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Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

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Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#171

Post by vonmoltke »

stale2002 wrote: post #24

Yes, I work at Refinery29 (obligatory www.corporate.r29.com/careers/), a large women's fashion website in NYC. Of our 30 person tech team, we have had about 5 people coming out of these bootcamps, and they are all awesome. Although I think your idea of who goes to these bootcamps is pretty off. These aren't people who "had never opened a text editor in their lives." Some of them are people who were working in science…

> The tech shortage is present more than ever in every level of the industry.

In the web and mobile sectors of the industry, maybe.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#172

Post by fecak »

lighthousedev wrote: post #148
fecak wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your experience is interesting to read, but not quite valid to the original post. The poster was referring to developer bootcamps like Flatiron or General Assembly that have a primary revenue derived from tuition (or recruiting fees for some), and are trying to produce developers to be hired by other organizations. Your bootcamp was to produce developers for your own company. They made an investment in you to bring y…

Fair, although my experience is still relevant because clients are still hiring developers that have gone through a bootcamp. There is full transparency that the clients are getting developers with limited experience, and they are still willing to pay a premium because of the bootcamp. The underlying concept is still the same - a company trains competent developers and gets a premium for doing so. The only difference…

"although my experience is still relevant because clients are still hiring developers that have gone through a bootcamp"

Historically, the clients had little choice who showed up for their projects when working with larger consulting shops. Has that changed? Clients weren't usually vetting Jen and Bill and Joe, but rather they ordered bodies and got "3 bootcamp grads".

Are you and your fellow bootcamp grads interviewed and vetted by clients before joining their projects, or do the clients get whoever the consulting firm decides should be on the team?

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#173

Post by ska »

shawndrost wrote: post #43

(Disclosure: I am a cofounder at one of these schools, Hack Reactor.) > Most of the job growth appears to be in academic stuff like AI and data science This is incorrect -- web jobs are growing quickly. > there are companies hiring people at $100k who, twelve weeks ago, had never opened a text editor in their lives. This is rare, but it does happen. The more common case is the student that coded on the side for a yea…

I care about capability, not credentials. That said, a BS from a decent CS program has some value, if only as a filter. And programs like these "bootcamps" have a similar value with a much lower bar. In both cases you need to know the program to really figure out how to scale it in your decision.

Running an educational program is hard, I agree. And if you guys are doing a really excellent job of it over, say, 10 weeks the way I look at it is this: the potential hire is an entry level person who has about a 3 month jump on the approx 2 years it will take to make a developer out of them. If your program is a year long, they're maybe half way there.

So given that: I'd have no problem hiring these people as entry level (i.e. developer in training), and if I knew something about the program itself that would count in their favor against similarly green candidates.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#174

Post by vonmoltke »

stale2002 wrote: post #24

Yes, I work at Refinery29 (obligatory www.corporate.r29.com/careers/), a large women's fashion website in NYC. Of our 30 person tech team, we have had about 5 people coming out of these bootcamps, and they are all awesome. Although I think your idea of who goes to these bootcamps is pretty off. These aren't people who "had never opened a text editor in their lives." Some of them are people who were working in science…

> The tech shortage is present more than ever in every level of the industry.

In the web and mobile sectors of the industry, maybe.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#175

Post by jmckib »

GolfyMcG wrote: post #119

My team (a small healthcare startup) spent a lot of time looking at this for our first hire so I feel like I could provide some insights. First off, I think it varies quite widely on the school. We talked to people from General Assembly and the quality varied A LOT. There were some people who I would have said were capable of being a junior developer and some who I would say are hardly employable. None of them were e…

App Academy claims on their homepage that SF graduates receive an average salary of $100,000. So unless they're blatantly lying or fudging the statistics somehow, it's not BS.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#176

Post by fecak »

lighthousedev wrote: post #148
fecak wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your experience is interesting to read, but not quite valid to the original post. The poster was referring to developer bootcamps like Flatiron or General Assembly that have a primary revenue derived from tuition (or recruiting fees for some), and are trying to produce developers to be hired by other organizations. Your bootcamp was to produce developers for your own company. They made an investment in you to bring y…

Fair, although my experience is still relevant because clients are still hiring developers that have gone through a bootcamp. There is full transparency that the clients are getting developers with limited experience, and they are still willing to pay a premium because of the bootcamp. The underlying concept is still the same - a company trains competent developers and gets a premium for doing so. The only difference…

"although my experience is still relevant because clients are still hiring developers that have gone through a bootcamp"

Historically, the clients had little choice who showed up for their projects when working with larger consulting shops. Has that changed? Clients weren't usually vetting Jen and Bill and Joe, but rather they ordered bodies and got "3 bootcamp grads".

Are you and your fellow bootcamp grads interviewed and vetted by clients before joining their projects, or do the clients get whoever the consulting firm decides should be on the team?

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#177

Post by fecak »

lighthousedev wrote: post #148
fecak wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your experience is interesting to read, but not quite valid to the original post. The poster was referring to developer bootcamps like Flatiron or General Assembly that have a primary revenue derived from tuition (or recruiting fees for some), and are trying to produce developers to be hired by other organizations. Your bootcamp was to produce developers for your own company. They made an investment in you to bring y…

Fair, although my experience is still relevant because clients are still hiring developers that have gone through a bootcamp. There is full transparency that the clients are getting developers with limited experience, and they are still willing to pay a premium because of the bootcamp. The underlying concept is still the same - a company trains competent developers and gets a premium for doing so. The only difference…

"although my experience is still relevant because clients are still hiring developers that have gone through a bootcamp"

Historically, the clients had little choice who showed up for their projects when working with larger consulting shops. Has that changed? Clients weren't usually vetting Jen and Bill and Joe, but rather they ordered bodies and got "3 bootcamp grads".

Are you and your fellow bootcamp grads interviewed and vetted by clients before joining their projects, or do the clients get whoever the consulting firm decides should be on the team?

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#178

Post by jmckib »

GolfyMcG wrote: post #119

My team (a small healthcare startup) spent a lot of time looking at this for our first hire so I feel like I could provide some insights. First off, I think it varies quite widely on the school. We talked to people from General Assembly and the quality varied A LOT. There were some people who I would have said were capable of being a junior developer and some who I would say are hardly employable. None of them were e…

App Academy claims on their homepage that SF graduates receive an average salary of $100,000. So unless they're blatantly lying or fudging the statistics somehow, it's not BS.

Re: Ask HN: Does anyone actually hire from 'developer bootcamps'?

#179

Post by jmckib »

GolfyMcG wrote: post #119

My team (a small healthcare startup) spent a lot of time looking at this for our first hire so I feel like I could provide some insights. First off, I think it varies quite widely on the school. We talked to people from General Assembly and the quality varied A LOT. There were some people who I would have said were capable of being a junior developer and some who I would say are hardly employable. None of them were e…

App Academy claims on their homepage that SF graduates receive an average salary of $100,000. So unless they're blatantly lying or fudging the statistics somehow, it's not BS.
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