Welcome to the Job References Hub! Struggling to find a solid reference? You’re in the right place. Post your request, and others in the community can step in to be your reference.
This is a space to share, support, and help each other succeed in the job search. Let’s get started—post your request and let the community help!
Hey, thx for the great points. I’m in the IT field and have given and requested refs many dozens of times legitimately. I would say from all those calls the same questions come up over and over. More recently, due to legal reasons, I’d say the calls have become very basic and short. Every so often, there will be an inquisitive HR/recruiter, but after 20 years of IT, it’s never a problem. As for giving refs via communities like Lemmy, Reddit, etc., I did that myself the 1st time due to not wanting my current employer to know and being 1 short of the typical 3 refs requested because of last-minute ghosting. I ended up finding someone on Reddit, did a quid pro quo, and it went great. After that, I continued to participate, giving another 6 refs or so successfully. One guy has reached out to me about once a year, which is typical for IT. I eventually switched to gig work and at one point needed 9 refs total for 3 bids. I ended up using a combo of legit, old, and new Reddit refs, and a website service. I never heard anything negative from anyone and got 2 of the 3 bids. Anyway, I think you raised some great points, and skepticism is the best approach when connecting with someone. I also think my perspective is distorted because my world is corporate IT. However, due to observation over 4 years in various communities, it appears people have been successful in other fields as well. You also had a great point when you said, “Reaching out to users you know and discussing in private the details would be better than just hoping someone will lie for you.” Typically, these communities are for doing exactly that, meeting new people, getting to know them via communication, skills, bio exchanges, and then helping each other out. Thx for your input, take care!
My experiences are all in IT as well, but are likely skewed as the security requirements for my current position require a lot deeper investigation that strangers on the internet not only couldn’t fulfill, but going that route would confidently cause me to lose my job due to not being able to pass the extensive background investigation. I’ve mostly writhed in federal government positions as a contractor so this experience is normal to me, when working in a position of trust, being paid out of tax dollars and with access/cognizance over sensitive systems that must be kept secure for the security of everyone, intrusive and through investigations are par for the course.
Glad you mentioned this. I need to do a post on the topic. Certain positions or fields don’t align with this community. I’ve seen positions like yours posted in certain threads, which makes me question the sanity of the poster. Fortunately, they are usually ignored or deleted. And from what I’ve seen, no service handles these positions as they are excluded in the terms. This type of community is geared towards entry and mid level positions. Most users, like you, understand this. I’ll post on this and ensure such requests are removed from the thread. Thanks for the input!