Shannan Bunch

NOW HIRING: Principal UI Designer - Web App Products | Remote USA | $300k+ | We are (and have been) seeing an incredible push in Design to make absolutely beautiful stand out products and experiences. Especially in domains dominated by boring. Cookie Cutter Dashboards, Bland tables, basic data vis - it's not enough. There are many companies surging ahead in these domains right now because they have brought the beauty and delight into these domains and products. They have taken that consumer lens for In-Product-brand, for key moments of delight for a User and injected that into spaces and places where a gradient and round cornered buttons were previously the pinnacle. If you are Taste-Making, UI Craft Master who wants to push the envelope - who knows that current ai and figma templates cannot keep up with your Creative Edge - then I want to chat! Visual Design is about to get so much more in demand - and this team is looking for the best of the best. Your work is going to ooze next level taste. It will be so clear and obvious from every touch point that you are a Visual Expert. You don't meet the bar - you are the bar that so many other teams aspire to reach. #designjobsusa #designjobs #productdesignhiring #productdesignjobs #jaredtredly

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Interview tip: Use "Live Captions." I can only verify on a Mac, however, you can run Live Captions in the background and it will give you realtime audio-to-text transcription. How many times have you been in an interview and have forgotten the question that was asked? With live captions, will transcribe it for you automatically and boom, you're good to go.

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I guess Hump Day is also rant day. To be clear, this is not complaining, this is constructive criticism with proposed solutions for the industry. To the companies who are hiring. If a job board doesn't cover the information you need to know and you put a post up where the only method of applying is to go to your site or another site and fill out all the information that is already in my resume... please don't use the job board. Oh, now you're not getting applicants at all? Then use the tool given and do what every job seeker needs to do, spend a few minutes (not an average of 5 seconds) looking over each application for pertinent questions to ask and send an email for clarification, if necessary. A few minutes on your side is better than the HOUR PLUS it takes to fill out an entire dossier for every employer on their own career page. If you're upset about how many applications you're getting, look into an algorithm for optimal stopping, and stop having FOMO. Don't complain about it, solve the problem. By the way, the solution is not ATS or stricter filters. That will only get you applicants that are "shotgunning" their resumes. We could get more done together if employers and applicants listen to each other. Don't you think? Both sides need to put in effective effort, not waste their effort. Before people say there's no way to look over hundreds of applications efficiently - I managed attendance and grades for 12 cohorts simultaneously, which amounted to nearly 550 students and payroll for 20+ staff. I had individual meetings with students that were running behind and gave personal emails to every student every week that was falling behind that week (50+ in real-time on average). It's amazing what you can get done if you target your needs and execute them using a batching process and logic. Do you need to count the hairs on an applicant's head? No. You need to determine if they are curious, genuine, ethical, and have a growth mindset. That's what a resume should tell you, because humans are more than the sum of their parts. The bonus is that you'll have an actually great team of people, and fewer applications to review. The position will get filled quicker too. Unfortunately it means changing a significant proportion of companies' recruitment protocols in order to implement (I won't hold my breath). In case anyone wonders what spurs this post, it's a number of things. Meta has an excellent prep for the interview series, but my guess is that they are interviewing the wrong people to begin with. They've invested heavily in this excellent primer. Next is the near-tears suffering of practically everyone on LinkedIn, recruiter or applicant. Next is the fact that there are millions of open jobs and employees and applicants alike can't find a match (maybe we should make a tinder for jobs to simplify the process. swipe right?). Last and least, My own frustrations as a newly minted unemployed professional.

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This job market is a dumpster fire. Hot, flaming garbage all around. I've read your stories. So many brilliant, talented and dedicated people are caught in the lurch. So many tragic stories of application purgatory (I'm looking at you, Workday and ATS systems) constant customization of resumes, CVs and cover letters... and more cover letters. (I got so sick of writing cover letters that I actually just sent a chili recipe as a cover letter - don't tell anybody) My point is this: You're valuable. Getting laid off is not your fault. Please don't feel like a victim - a big ask, I know. You've honed your craft and your skills absolutely have value. This too shall pass and I want you to know that I'm cheering for you. Simple as that. I'm cheering for you to get a better gig than you had, to get the remote or in-office situation that suits you best, a competitive market-value salary (no low-ball offers), and a chance to work within a team that values your contribution and makes it known. You deserve every bit of it. EVERY BIT. A colleague had a brilliant quote: "Your network is your net worth." Work those contacts, use this platform to connect in positive ways. I'm cheering for you.

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I've assessed a lot of "homework" submissions as part of the hiring process. Setting aside the question of whether this is even a good use of your time, if you do submit homework, my advice is to do *no more* than what is asked, for the following reasons: * if your submission increases the scope of the work, you are also increasing the likelihood of bugs existing in your code * i'm judging you as a prospective future teammate and i don't want to work with someone who * can't or won't follow instructions * unnecessarily increases the complexity of assigned work You can always reach out to someone on the hiring side to see if it's ok to deliver a bigger answer than was asked for, but probably less is more. If you have that much time to spend on homework, add a few more tests. If you get pushback on the tests, you don't want work there anyway. [Attribution: Sad pianist from Peter Ibbetson, Etc published by J.R. Osgood & Co. (1892). Original from the British Library.]

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Freelancer or consultant? Avoid saying: "My rate is $100/hour" Instead, try: "I'm currently earning $100/hour on similar projects" This shows you're in demand. And anchors your rate to an existing project. (less likely to get hard-balled) If you have no other work or are just starting out... "I'm currently quoting $100/hour on similar projects" Another option, to give yourself some wiggle room... "I'm currently quoting $80-$100/hour, depending on the duration of the project" What's worked for you?

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Todays #resumetip…#TITLES! Its best practice to use industry common titles and not the title your company thought was super trendy and cool (kind of like the idea of nap pods). Don’t use “superhero coder”. Try “software engineer”. Don’t say “Inclusion Activist” say “Human Resources Manager” (or whatever you truly were!). Then, in the position summary it’s okay to describe it a bit more. Make it #SIMPLE for recruiters and Hiring Managers to find you!

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Have you noticed that LinkedIn launched games? I'm not interested in this new feature. Are you? It appears that a few people in my network have tried them. You can access games here: https://lnkd.in/gk6gRZS3 #linkedinfeature #game #linkedintips

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Jr. Devs, Today marks 2 years at my current employer. Yay! Some of you will celebrate with me because you are struggling to get your first job or maybe even your first interview. Some of you might think celebrating only 2 years at a job is weird. For me, in my career experience, 2 years is a milestone… unfortunately. In fact, on average, my employment at a company has lasted about 2 years, often less. There are varying reasons why, from being a contractor and finishing projects to being part of several layoffs to moving on to other opportunities. Now, that doesn’t mean you will have the same path. I have a friend who’s been at the same company for around 20 years as a developer. So, I’m not saying your journey will look like mine. What I’m saying is to prepare yourself for the reality that once you get in, it may not be everything you hoped it would be. It may have twists and turns that you don’t expect. You may feel like everything is great one day only to have the rug pulled out from under you the next. It’s all part of the journey and you can flourish in it. But you need to recognize the possibility and be prepared to handle it well when/if it happens.  So, when things are going well… celebrate, like I am today! If you want to know more about my journey, you can watch this very, very long YouTube video: https://lnkd.in/gqRJ_uGU Maybe it will be an encouragement on your journey as well! #juniordeveloper #mentoring

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Here's a job search tip. When searching for a job role on Linkedin, you can omit and filter out companies that spam job listings. Put this in your search bar: frontend developer NOT FullStack Labs NOT Tree Top Staffing LLC NOT Aha! NOT Dice NOT DataAnnotation NOT Underdog.io NOT Jobot For some reason it does not work on DataAnnotation and I think because they are promoted. Does anyone have any other good tips on filtering a job search?

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We need to normalize openly looking for jobs. The job search sucks, it sucks more than you can't talk about it, ask for help, and get leads/recommendations from your manager and co-workers. Your current organization should be looking to move the sector and the mission forward. That won't always mean your next job is a promotion. We need to embrace that, especially as managers.

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…But that’s if you're starting from zero. Look, you don't have to spend hundreds of hours figuring it out. Instead, you can use these 3 Conversation Code Strategies and be ready to connect with clients and candidates tomorrow: 1️⃣ The Trust Builder Strategy: ✅ 1: Start the conversation by genuinely complimenting your candidate’s career achievements. Everyone likes recognition. ✅ 2: Share a quick anecdote about your own career path or recruiting journey to create relatability. (Your Backstory) 2️⃣ The Value Proposition Strategy: ✅ 1: Identify the top three pain points for your clients and integrate them into your value proposition. ✅ 2: Clearly outline your unique recruiting process and how it directly addresses those pain points. 3️⃣ The Relationship 'Deepener' Strategy: ✅ 1: Schedule consistent follow-up calls with every client and candidate to build rapport. ✅ 2: Send a thoughtful article, podcast, or book recommendation relevant to their interests or industry. And just for reading this far... I pulled 10 more Conversation Code Strategies from my training, The Conversation Code, for each of these... Plus... I'm throwing in some examples you can use right away... Giving you a total of 30 strategies to connect like a pro. Want access to these 30 Conversation Code Strategies? Drop your biggest cold call phrase that you hate to hear, or DM me directly and I'll get you the link to the docs... Happy Headhunting ~ Rick #GenuineConnections #RecruitingRevolution #TheConversationCode #RecruitingTips #TalentAcquisition #HumanResources #RecruitingSuccess #CareerConversations #Networking #LinkedInNetworking

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I see the post author has a lot of reasons to think like that but let me reason about his particular experience with remote work. One of his pleadings regards the company bureaucracy, the main issue he found while a remote worker, this is what I think. Most of the companies are not even partially adapted to the reality of remote work but they are struggling push their own outdated culture and processes over remote workers, keep that in mind. Another point to consider regards the following statement: We tend to be conservative when we are put to challenges. This happens with companies and also with individuals if we ask them just to think about positive impacts of remote work. In reality, you cannot adopt remote work in a company that doesn’t care about ‘revolution’. Revolvere, from the Latim, means ‘turn over' or 'transform', so, if there is no process flexibility, if the company is not prone to change, and relies entirely on rigid bureaucracy, hierarchy and things like that, the company will not succeed as a remote work adopter. Firstly you need to renew the processes. I saw this happening. Companies evolving, migrating from large offices, rigid work routines, time records and lots of micro management to decentralized cross country teams, flexible working hours and things like that. The ones that really took flexibility as a value, they succeeded… other ones, failed and then claimed that remote work is a delusion. They came to rely on rigidness as their life-saver... they are not totally wrong. But let's see how history gives us some lessons: In the past century, Japan had lots of earthquakes, some with fatal casualties… They had to overcome the situation with lots of engineering. Nowadays, homes are constructed to resist earthquakes by adding some level of flexibility right on their foundations… Hospitals and skyscrapers are built the same way. Flexibility combined with rigidness. Sounds cool, right? So, if there are challenges regarding remote work at your company and you have the power to make changes, take this in account… Review your processes, eliminate bureaucracy where it cannot be directly translated into benefits for your organization and perhaps you'll succeed. Bureaucracy is good but it creates limitations. What do I know about this? Just think of me as a ‘philosopher of work relations’... jk. In fact, I think remote work suffers the same misjudgments and misconceptions as great things invented or discovered in the last century. Think of the discovery of AC current, the first heart transplant surgery, the artificial heart or artificial lungs… Like all these, remote work gives us all a glimpse of ‘the unknown’ and a question: “What if it fails?”. Remote work puts us face to face with an new way to do the same things we used to do in crowded and/or noisy rooms, prone to interruptions. The question remains the same and it’s just a speculation. It will only fail for organizations that really fails to renew, even refounding itself.

💀 No candidates were harmed in the making of my bot. Take notes recruiters: Humane treatment of people means no ghosting. I'm headed to UNPARSED and needed to tap a developer to create a custom widget to meet the deadline. I mean, those buttons I designed won't get code-zhuzhed by themselves! I mean, I kinda know Voiceflow, but not well enough. Fiver sucked. I teared up at just the * thought * of Upwork. Shudder. So I put out a call right here on the LinkedInz. Fifty lovely humans applied and, having been ghosted (even after a third round of interviews at one "great place to work" place), I know to treat people the way I want to be treated. Especially in this economy. Sheesh. When I found my dev dude, I let them know. The end. #Unparsed #Voiceflow #ConversationDesign #ItIsEasyToBeNice #NoGhosting

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I'm seeing a lot of these "expert answers" about frontend development and what does HTML, CSS, and Javascript do. So many of them over complicate it: HTML is content authoring. You are writing a document and should use the tools and formatting available to make it as clearly understood as possible. Most people should be able to write some HTML much like most people can post dross on social networks. However there is a big difference between a coherent, semantically correct HTML doc and some div/span catastrophe. The latter is more like the local racists latest rant with no punctuation, swimming with spelling mistakes, and they've tied themselves in knots over the fact there was once a rainbow flag in Morrisons. CSS is not just about making things "look nice". Yeah it'll make things look better but it's main purpose should be to improve usability, legibility and make your content more understandable. Finally Javascript - Javascript is usually unnecessary and I reckon 90% of the internet could do without it. A lot of the things that Javascript has introduced has made the internet worse, less stable, and less accessible. It's main purpose has been to make frontend development more like a programming discipline, rather than the design discipline it originally was. This is coming from someone who has built their career around frontend development 🤷‍♂️

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Welp, it’s back to the drawing board. I've been quiet here because I went through 5 rounds of interviews with a company, including the final interview. This morning, I got the update email I was waiting for. I didn't get the job. Here are my takeaways from the experience: - I loved all the interviews with each of the team members. It seems like a highly collaborative environment full of down to earth people, which I thrive in. - I built a project using their tech stack (which was not required) so I could make solid contributions from Day 1 and I learned a lot in the process. This project included #Sanity, #Next, and #GROQ, Sanity’s query language. I nerded out with their developer when I presented this project during my technical interview. - I built an additional project to learn user testing with Jest. - I learned more about cyber security to better understand their business needs as it pertains to demand generation. - My strong focus and background in #accessibility and #WCAG best practices allowed me to point out some a11y issues on their current website, which was well received and was identified as something that could go into their list of open tickets. While I am disappointed with the outcome, I enjoyed my time through the process and learned a lot. I wish the company all the best with their chosen candidate. Now for my 30 second elevator pitch (yes, this was timed): I'm a senior front-end developer with 15 years experience, with strong focus on UI/UX and accessibility. I have a user-centric approach to development and love bouncing ideas off my teammates in a collaborative environment. I love documentation, both writing and reading. I'm an advocate for the 'no-handoff' handoff. Getting all team members across departments, especially designers and developers, together early on, which I've seen can cut down development time by at least 10%. (This process avoids the back and forth that typically occurs between design and development) My goal is to grow my skills to full stack within 6 months to a year. I'm full of grit, tenacity, and above all, empathy. If you want all of this and more on your team, sneak into my DMs, email me, call, send me a carrier pigeon. The choice is yours.

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So I had another interview today (I’ll consider naming the companies once I’ve completed the process as I think they deserve shout-outs). Again, it was very conversational and the two engineers who interviewed me were super chill. This made it more of a flowing chat about my technical experience and less of a set of random probing questions, which let’s be honest can be quite jarring and feel one-sided. I was able to convey my experience quite well, and any follow up questions were to dig a bit deeper into things I had touched on and maybe could do with some more elaboration. I also loved the fact that when I asked about challenges and the less-than-perfect reviews I read on Glassdoor, they were both completely transparent and didn’t try to mask the reality. This is something I’ve always tried to do when interviewing candidates - setting the scene of what they’re potentially going to walk in to is super important. By being transparent about the inner workings of your company is a winning strategy to avoid people leaving during probation, when they realise that “perfect” culture you painted doesn’t actually exist. #interview #iobhunt #softwaredeveloper

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So I had another interview today (I’ll consider naming the companies once I’ve completed the process as I think they deserve shout-outs). Again, it was very conversational and the two engineers who interviewed me were super chill. This made it more of a flowing chat about my technical experience and less of a set of random probing questions, which let’s be honest can be quite jarring and feel one-sided. I was able to convey my experience quite well, and any follow up questions were to dig a bit deeper into things I had touched on and maybe could do with some more elaboration. I also loved the fact that when I asked about challenges and the less-than-perfect reviews I read on Glassdoor, they were both completely transparent and didn’t try to mask the reality. This is something I’ve always tried to do when interviewing candidates - setting the scene of what they’re potentially going to walk in to is super important. By being transparent about the inner workings of your company is a winning strategy to avoid people leaving during probation, when they realize that “perfect” culture you painted doesn’t actually exist. #interview #iobhunt #softwaredeveloper #culture #workculture #life

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Shopify - you should open the Slack gates... we have waited over a year. Discord sucks. There - I said it. Discord is not Slack. Its medicore and gives me no joy. At least with Slack - you can have x2 channels of Developer fluidity. Open it up please. If I just missed it - please let me know where to access the Slack Developer Channel - then immediately update all of your Web and Google cached content as you are way out of date. Love, Gonz #shopify #slack #shopifydeveloper

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