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Ask HN: How do you determine the line between hustling and trying to hard?

1 pointsby aorshanabout 13 years ago
tl;dr How do I show I care without being annoying and trying to hard?<p>A few weeks ago I applied to foursquare as a marketing and communications intern. I sent in a cover letter and resume (both of which I received a great deal of help on from the HN community, so thanks guys!)<p>Since then I have created a presentation on sliderocket (http://aorshan.wordpress.com/2012/02/20/my-application-to-foursquare/) and shared it on twitter with pretty much every foursquare employee I could find, as well as various members of the tech press and prominent members of the community (Brad Feld, Ben Barr, Andrew Chen, Chris Dixon, etc).<p>I also managed to track down the emails of Naveen (one of the foursquare founders) and Alex (their head of product). I sent them both emails describing my love for the company and how much I want to work for them, as well as included a link to the sliderocket presentation. They both responded to me, Naveen forwarding my email to recruiting and Alex saying he will send my email to the right people.<p>I haven't heard anything since then. I really want to intern at foursquare and want to do everything I can to show that I want the job (and am qualified to get it). I feel like at the moment I have done a reasonable amount and fear that doing anything more will push me over the line into the realm of annoying people who try to hard.<p>Thoughts?

1 comment

dmils4about 13 years ago
Move on. It's a numbers game. There are enough other companies out there that will see your passion as an asset.<p>Understand things from their point of view: they're a popular company in a popular area. They probably have so many resumes being sent in that it's tough to manage the flow, and at junior positions like interns, it's difficult to differentiate candidates. One core differentiator at pre-entry level positions is ability to learn - and that's something that isn't too easy to pick up on in a resume.<p>Their loss is another company's gain.<p>If you're meant to end up working there - you'll end up there. Sometimes it's out of your hands, but there are enough awesome startups in New York that you'll get picked up somewhere fast.<p>And if you don't get the job, once you're tremendously successful a few years from now - you can always send Dennis and Naveen an email letting them know they missed out :)