressed by your recent tech stack work at (company/project).

My team is hiring Full Stack Developers at the Bay area. Would you be interested in learning more?

{Name 2}

A word of Caution for Recruiters

This has become a great resource for me and in some ways I’m hesitate to share this hack. Please do not mass email devs from this list. Take the time to review and message the appropriate devs for your openings.

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Jonathan Kidder

With more than 12 years of recruitment experience, Jonathan has helped startups and small businesses find the talent they need. He runs the blog WizardSourcer, which explores the latest trends in talent sourcing, provides reviews of recruitment tools, and features interviews with prominent figures in the industry.