What Companies Mean by Culture Fit • Hacker News Board

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#131

Post by thereisnospork » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:30 PM UTC

watwut wrote: post #116

thereisnospork wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe, but cultures are relative. If a small subset of the population, 'assholes' prefer to work in an environment with other 'assholes' is it a bad thing that some companies nurture an 'asshole' culture? Provided nothing crosses the bounds of a federally protected class ofc.

Assholery is not just a question of preference. Generally, when we talk about assholes we talk about people who act unethically, lie, take advantage of others, steal whenever they get away with it and so on. Yes it is bad to build next Enron or Theranos. And yes they will cross bounds of federally protected class, because in asshole culture people need to take advantage of others as much as possible - it is not optio…

You are conflating unethical behavior with unpleasant - two very different things. If it was unclear, I am explicitly referring to the latter, which again is highly relative. A company full of dog lovers with a pet friendly office would have a high 'asshole score' to someone who is allergic to dogs while at the same time being highly appealing to some. Accommodating 'poor culture fits' in this hypothetical company would ruin the appeal for many who work there, negatively impacting business metrics like employee retention/acquisition.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#132

Post by ivraatiems » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:35 PM UTC

some_account wrote: post #89

kgilpin wrote: post #37

I'm in agreement with other commenters here that "culture fit" usually feels like a euphemism for something else. I think what it's really about is explained here in the article: "A single toxic employee who is a bad fit for the existing culture can tank the morale and productivity of an entire team. " So, is there really more to "culture fit" than the No Asshole Rule (1)? If not, can we start calling it what it is:…

50 year old programmer in the middle of an open office with 25 year olds bouncing balls around, playing loud music - bad culture fit. Foreign middle aged man who can't speak the language very good in an environment where native language is important - not a good culture fit. Female 25 year old in a group of 50 year old men who mostly wants to relax at work and are a bit awkward around young women - bad culture fit. V…

I think you're right that this happens in all the scenarios you mention.

But I'm certain the first and third example you've given aren't just "not socially accepted," they're actually illegal in the United States and many other places. The second one is questionable but may also be illegal, depending on whether the issue is actually English competency or just "he's foreign."

Only the fourth one, which is based on the person's behavior but not their membership in a protected class, is anything like what "culture fit" can or should legally be used for.

I agree with you that this kind of discrimination-by-another-name is status quo, but are you okay with it? If no, what do we do about it? If yes... why should I be?

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#133

Post by ivraatiems » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:40 PM UTC

chosenbreed wrote: post #127

lovich wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Might as well say "we may not like it, but yes, race matters for culture fit". Both are highly illegal and pretty unethical.

>...Both are highly illegal and pretty unethical Agreed. But should they? I mean if I start a company with no recourse to public funds why should I obliged to employ someone I wouldn't want to work with? I understand why it is illegal. I think the ethics are debatable too. Most importantly, I think both are routinely violated under some guise such as 'culture fit', etc.

> I mean if I start a company with no recourse to public funds why should I obliged to employ someone I wouldn't want to work with?

Because otherwise certain classes of people will never be able to get certain classes of job, despite being qualified, because the people who hold those jobs are all members of another class who doesn't want to work with them.

For example, at various times both women and African Americans couldn't become doctors. There is no evidence that women or African Americans are worse at being doctors than men or white people, but the people who _were_ doctors (mostly men and mostly white) at those times didn't want to work with them, and culture suggested they were not capable of performing that profession.

Preventing discrimination against protected classes is a balancing act - balancing the infringement on the liberties of a group that systemic discrimination brings vs infringement on the liberties of an individual or single entity by saying they cannot make choices based on certain criteria. The protected classes that exist now (such as gender and race) exist because far more harm is done to far more people when they don't exist, even factoring in the fact that certain people will lose the ability to make certain choices based on all the criteria they'd like to.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#134

Post by mmirate » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:42 PM UTC

rleigh wrote: post #123

bjornlouser wrote: post #56

Good culture fit is when we ask an employee to do something and they do it. A bad fit is someone who occasionally says no. A toxic employee occasionally says no and explains why they won't.

Why do you consider it bad to say no? Do you not expect your employees to exhibit independent thought and act professionally? If someone was asked to do something which was seriously wrong, wouldn't you want them to call it out rather than be a yes man and silently let something bad happen? If they explain exactly what's wrong and why, isn't that simply being professional? Or do you just want obedient slaves?

From the perspective of a dev: why should I be anything less than a yes-man, on topics where the decision authority clearly isn't mine?

The ACM Code of Ethics has no teeth, meaning CS isn't a profession; and even if the decision in question is so thoroughly self-destructive that the company goes under, there's plenty more companies to work-for in that case.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#135

Post by zoomablemind » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:48 PM UTC

LanceH wrote: post #8

ska wrote: post #5

In my experience "Candidate X isn't a good cultural fit" has almost always been used as short had for either "I don't want us to hire them, but I can't articulate why in way I am comfortable with" or less often "What an asshole". I don't think I've ever been part of a conversation about "cultural fit" that wasn't swimming in bullshit, or at least wading in it.

A big classifier I've seen that gets put under "cultural fit" is the "it's not my job" problem. A startup can't have people saying that, but big enterprise companies live by it. Some people just can't transition from one to the other. I've found in interviews that some people expect to do exactly what their credentials have prepared them for. At least for the places I've worked, that's insufficient for programming an…

"Not my job" may be due to dysfunctional team dynamics, where team-members are not empowered enough to feel secure about their areas of responsibility.

Basically, a situation when the areas are guarded (via seniority, permissions, available info), yet the performance or interest is no longer there. This way the responsibilities are fuzzy on purpose. "A team-player doesn't say No... - if not you, then who?!"

Ideally, a collaboraive team should not restrict the information flow, yet that's how the hierarchy works. The Boss knows, the minions infer.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#136

Post by mixmastamyk » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:50 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #106

lovich wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree it speaks to bad interviewing, because these whiteboard interviews are a bad interview practice. Yea knowing how to not acciddentally get an O(n^3) bottleneck is table stakes for development. What we get however is you interviewing for a job to make data entry apps and they ask you to implement a variety offlood fill algorithms with modifications that force edge cases unless you work around it. Or you'll be m…

Yea knowing how to not acciddentally get an O(n^3) bottleneck is table stakes for development. It seems to me that a lot of younger folks want to lower the bar below that. If you're looking for devs to show that they understand the ideas, you'd be better off telling them the problem space ahead of time so that they can prepare for it, and then deeply questioning their knowledge in that space Perhaps combine that with…

Creativity comes from solitude not with a gun to your head.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#137

Post by RHSeeger » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:56 PM UTC

convolvatron wrote: post #126

thereisnospork wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe, but cultures are relative. If a small subset of the population, 'assholes' prefer to work in an environment with other 'assholes' is it a bad thing that some companies nurture an 'asshole' culture? Provided nothing crosses the bounds of a federally protected class ofc.

if we temporarily define asshole to mean things like: - narcissistic - more interested in asserting dominance over other employees than advancing the good of the project - likely to divert the project to advance some personal goals - constantly generates interpersonal conflict then yes, you aren't getting as much as you should out of your engineering organization.

But it's not uncommon to label someone an asshole for being comfortable saying "That's a bad idea and it won't work; here's why..." rather than beating around the bush.

On the other hand, someone who is willing to "divert the project to advance some personal goals" all too often, will be very likable and sociable and not considered an asshole. There was a phrase at a company I used to work at "he doesn't need the project to succeed, he just needs it to not fail", and there were a lot of people who would drag a project on long enough to move up; really pleasant, friendly people... who didn't care who got hurt once they moved on to the next project.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#138

Post by mattnewton » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 9:59 PM UTC

dbt00 wrote: post #55

I found the Uber comments interesting. As someone on the other side of the table from Uber recruiting, I always figured a huge part of their hiring problem is that it was obvious from the early stages that Uber was run by and populated by a huge percentage of assholes, and people who had the sensitivity to understand that and the desire and choices available to avoid doing so would. Thus, the asshole primacy was main…

Agreed- I had a phone screen from Uber that turned me off from the company single handedly several years ago.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#139

Post by mixmastamyk » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 10:00 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #101

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even a seasoned expert who literally writes card shuffling software would have a difficult time writing a well-explained solution on a whiteboard in 30 minutes. Most candidates we interview have a combination of CS degrees, statistics degrees or experience, and are prepped ahead of time with some materials about the general type of question we might ask, and around 90% of them are rejected for failing to solve this q…

Even a seasoned expert who literally writes card shuffling software would have a difficult time writing a well-explained solution on a whiteboard in 30 minutes. Sure. We used to give an hour, and HR reduced it to 45 minutes. I'd rather have more time. Also, you can dial up the stringency of this particular question to an expert level where hours could be used. Or, as you admit below, it can be dialed down considerabl…

> understanding anything isn't required

Things are truly understood in solitude not with a gun to your head.

Also, what a developer knows this second has less bearing on what they could learn than often thought. No one knows everything.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#140

Post by P_I_Staker » Mon, Sep 10, 2018, 10:07 PM UTC

bjornlouser wrote: post #56

Good culture fit is when we ask an employee to do something and they do it. A bad fit is someone who occasionally says no. A toxic employee occasionally says no and explains why they won't.

No. Sometimes you must say no. No is important. Explaining why no is the answer isn't toxic, it's usually necessary, because otherwise you're saying: No, because I said so, which is toxic.