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Who Y Combinator Companies Want

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Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#221

Post by Matt_Mickiewicz »

exelius wrote: post #6

Well, consider that there are well documented academic studies (that I can't be bothered to look up right now) showing that most hiring processes are no better than throwing darts at a board with regards to retention rate, employee success, and every other measure of success of the HR process. The only thing that is remotely effective are IQ scores, and even then it's only a weak correlation. So regardless of what th…

Not true.

Actually work sample tests have a .29 correlation to on the job performance, followed closely by structured interview questions.

See: http://www.wired.com/2015/04/hire-like-google/

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#222

Post by tinco »

throwaway456789 wrote: post #200
tinco wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well sorry to be crude, but it just signals that you're all talk. You say you're a great programmer, and could learn to program in Ruby in a few days, yet in 10 years you've never done it, even though you are apparently applying for jobs that are interested in that skill. If you can't even bother with learning the language that's requested in the advert in a few days, why should a hiring manager be interested in you?…

Who ever said I was interviewing for a job? I was commenting on the state of the industry as a whole. Read some of the comments (and the article). The article mentioned that one person who multiple companies thought was the best they have ever seen got rejected from the first company he interviews with because he didn' write tests. Hiring is so subjective. This comment in particular really illustrates the sad state o…

I'm not saying you're all talk, I said you signal you're all talk. If you don't have issues getting a job, why are you posting about the state of hiring here? It makes no sense. You've got replies trying to understand if there's ageism that's dragging you down, but you have a 400k job.

edit: I am sorry I offended you. I really did not mean to say that you are all talk, I thought we were talking about how Java programmers should apply to SV jobs and was trying to give you a hiring side perspective, but I guess I am a bit tired and I misread your point.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#223

Post by d0m »

bjacks wrote: post #76

I'd really like to know what it is about a resume or in an interview that makes someone seem like more of a 'product programmer'. Is it the particular things they have worked on at other jobs, i.e. their experience, or is it the way they talk about what they want to build? I'd be really interested to hear how I can make myself sound like more of a product programmer.

Talk more about the product you built (What worked, what customers said, how was it improved overtime, what did you learn from customers using the product and talking to them), rather than going in detail about the technical requirements of the product (Used technology, improved loading time by n%, rewrote using a different framework).

And the reason why it's important is because startups fail because of bad value propositions, not lack of technical expertise.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#224

Post by LordHumungous »

noarchy wrote: post #197
LordHumungous wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've made the mistake in the past of overcommitting myself to interviewing with multiple companies at once. The time commitment wasn't the worst part, the real factor I didn't for see is that interviewing is stressful and mentally exhausting. On top of the interview itself, there's the hours of studying you have to put in. It's extremely hard to do while doing your full time job. Now I have a rule that I will intervi…

>On top of the interview itself, there's the hours of studying you have to put in. Yikes, are people really doing this, or feel like they must? If I'm interviewing, I expect to be asked about previous projects, maybe my Github portfolio, and so on. I also expect to be asked how I might approach a given problem within my area of work. I can't imagine studying that - I'm paid to do this stuff every day. So are we talki…

Data structures and algorithms mostly. Most companies will ask you to solve those types of questions.

>If I'm interviewing, I expect to be asked about previous projects, maybe my Github portfolio, and so on.

Oh. Well you are in for a big surprise if you interview at 90% of tech companies.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#225

Post by ryandrake »

jcadam wrote: post #196
ryandrake wrote: post #8

> "We’ve seen that most engineers only have the stomach for a limited number of interviews. Investing time in the wrong companies carries a high opportunity cost." I suspect in addition to not having the "stomach" for an unlimited number of interviews, they don't have the vacation days to burn for them. Let's say you are working already and have 10 days a year vacation (pretty standard). With these ridiculous all-day…

I'll use myself as an example -- I work as a programmer in the Defense industry. I've wanted out for years. So every so often I start sending out resumes and going on interviews. After wasting about half of my vacation time on (multiple) rounds of interviews with each prospective employer (that ultimately lead nowhere -- most often, a potential employer who inexplicably stops communicating with me), I give up. Then,…

"Whiteboard hazing"

Heh. I'm going to squirrel that one away for later. It beautifully captures what's currently thought of as a best practice in tech interviewing.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#226

Post by eldavido »

throwaway456789 wrote: post #200
tinco wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well sorry to be crude, but it just signals that you're all talk. You say you're a great programmer, and could learn to program in Ruby in a few days, yet in 10 years you've never done it, even though you are apparently applying for jobs that are interested in that skill. If you can't even bother with learning the language that's requested in the advert in a few days, why should a hiring manager be interested in you?…

Who ever said I was interviewing for a job? I was commenting on the state of the industry as a whole. Read some of the comments (and the article). The article mentioned that one person who multiple companies thought was the best they have ever seen got rejected from the first company he interviews with because he didn' write tests. Hiring is so subjective. This comment in particular really illustrates the sad state o…

I'd be really interested to know the rough details of your work situation. Sounds like you've got a pretty good thing going.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#227

Post by eropple »

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #168
ammon wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cost of a real work test is much higher, both to the company, and to the applicant. Some companies take that approach (weebly for one), but it means that some of the best programmer will not apply, and it only makes worse the problem of having to aggressively pre-filter (based on credentials, or something else). You are 100% correct that most research into interviewing has show it to be far less predictive than c…

The best programmers do apply. Whatever you think a work-hire test is, that wasn't it. A work-hire test attracts the best programmers. It doesn't repel them. It's a chance to demonstrate their skill. It's also far better: anything is better than the fake contests they're currently forced to endure. Which would you prefer? Spend a couple hours remotely fixing some bugs and adding a feature on a fake iOS app, or spend…

> A work-hire test attracts the best programmers. It doesn't repel them.

I'm not the best programmer, but I'm comfortable I'd slot in the top quintile, probably top ten percent, of people that walk through a startup's door. And I'd never even return your call. No work-sample test I've ever seen would take less than four hours. That's a $550 opportunity cost for me at my standard rates. What the hell makes you think you deserve that for free? You aren't Google and you aren't Facebook. You need me more than I need you. And almost everybody else who's like you--and given the way you are acting, probably you too--will forget about me or blow me off at some point in the process, wasting my time even further.

On the other hand, an in-person, discussion-based interview isn't work and isn't priced as work; not only does it tells me about the company and whether or not I actually want to work there, but I enjoy meeting new people in a professional setting (there are multiple companies where I've turned them down, but have become friends with people I've met through the process!).

Look at my Github and decide if I can hack if you want, that's why it's there, but I don't work on effing spec.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#228

Post by ammon »

vinceguidry wrote: post #62
ryandrake wrote: post #8

> "We’ve seen that most engineers only have the stomach for a limited number of interviews. Investing time in the wrong companies carries a high opportunity cost." I suspect in addition to not having the "stomach" for an unlimited number of interviews, they don't have the vacation days to burn for them. Let's say you are working already and have 10 days a year vacation (pretty standard). With these ridiculous all-day…

I found my current job through a recruiter, I think I will find all subsequent jobs through one as well for this reason. Applying for a position is fundamentally an act of sales, so it behooves you to either be a salesman yourself or to hire someone to do it for you. Otherwise you're throwing yourself at the mercy of people's deep-seated fears and prejudices.

I think that recruiters do make sense (clearly). I hope that we can use our position as recruiters to be better than most companies at figuring out who's a good programmer, and better than most candidates at figuring out which companies are good places to work (we're candidate constrained, so we have no incentive to send people to bad companies)

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#229

Post by walshemj »

d4rti wrote: post #180
kelnos wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2) 15-25 days of vacation a year Really? 25 days is 5 weeks; I feel like the standard for PTO is 10-15 days, and often it's 10 days, but you get bumped up to 15 after you work at a place for a year or two. 3) "Unlimited vacation," which is usually a hip facade for 1 or 2. Is that really true? I have very limited first-hand experience; only two of my employers have offered unlimited vacation. For one of them, it was a…

Come to the Uk, 20 days is minimum, 25 is fairly common, plus 8 bank holidays. Sick days are extra, not taken out of holiday. Usual disclaimers about not every company etc.

One large company in the UK (part of elsiveer) I worked at offered 30 from the get go

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#230

Post by noarchy »

LordHumungous wrote: post #224
noarchy wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>On top of the interview itself, there's the hours of studying you have to put in. Yikes, are people really doing this, or feel like they must? If I'm interviewing, I expect to be asked about previous projects, maybe my Github portfolio, and so on. I also expect to be asked how I might approach a given problem within my area of work. I can't imagine studying that - I'm paid to do this stuff every day. So are we talki…

Data structures and algorithms mostly. Most companies will ask you to solve those types of questions. >If I'm interviewing, I expect to be asked about previous projects, maybe my Github portfolio, and so on. Oh. Well you are in for a big surprise if you interview at 90% of tech companies.

Maybe where you are (and how unfortunate). But in a decade-plus of doing this, I haven't been asked things like that since I was trying to find my first job in software development. At that point, asking CS 101 questions made sense, since I didn't have much in the way of products shipped, and so forth.
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