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Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

braythwayt.com

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Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#21

Post by braythwayt »

Retric wrote: post #16
braythwayt wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author, who speaks of himself in the third person, was a parent and in his forties when he wrote that. Perhaps the article is not a comment on whether making conservative life choices is or isn't cool. Perhaps the article is not a comment on whether a degree in CS does or doesn't provide personal edification or improves your programming. Perhaps the article is nothing more than what it claims to be: A comment on…

Large companies employ many people without degrees, it's really front line managers that handle those requirements. Further, while self taught programmers are often very good they tend to be weaker at working with other developers on large scale projects. So, many managers have examples of both and still prefer people with degrees for most projects.

Waving hands furiously, we might say that everything is more nuänced than can be ex-plained in a tweet or a blog post, and that nothing is absolutely uniform.

We can also say that in the twelve years since this blog post was first written, attitudes towards hiring have changed in many ways. Nobody (for some loose definition of "nobody") cares how we would move Mount Fuji, or how many ping pong balls would fit in a 747.

Broadly speaking, though, I stand by the fundamental assertion that the stereotypical "BigCo" values conformity, and values people who value conformity, and that many of the things they lok for are, at a deeper level, social signals.

Startups aren't so different. In 2012, we could just as easily have rewritten this blog post to be about a startup wanting applicants to have a GitHub profile because it indicated a certain need to belong to "hacker culture" that the hypothetical startup could exploit.

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#22

Post by mc32 »

bootsz wrote: post #20

This reminds me a lot of a book I read a while ago called "Disciplined Minds" by Jeff Schmidt. It focuses on the sociological aspects of hiring practices & performance evaluation measures in the knowledge economy. It's a rather obscure book but I found it fascinating. Basically, one of the central conclusions is that many of the metrics by which knowledge workers are evaluated are really less about measuring actual t…

Do we know that people with degrees conform at greater rates than people without degrees?

Is an uneducated blue collar worker, for example less likely to conform to authority than a person with a degree or advanced degree?

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#23

Post by braythwayt »

mc32 wrote: post #22
bootsz wrote: post #20

This reminds me a lot of a book I read a while ago called "Disciplined Minds" by Jeff Schmidt. It focuses on the sociological aspects of hiring practices & performance evaluation measures in the knowledge economy. It's a rather obscure book but I found it fascinating. Basically, one of the central conclusions is that many of the metrics by which knowledge workers are evaluated are really less about measuring actual t…

Do we know that people with degrees conform at greater rates than people without degrees? Is an uneducated blue collar worker, for example less likely to conform to authority than a person with a degree or advanced degree?

I think we have to ask that question _in the context of a job where degrees are the norm_ (whether justified or not).

It could be, for example, that a person with a degree working nights as a security guard is less likely to conform, while a person without a degree who gets a job that traditionally requires a degree is less likely to conform.

Maybe it's all about being "intentionally different."

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#24

Post by EADGBE »

braythwayt wrote: post #15
patientplatypus wrote: post #11

Lame. What happens when you're over thirty and want to marry and have kids? Are you then not cool because you need/want to have a stable home? Are you not enough of a hacker, not 1337 enough, because you want to work for a company that might be around in 3 months? It never ceases to amaze me how many people, who consider themselves very smart no less, by default consider anyone even five to ten years older than them…

The author, who speaks of himself in the third person, was a parent and in his forties when he wrote that. Perhaps the article is not a comment on whether making conservative life choices is or isn't cool. Perhaps the article is not a comment on whether a degree in CS does or doesn't provide personal edification or improves your programming. Perhaps the article is nothing more than what it claims to be: A comment on…

There's way too much "conservative" in this.

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#26

Post by bootsz »

mc32 wrote: post #22
bootsz wrote: post #20

This reminds me a lot of a book I read a while ago called "Disciplined Minds" by Jeff Schmidt. It focuses on the sociological aspects of hiring practices & performance evaluation measures in the knowledge economy. It's a rather obscure book but I found it fascinating. Basically, one of the central conclusions is that many of the metrics by which knowledge workers are evaluated are really less about measuring actual t…

Do we know that people with degrees conform at greater rates than people without degrees? Is an uneducated blue collar worker, for example less likely to conform to authority than a person with a degree or advanced degree?

I'd be interested to know if anyone has attempted to research that. I'd imagine it might be hard to accurately measure levels of "conformity"

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#27

Post by dorfsmay »

Retric wrote: post #16
braythwayt wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The author, who speaks of himself in the third person, was a parent and in his forties when he wrote that. Perhaps the article is not a comment on whether making conservative life choices is or isn't cool. Perhaps the article is not a comment on whether a degree in CS does or doesn't provide personal edification or improves your programming. Perhaps the article is nothing more than what it claims to be: A comment on…

Large companies employ many people without degrees, it's really front line managers that handle those requirements. Further, while self taught programmers are often very good they tend to be weaker at working with other developers on large scale projects. So, many managers have examples of both and still prefer people with degrees for most projects.

Do they teach how to work with other developers on large scale projects in CS degrees? Or is the problem that people without those degrees can't get hired BG big corps with large scale projects and can therefore never get the experience?

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#28

Post by RightMillennial »

gaius wrote: post #25

What college proves is that you have the ability to think and execute on at least a 4-year horizon. Modern day devs where a "framework" is obsolete in 2 years when a new fashion comes along, will obviously not see the value.

Aren't most of these modern day developers 4-year Computer Science graduates though? They seem awfully short sighted to me by following every latest fad.

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#29

Post by _8j50 »

minhaz23 wrote: post #4
_8j50 wrote: post #3

This really makes you ask 'What on earth am I doing with my life?'. The article is well said ,they want you to be too scared to leave,much like a well cared for house slave would. They even trick you into believing "benefits" are a valid form of compensation. That being said,not all corps are like that. Some take in people like me with no college education(hah!) And give us opportunities to prove ourselves.

May I ask what field you are in and how you managed to get your foot in the door without a college educations?

Would love to answer,however not in a public forum like this. I can say that I paid my dues and had people take a chance on me.

Re: Why You Need a Degree to Work for BigCo (2013)

#30

Post by Retric »

dorfsmay wrote: post #27
Retric wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Large companies employ many people without degrees, it's really front line managers that handle those requirements. Further, while self taught programmers are often very good they tend to be weaker at working with other developers on large scale projects. So, many managers have examples of both and still prefer people with degrees for most projects.

Do they teach how to work with other developers on large scale projects in CS degrees? Or is the problem that people without those degrees can't get hired BG big corps with large scale projects and can therefore never get the experience?

It's a set of skills that's indirectly taught in many CS programs. You can debate the relative importance of for example a shared vocabulary, but it's clearly useful.
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