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What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

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Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#151

Post by poulsbohemian »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #75
DoofusOfDeath wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For example, all the senior engineers I may be wrong, but it sounds like you're using hyperbole in two ways here: (a) you make a statement about all the senior engineers you know, and (b) that statement makes a rather extreme claim about how they evaluate candidates. I think using hyperbole is a mistake in this conversation because we're interested specifically in how common and how intense these phenomena are. (I…

It is sincerely not hyperbole. My company has 12 principal engineers including me, and in the meeting where we discuss interviewing and hiring, the anecdote I described above is literally the standard of discourse. I can’t be certain that the same would have applied to all senior engineers in other companies where I previously worked. But I did interact with dozens of other senior engineers over the years and it’s a…

I like your choice of the word myopia, because I think you've accurately captured one of the central problems in hiring. Rather than finding ways to accurately assess whether a person can do the job, grow in their career to benefit the future needs of the team and company, we instead look to more or less trick them using technical games and puzzles that generally have nothing to do with the work they will be doing.

> I think it’s a symptom of the tech world wishing to be associated with generally progressive human values

I'm having trouble parsing this part of your statement, but let me say that I think it is more a function of the personality types that get into software development and technology more broadly. Many of us are INTJ types (self included and yes I know that Myers-Briggs is bunk to many of you), and many of us have what was formerly called Aspbergers. In short, there are particular personality types that go into these fields, and those personality types fixate on details. So it isn't surprising that's how many then interview and expect their fellow team members to exhibit similar traits. Without going too far off tangent, I think this is often why this field is seen as combative towards women and non-white people, IE: it has less to do with a deliberate desire to exclude and more to do with the quirks of the people who enter this field.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#152

Post by mgkimsal »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #141
SonnyWortzik wrote: post #119

We joke a lot about that after I was hired as a middle aged coder... during interview Boss: "so do you think you can fit in this culture?" Me: "You mean, do I wear skinny jeans and drink kale smoothies? Probably not, but if you want your work done, does culture fit matter when you have a mile long back log?" Boss: "good point, so... How does your schedule look for next week?" it was all history from there.

Often companies actually do care more about optics than productivity. I’ve definitely worked in large, successful companies where wearing the skinny jeans and drinking the smoothie are vastly more important than your productivity most of the time. Another big, obvious manifestation of this is open-plan offices. “Does working in a noisy, open space that doesn’t actually save significant money relative to engineer sala…

If you're the person getting stuff done, while others aren't relative to your output, you make others look bad which certainly doesn't help you 'fit in' with the culture.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#153

Post by protopeer »

aeternus wrote: post #145
stcredzero wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience about 'culture fit' was that it was a code word for ageism. I've experienced people figuring out my age when looking at my resume, then weirdly warping the questions while accusing me of Googling the answers in response. (Based only on hearing me type. I was scripting a Python script to give the answer.)

Interesting, that instinct to Google for the answer is actually one of the 'culture fits' that we look for. There are a surprising number of candidates & engineers that simply give up when they encounter a hard problem.

perhaps if you make it clear that it's okay to Google, then you might get a different outcome. it's highly common for candidates to assume that in an interview, it's not allowed or highly penalized to do so.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#154

Post by maxxxxx »

aeternus wrote: post #145
stcredzero wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience about 'culture fit' was that it was a code word for ageism. I've experienced people figuring out my age when looking at my resume, then weirdly warping the questions while accusing me of Googling the answers in response. (Based only on hearing me type. I was scripting a Python script to give the answer.)

Interesting, that instinct to Google for the answer is actually one of the 'culture fits' that we look for. There are a surprising number of candidates & engineers that simply give up when they encounter a hard problem.

I would google for the answer too if the expectation was to find the right solution quickly. I have rarely had an interview where they gave me time to think through a problem. The wanted "the" answer quickly without much thinking.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#155

Post by 1337biz »

zoomablemind wrote: post #103
some_account wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Shouldn't then the job descriptions just mention that so it's obvious for the applicant beforehand?

That's actually a good point. If job discriptions had a short description of the team / company culture, it would weed out many non fitting candidates.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#156

Post by komodosquirrel »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #141
SonnyWortzik wrote: post #119

We joke a lot about that after I was hired as a middle aged coder... during interview Boss: "so do you think you can fit in this culture?" Me: "You mean, do I wear skinny jeans and drink kale smoothies? Probably not, but if you want your work done, does culture fit matter when you have a mile long back log?" Boss: "good point, so... How does your schedule look for next week?" it was all history from there.

Often companies actually do care more about optics than productivity. I’ve definitely worked in large, successful companies where wearing the skinny jeans and drinking the smoothie are vastly more important than your productivity most of the time. Another big, obvious manifestation of this is open-plan offices. “Does working in a noisy, open space that doesn’t actually save significant money relative to engineer sala…

I see that in start-ups. Their workforce must look "fresh" and "cool", "Instagram ready". This supposedly brings money apparently bored with life Angel investors love to burn. In those companies your product is a lifestyle for investors, what you are actually making is secondary. If someone is talented, it is a worst place to be in.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#157

Post by 1337biz »

BadassFractal wrote: post #52
uhhhhhhh wrote: post #29

In my experience, "Culture fit" has always been the cover for "toxic" workplaces where sexism, bullying and worse run rampant. If everyone acts professional then chances are you'll figure out how to work together. If you're unable to act professional then chances are the new hire isn't the problem, you are.

The candidate can also be toxic and unprofessional, this is a two-way street. What if the company doesn't want to bring "sexism, bullying and worse" into the group?

Such an elegant response. Thanks you for that!

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#158

Post by SamReidHughes »

tzs wrote: post #122
mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s still hard to know what this means. For example, all the senior engineers I currently work with are great at telling a story about how they look to hire based on talent, self-awareness, critical thinking, and many soft skills, and that the technical particulars are only incidental guideposts. Then they proceed to ask candidates to derive a card shuffling algorithm on a whiteboard in 30 minutes and fail them from…

> Then they proceed to ask candidates to derive a card shuffling algorithm on a whiteboard in 30 minutes and fail them from the interview if the running time complexity would be too high or if they can’t mathematically prove the result would be a uniform draw from the space of permutations of the cards. I'd actually expect a surprisingly large fraction of programmers to be able to do reasonably OK on that particular…

Yep. I encountered the problem of shuffling while writing QBASIC code as a teenager. I couldn't prove that random swapping wasn't uniform, in those days, but was able to come up with the uniform algorithm everybody uses now and feel comfortable with its correctness.

Granted, the interview question is pretty bad if it's just a test of if you've seen the problem already.

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#159

Post by meowface »

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #141
SonnyWortzik wrote: post #119

We joke a lot about that after I was hired as a middle aged coder... during interview Boss: "so do you think you can fit in this culture?" Me: "You mean, do I wear skinny jeans and drink kale smoothies? Probably not, but if you want your work done, does culture fit matter when you have a mile long back log?" Boss: "good point, so... How does your schedule look for next week?" it was all history from there.

Often companies actually do care more about optics than productivity. I’ve definitely worked in large, successful companies where wearing the skinny jeans and drinking the smoothie are vastly more important than your productivity most of the time. Another big, obvious manifestation of this is open-plan offices. “Does working in a noisy, open space that doesn’t actually save significant money relative to engineer sala…

But have you seen this sort of thing at a company that wasn't dysfunctional or unsuccessful?

Re: What Companies Mean by Culture Fit

#160

Post by jayalpha »

ionforce wrote: post #148
seppin wrote: post #49

"I don't want to spend 8 hours a day with this person" is a perfectly good reason not to hire someone.

Do you maintain that stance if that sentiment is rooted in gender or race or sexuality (etc etc)?

My mind is still puzzled by this discussion and I will think deeply about it. But regarding your question: Yes, why not? I learned it the hard way that sometimes some kind of sentiment is good. :-)
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