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Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

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Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#101

Post by shagie »

Aeolun wrote: post #96
HillaryBriss wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You should expect to train and mentor ... I've always thought so too. But it doesn't seem like any companies really buy into this any more.

Not if you have to pay them a 150k starting salary!

... Or if they start looking for a new job within a few weeks of starting (the idea of getting 3-4 jobs in the first 2-3 years with increased compensation each step).

After getting a few hires that only stay for 6-12 months, its a question of "is it worth it to put in the time to mentor them if they're going to be gone shortly afterwards?"

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#102

Post by Aperocky »

gowld wrote: post #77
mreome wrote: post #27

Isn't this just observing the fact that college isn't the same as work experience, and only provides the base skill-set needed to enter enter the industry? "When you join a startup, there’s a lot of emphasis on the design of the application, reusability and clean code, and the ability to conduct and undergo code reviews, as well as the ability to think of and build systems that can scale based on users and geography"…

> "When you join a startup, there’s a lot of emphasis on the design of the application, reusability and clean code, and the ability to conduct and undergo code reviews, as well as the ability to think of and build systems that can scale based on users and geography" How can anyone take the article seriously? These are all problems that startups punt on until after they've suceeded.

This is like the opposite of a startup, the startups that I've heard about barely write tests, and that's dependent on the mood of the dev.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#103

Post by hazz99 »

gowld wrote: post #77
mreome wrote: post #27

Isn't this just observing the fact that college isn't the same as work experience, and only provides the base skill-set needed to enter enter the industry? "When you join a startup, there’s a lot of emphasis on the design of the application, reusability and clean code, and the ability to conduct and undergo code reviews, as well as the ability to think of and build systems that can scale based on users and geography"…

> "When you join a startup, there’s a lot of emphasis on the design of the application, reusability and clean code, and the ability to conduct and undergo code reviews, as well as the ability to think of and build systems that can scale based on users and geography" How can anyone take the article seriously? These are all problems that startups punt on until after they've suceeded.

I was expecting them to talk about gathering requirements, talking to users, innovating etc.

Not this!

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#104

Post by flukus »

shagie wrote: post #101
Aeolun wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not if you have to pay them a 150k starting salary!

... Or if they start looking for a new job within a few weeks of starting (the idea of getting 3-4 jobs in the first 2-3 years with increased compensation each step). After getting a few hires that only stay for 6-12 months, its a question of "is it worth it to put in the time to mentor them if they're going to be gone shortly afterwards?"

> ... Or if they start looking for a new job within a few weeks of starting (the idea of getting 3-4 jobs in the first 2-3 years with increased compensation each step).

This is half tragedy of the commons of so few companies offering training and half companies being so god awful at offering raises as employees gain experience.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#105

Post by shagie »

slothtrop wrote: post #57

Even startups should be willing to train. The skills really aren't that hard to pick up with the right mindset and knowledge a CS grad ought to have. We had an intern come in that was still stuck in that student-mode of needing to be told everything and not asking pointed enough questions. After a few weeks they were up to speed and productive. Frankly even experienced workers will still require a period to absorb sp…

They should. Often, they aren't. There are a number of reasons there - some don't have the time.

> Because startups need to bring their products to market quickly, applications are built iteratively, with rapid prototyping. The timing of the product release is crucial because it has a direct impact on acquiring customers and affects the bottom line. Significant delays can put a company out of business. While time to market is also vital for large companies, their software releases are typically for established products, and if they run late, such companies usually have the money to survive.

---

Some don't have enough people to properly mentor and train a new hire.

The page for the startup of the engineer featured in the article: https://www.linkedin.com/company/datarista/about/

> size 2-10 employees

I would contend that any company in the 2-10 range hiring a new grad is a mistake for both particles.

---

Some acknowledge the "they get a job, they get trained, and they go on to greener pa$ture$." In this case, the mentoring is a lost ROI in many cases.

---

My reading of the desires of the person featured in the article... they want to hire a person at new grad wages who knows how to debug a legacy code base, architect a cloud solution, come up with new product ideas, do market research, and be a participant in the "devops means we give developers root" culture... and be able to do this within single digit number of days.

Those are things that come with experience and failure. No class or boot camp will teach those things to a point where the person is competent in them without some good time to work on those skills (side note: this is where college often produces better candidates than boot camps - they've got more time to learn the tools).

Rambling on the above... I now have a one question that will distinguish a good candidate from a poor one: "How do you set a breakpoint in your preferred debugger?"

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#106

Post by cle »

cameronbrown wrote: post #83
cle wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> FAANG...have literally too much talent coming through the door From first hand experience, I would strongly disagree... I won't beat the dead horse of the sad state of tech interviews, but just wanted to point out that this statement does not align with my experience at all.

I'm more referring to quantity than quality. At that scale it's better to optimise for a lower false positive rate because your business isn't going to collapse if you miss a decent candidate.

It will negatively impact the business if the business can’t identify the best candidates. It can have a low false positive rate and still hire relatively mediocre engineers. Which is what I’ve seen happen over and over again.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#107

Post by matwood »

andrewljohnson wrote: post #47
geebee wrote: post #10

Really? Cause it seems, based on my interviews, startups couldn't care less about my background in leading customers through beta demos, collaborating with scientists, participating in sales presentations and outreach, writing documentation, or any of the issues described here. They do seem awful interested in whether I can find all matching subtrees in a binary tree, though. Which, now that I think about, is the one…

The thing about all of those skills is they are all soft skills, that can be taught quickly on the job to the right candidates. Whereas a deep ability to solve a technical problem cannot be taught in a reasonable amount of time to most people. Asking someone to find the matching subtrees in a binary tree might not be the best interview question, and to some extent it is kind of trivia for "did you grok your CS educat…

> The thing about all of those skills is they are all soft skills, that can be taught quickly on the job to the right candidates. Whereas a deep ability to solve a technical problem cannot be taught in a reasonable amount of time to most people.

This is the exact opposite I have seen in 20 some odd years of working. Maybe if you mean deep technical skills as an expert in cutting edge ML? Thing is, most companies do not need that that depth of expertise. They need someone who can get build standard web/mobile apps, and not be an asshole (and even a bigger plus if they know anything about business/finance/project management). How many assholes have you ever turned into not assholes vs. how many people have you been able to teach something technical? Soft skills are hard for many people.

EDIT

Wanted to add that a pretty standard soft skill of being able to check their ego often allows people to learn more easily than those who can't put their ego aside.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#108

Post by donw »

nickpinkston wrote: post #97
donw wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Candidly, I would say that college does not even provide the base skill-set. In the Real World(tm) of building software, you will work on systems built over years by other people, many of which have long since left the project or company. The level of integration tests, unit tests, documentation, and automation will depend entirely on the culture of the organization. Databases, low-level I/O, sorting operations, and…

Maybe make them work on open source projects? Or even the college's own toy systems?

There's a wealth of opportunities here.

Annually from the second year on during a computer science or software engineering program, students should be required to have one class where they spend at least one full day per week contributing to their choice of one of the following:

(1) An open-source project approved by the instructor.

(2) Production software used within the university, excluding systems dealing with student or faculty PII or sensitive information (grades, schedules, etc). Lots of opportunities here to contribute across the sciences!

(3) Non-commercial software benefitting the community or government at any level (from local to national).

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#109

Post by mailslot »

donw wrote: post #75
mreome wrote: post #27

Isn't this just observing the fact that college isn't the same as work experience, and only provides the base skill-set needed to enter enter the industry? "When you join a startup, there’s a lot of emphasis on the design of the application, reusability and clean code, and the ability to conduct and undergo code reviews, as well as the ability to think of and build systems that can scale based on users and geography"…

Candidly, I would say that college does not even provide the base skill-set. In the Real World(tm) of building software, you will work on systems built over years by other people, many of which have long since left the project or company. The level of integration tests, unit tests, documentation, and automation will depend entirely on the culture of the organization. Databases, low-level I/O, sorting operations, and…

Conversely, too much practical experience can lead to a lack of fundamental understanding, innovation, and helplessness.

I can’t stand it when an engineer wastes hours looking for a library, instead of even considering actually writing code themselves. Many just can’t because they’re so accustomed to glueing together other people’s code.

Of course, I’ve worked with academic types that can never stop theorizing and actually be productive. That have zero discipline.

There has to be a balance. But yes, fresh out of school == fairly worthless for anything I’ve worked on ever.

Re: Software Engineering Grads Lack the Skills Startups Need

#110

Post by SkyPuncher »

all_blue_chucks wrote: post #25
paxys wrote: post #7

The skills startups want are taught at coding bootcamps, not universities. The degree is called computer science for a reason.

Most major schools offer degrees called Software Engineering. Most Computer Science students are looking for careers in Software Engineering. So ultimately it is called computer science for the wrong reason.

I am not aware of any that offer SE. I went to a highly practical school and the SE discussion frequently came up - because many students preferred the pratical to theoretical.

Ultimately, my school could not offer a formal Software Engineering. "Engineering" degrees have not caught up with the times to include software. A software engineering degree would require completely irrelevant course in physical science - like thermodynamics, statics, and advance physics.

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