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We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

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Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#31

Post by close04 »

cjf4 wrote: post #3

>When I started programming, I heard a lot about how programmers are down to earth, not like those elitist folks who have uniforms involving suits and ties. You can even wear t-shirts to work! But if you think programmers aren't elitist, try wearing a suit and tie to an interview sometime. Indeed: http://web.archive.org/web/20140618142018/http://blog.42floo...

> Dress appropriately

> Don’t overdress, don’t underdress.

That's the kind of ultra generic advice bordering on truism. Without knowledge of exactly what that startup expects, it looks like (and the rest of the article enforces this) the only generically safe choice is jeans and sneakers. Suit is clearly defined as overdressing.

I can assume flip-flops would be a case of underdressing but I think that would be a bit ridiculous for any kind of interview regardless. So honestly, what's underdressing when it comes to such a startup interview?

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#32

Post by leetrout »

reaperducer wrote: post #28
throwaway444010 wrote: post #15

> When I've compared notes with folks who attended schools like Utah and Boise State, their education is basically the same as mine. I work at one of the well-known tech companies, and what I’ve noticed among most software engineers and data scientists is that they don’t really care about your background as long as you can do the work. Which is really nice; whenever I interview candidates, I don’t notice much correla…

There were also a few disparaging comments about the South in general Silicon Valley is all about equality and opportunity. Except when it isn't. Certain types of bigotry are not only tolerated, they're celebrated.

A large-ish, very pro-underdog company I worked for was absolutely fine with "toothless" jokes because I was from Tennessee and fat jokes. I was pretty incensed about the fat joke because that's one level under orientation, skin color, etc IMO.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#33

Post by SketchySeaBeast »

calt wrote: post #5
cjf4 wrote: post #3

>When I started programming, I heard a lot about how programmers are down to earth, not like those elitist folks who have uniforms involving suits and ties. You can even wear t-shirts to work! But if you think programmers aren't elitist, try wearing a suit and tie to an interview sometime. Indeed: http://web.archive.org/web/20140618142018/http://blog.42floo...

My university's career coaching always told us to dress at the level of the workplace + 1. I think this is a good rule. You look good, but not awkwardly out of place. Perhaps it's an unfortunate social rule that we shouldn't have to follow, but I've learned to shrug my shoulder to a lot of such rules and just go with it.

My question for that is how to figure out what the workplace looks like before you interview.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#34

Post by sigstoat »

foobiekr wrote: post #20
jdmoreira wrote: post #13

I'm sorry but I find it very hard to believe that someone with "11 years in industry" would have any trouble finding a job in this market unless there is something extremely wrong with that person. You don’t create a network of personal relationships with other professionals in 11 years? That’s crazy!

Try finding a gig as a top-notch embedded coder who has spent a decade or two doing C. Uncool stack with a helping of age bias on top. I’ve personally seen Windows developers assumed to be idiots in interview round tables even if they did fine.

> Try finding a gig as a top-notch embedded coder who has spent a decade or two doing C. Uncool stack with a helping of age bias on top.

my previous employer literally can't hire folks like that fast enough.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#35

Post by onlyrealcuzzo »

rb808 wrote: post #7

I worked on a big C# system with hundreds of windows servers, developed on Visual Studio etc. It was an awesome project and everything worked like clockwork. However there are very few projects using that technology so when I wanted to move I had trouble getting interviews. I'm now working with a very fashionable tech stack, its horrible, infrastructure is regularly broken, people can't trace problems easily, our fun…

What company is on a trendy tech stack and paying higher than FAANG+M?

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#36

Post by wool_gather »

CapmCrackaWaka wrote: post #10
z3t4 wrote: post #2

You need to present yourself as whatever image the employer/recruiter has in her/his head. For example my old employer thought that people who had their heir in a certain way was more structured and would be a better manager. Or the company might want do diversify, so they look for someone that is different . So in the end I think it's mostly about luck unless you are very good at figuring these things out.

Very true - there are often unofficial qualifications that aren't listed in the job posting too - things that would be strange to put into the official posting. We were hiring an analyst at my old company who needed to be tough. The job entailed performing statistical analysis, but also being the data liaison for some of our vendors. If the vendors were slow in responding or broke something, this analyst was the one…

Surely there's a way to wordsmith an expectation like that into the post. Off the top of my head, you could include a bullet along the lines of

- Responsible for advocating for the team's needs in liaison with vendors

Although doing so kind of points out the fundamental problem: that you probably shouldn't expect a data nerd to do this. Ideally you'd have an account manager of some kind with just enough technical understanding, but who's actually a negotiation/people person.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#37

Post by traderjane »

cjf4 wrote: post #3

>When I started programming, I heard a lot about how programmers are down to earth, not like those elitist folks who have uniforms involving suits and ties. You can even wear t-shirts to work! But if you think programmers aren't elitist, try wearing a suit and tie to an interview sometime. Indeed: http://web.archive.org/web/20140618142018/http://blog.42floo...

A suit costs way more money than t shirt and jeans. And people will know if you only have one suit, and people can eyeball if you have a bad suit — it’s like an advertisement for how low class you are, and it is in fact embarrassing and reflects on your credibility for those who don’t know you. That’s not something you control.

The casual look is as low a hurdle as you can make it. Complaining that you don’t walk in like it’s Goldman Sachs is a bit silly. What a deprivation.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#38

Post by mharroun »

The sad reality is often startups are started by smart but inexperianced founders. They hire smart and hardworking but again inexperianced senior leaders or employees who get promoted into senior leaders.

If the company then is sucessfull enough to grow/scale they need to put in formal processes and hire departments.

This inexperianced managment team often tries to cut and paste processes and demands large companies have. "They are super successful so we should copy that!!!". However what they fail to see is that's a process of a giant unicorn... and theres no way for them to truly follow there process or pay the premiums needed to support it. Thoes unicorns grew on completely different processes/tech/people. This leads to the broken disjointed processes and expectations I see in most startups.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#39

Post by jtcruthers »

close04 wrote: post #31
cjf4 wrote: post #3

>When I started programming, I heard a lot about how programmers are down to earth, not like those elitist folks who have uniforms involving suits and ties. You can even wear t-shirts to work! But if you think programmers aren't elitist, try wearing a suit and tie to an interview sometime. Indeed: http://web.archive.org/web/20140618142018/http://blog.42floo...

> Dress appropriately > Don’t overdress, don’t underdress. That's the kind of ultra generic advice bordering on truism. Without knowledge of exactly what that startup expects, it looks like (and the rest of the article enforces this) the only generically safe choice is jeans and sneakers. Suit is clearly defined as overdressing. I can assume flip-flops would be a case of underdressing but I think that would be a bit…

>What's underdressing when it comes to such a startup interview?

Flip-flops, jorts, and a cutoff tee that says "GTL" in a neon font of your choice.

Re: We Only Hire the Trendiest (2016)

#40

Post by Reedx »

Bootwizard wrote: post #19
cjf4 wrote: post #3

>When I started programming, I heard a lot about how programmers are down to earth, not like those elitist folks who have uniforms involving suits and ties. You can even wear t-shirts to work! But if you think programmers aren't elitist, try wearing a suit and tie to an interview sometime. Indeed: http://web.archive.org/web/20140618142018/http://blog.42floo...

Is it bad that I've always worn a suit and tie to interviews? Obviously nobody else there was wearing one so I did feel a bit out of place.

That means you're interviewing in hard mode and decreasing your odds. For sure it won't help you. So it's not well advised to wear a suit to a tech interview.

Unless perhaps that's genuinely how you like to dress and how you go to work. Then just make that clear at the start of the interview. Otherwise interviewers will be wondering why you're wearing a suit and are unlikely to assume it's merely an aesthetic choice (as it's rare that's the case - usually it's simply that they didn't know it was ok to be casual).

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