The software industry's greatest sin: hiring • Hacker News Board

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#571

Post by frankzinger » Sun, Apr 12, 2020, 5:44 AM UTC

kcorey wrote: post #540

In my experience the UK is slightly less focused on credentials than the backwards boneheads in the US. That's the good news. The bad news is that tech interviews in the UK tend toward the same faux-IQ test mentality. When are recruiters going to realise that just because you can reduce a person to a HackerRank score, that doesn't inform a good hiring decision? I've often said the only way to see how someone is going…

> When are recruiters going to realise that just because you can reduce a person to a HackerRank score, that doesn't inform a good hiring decision?

Never. If tech people can't find a way to do it there is no way a non-technical person will be able to. Pretty sure this is why Google has its own recruiters. Your average recruiter has no clue how to grade candidates. For other companies it's probably best to find a way to apply directly.

I recently went through the process and got a job from a direct application. I dealt directly with the tech lead. The process was entirely devoid of BS. We understood each other right from the beginning---perfect clarity. After the little bit of time I spent looking through job ads and dealing with recruiters I am endlessly thankful that I got this job before having had to deal with all that for longer than a couple of weeks. The difference was stark.

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#572

Post by lmm » Sun, Apr 12, 2020, 1:36 PM UTC

learc83 wrote: post #553

lmm wrote: post #534

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's no you were rigorous enough in tracking this for this statement to be useful to anyone. Sure, but has anyone claiming the opposite done rigorous analysis? Is there any evidence that having a CS degree makes for better programmers than not? > The people who don't fit the mold stand out. I'm not thinking about people who stood out as particularly unusual. Most of the time I didn't find out which field someone…

>Sure, but has anyone claiming the opposite done rigorous analysis? Is there any evidence that having a CS degree makes for better programmers than not? I'm not making that claim, you're the one making a claim that people with degrees other than CS are better programmers without evidence. I'll only make the claim that a CS degree made me a better programmer. Specifically the upper level theoretical classes. I can ver…

> Absent any other evidence though, the simplest explanation is that domain specific knowledge is likely useful.

Disagree; surely the null hypothesis for any given training programme is that it has no effect.

> The point is that the more unusual someone's background is, the more likely you are to remember it. Particularly if there is some confirmation bias involved.

There isn't anything unusual about professional programmers having a degree in maths or physics rather than CS. At least in my experience it was pretty close to an equal split.

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#573

Post by cies » Sun, Apr 12, 2020, 4:40 PM UTC

ativzzz wrote: post #468

cies wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's common to all developing nations, and the US (which is both a developing nation and a developed nation in one).

It's common to all nations, period.

It's a heck of a lot less common in Scandinavian countries, or even a large part of (Eastern-) Europe. But yeah, no facts, just an opinion i guess

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#574

Post by pdimitar » Sun, Apr 12, 2020, 8:31 PM UTC

frankzinger wrote: post #570

pdimitar wrote: post #227

Anecdotal evidence: Several times in my life I've had the strange luck of being told the internal workings of a decision after I was rejected for a job. Usually somebody from the interviewers liked me but couldn't convince the others, and subsequently decides to find me on LinkedIn and send me a direct message. The messages have been eerily similar and are usually like this: "Hey Dimi, I want you to know that I think…

Yeah almost anything is possible so one really has to try not to obsess about it too much. I know it's hard. I can't say I'm able to do it either. Anyway, my anecdote: we were interviewing for a C developer position. The next candidate was in his 50s. Our project leader took a dislike to him the moment he saw his resume. No idea why but I assumed it was either his age or that this project leader knew him and didn't w…

Not sure how legal this is (the giving insights into your internal processes to a stranger part) but since there are no trade secrets involved I'd imagine it's quite safe.

As I said above, it can be really bittersweet knowing the details but I'd advise you to strive to show maximum sympathy -- including contact them privately and let them know what and why happened.

It's a little comfort for somebody who is about to run out of savings to hear "sorry that our process is so effed up, dude, and best of luck in the future!" but I can assure you that it helps them make peace with that past further down the line.

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#575

Post by lordCarbonFiber » Sun, Apr 12, 2020, 8:47 PM UTC

thu2111 wrote: post #547

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #479

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This line of reasoning doesn't hold up. It's just as easy to flip your conclusion on it's head currently; any given member of a majority group could be viewed as only being hired because of internal biases, not merit. To contribute my own, relatively unique, anecdote, Ive interviewed both as a man and as a woman and the process is considerably easier when you just get to coast through on the "white nerdy guy, must kn…

There are no internal biases in favour of men in any organisation, anywhere. This is feminist propaganda - an assumption that if women dominate a field it's because they're good at it, but if men dominate it's because of innate sexism. Showing bias in favour of women is very easy: just quote the executive leadership saying things like "we want more women", cite pro-women policies or present one of many other pieces o…

The amount of just unsourced vitriol of your comment is unapproachable. Like, jsut, do some basic math. If you assume roughly even distributions of talent across gender and compound the fact that people tend to not like working in environments where they feel tokenized, hiring women (or any unrepresented minority talent) is just good business sense, no moralizing required.

Maybe try talking to actual women in the field before making such wildly false claims. I do find it hilarious that there's this overarching "feminist propaganda" and despite all that tech companies still routinely have essentially no women in the engineering staff. [0]

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#576

Post by thu2111 » Mon, Apr 13, 2020, 12:14 PM UTC

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #575

thu2111 wrote: post #547

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are no internal biases in favour of men in any organisation, anywhere. This is feminist propaganda - an assumption that if women dominate a field it's because they're good at it, but if men dominate it's because of innate sexism. Showing bias in favour of women is very easy: just quote the executive leadership saying things like "we want more women", cite pro-women policies or present one of many other pieces o…

The amount of just unsourced vitriol of your comment is unapproachable. Like, jsut, do some basic math. If you assume roughly even distributions of talent across gender and compound the fact that people tend to not like working in environments where they feel tokenized, hiring women (or any unrepresented minority talent) is just good business sense, no moralizing required. Maybe try talking to actual women in the fie…

If you assume roughly even distributions of talent across gender

Given the differences in the genders of who chooses to study the relevant qualifications, that's obviously a false assumption.

The amount of just unsourced vitriol of your comment is unapproachable

My comments are phrased in a level, factual manner. They're mostly retellings of things seen or experienced first hand, thus I am myself the source. But if you want sourced evidence of similar claims, by all means, go read the recruiter lawsuit against Google that was filed. It has plenty.

Maybe try talking to actual women in the field before making such wildly false claims

If you're going to assert a claim is false you need to pick something specific and show it's false, otherwise you're just blustering. And having direct experience of talking to women about this, I can tell you that many recognise the built-in advantage they have and are quite uncomfortable about it.

I do find it hilarious that there's this overarching "feminist propaganda" and despite all that tech companies still routinely have essentially no women in the engineering staff. [0]

It's pretty ironic that you put citation number in square brackets and then don't actually provide one, given your moaning about unsourced claims. As for "essentially no women" you mean about 15-20%, which is far cry from essentially none. It's this sort of thing that justifies my claim of propaganda; it's normal for jobs to have unbalanced distributions of genders. Very few jobs have exactly equal proportions of men and women. For instance HR has a higher proportion of women than software has a proportion of men, but I don't see much talk of the terrible anti-male bias that must obviously pervade the HR industry. /s

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#577

Post by learc83 » Mon, Apr 13, 2020, 1:36 PM UTC

lmm wrote: post #572

learc83 wrote: post #553

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Sure, but has anyone claiming the opposite done rigorous analysis? Is there any evidence that having a CS degree makes for better programmers than not? I'm not making that claim, you're the one making a claim that people with degrees other than CS are better programmers without evidence. I'll only make the claim that a CS degree made me a better programmer. Specifically the upper level theoretical classes. I can ver…

> Absent any other evidence though, the simplest explanation is that domain specific knowledge is likely useful. Disagree; surely the null hypothesis for any given training programme is that it has no effect. > The point is that the more unusual someone's background is, the more likely you are to remember it. Particularly if there is some confirmation bias involved. There isn't anything unusual about professional pro…

>Disagree; surely the null hypothesis for any given training programme is that it has no effect.

That's not what's under test here though. It's training program A that includes domain specific knowledge or training program B that does not.

>There isn't anything unusual about professional programmers having a degree in maths or physics rather than CS. At least in my experience it was pretty close to an equal split.

Look at the number of graduates, the only way that is true is if almost every single physics or math graduate goes into programming. The fact that you think it's true is just further evidence of bias.

According to the Stack Overflow Developer Survey [1], about 8% of professional developers with degrees majored in math, or natural sciences vs. 63% in CS, software engineering, or computer engineering. There could be some sampling bias, but that's a huge difference.

1. https://insights.stackoverflow.com/survey/2019#education

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#578

Post by jiveturkey » Mon, Apr 13, 2020, 6:08 PM UTC

Drecula wrote: post #495

jiveturkey wrote: post #477

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You say that as if you were born perfect. As someone of elder years myself (and not just by SV standards), what you are saying is quite obvious to anyone with experience. But when you're young and know everything, it's not so obvious. We too, were brave believers of complex == good in our youth. Well, I sure was. It's also important to learn by failing (aka learn by doing). Like parenting, there are many things in or…

I'm sorry if I made it sound like I was born perfect. That wasn't what I was trying to convey. Yes, we learn by making mistakes, and I've sure made at least my fair share of them. My point is that horking out algorithms on demand is definitely not the same thing as being a competent software engineer, nor is it particularly predictive of the likelihood of developing those skills. Also, I measure my success by the peo…

Agreed!! Sorry I didn't mean to accuse you of anything.

I share your criticism for poor interview practices. But not that basic knowledge whiteboard questions are asked -- sadly, it's a requirement -- rather that most don't get beyond that. Or dwell on the classic "OMG how could you not know this piece of trivia that we only learned here at our org after 12 years refining the solution".

Anyway I adore that kind of interview. It lets me know I don't want to work there! I call those interviews successful. Most candidates (or at least most discussion of interviews from the candidate POV) seem to think the entire purpose of an interview is to prostrate yourself to the all powerful company, that they may see you as worthy, oh master. It's the wrong perspective.

So while I share your criticism, I am not dismayed by it.

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#579

Post by lordCarbonFiber » Mon, Apr 13, 2020, 8:30 PM UTC

thu2111 wrote: post #576

lordCarbonFiber wrote: post #575

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The amount of just unsourced vitriol of your comment is unapproachable. Like, jsut, do some basic math. If you assume roughly even distributions of talent across gender and compound the fact that people tend to not like working in environments where they feel tokenized, hiring women (or any unrepresented minority talent) is just good business sense, no moralizing required. Maybe try talking to actual women in the fie…

If you assume roughly even distributions of talent across gender Given the differences in the genders of who chooses to study the relevant qualifications, that's obviously a false assumption. The amount of just unsourced vitriol of your comment is unapproachable My comments are phrased in a level, factual manner. They're mostly retellings of things seen or experienced first hand, thus I am myself the source. But if y…

My bad for the previously missing source that's on me. Ive expanded on the thought below with references. (and despite calling me out you still can't find a single source for your claims (short of a vague, go read a document I clearly haven't read for me, which is just, beautiful))

Edited previous comment for the missing source, that's my bad. (and despite calling me out you still can't find a single source for your claims (short of a vague command to go read a document you clearly haven't read, which is just, beautiful))

Let's even abandon, for the sake of argument, any desire to see ratios in engineering even approach demographic ratios and instead just look at the rates graduating with CS degrees. That puts the ceiling closer to between 30 and 40 percent[0, for a representative top tier school] and, by your own admission, we close to half that on average (the numbers fall of faster if you consider technology leadership[1] or look more at smaller companies (which is harder to source considering a lot of places aren't very open with regards to their hiring stats, but in my experience working in nyc I’ve only seen sub 10% (N=3). Sub 10% to me essentially none, since that can basically evaporate with normal engineering churn). If we were to assume there was a grand bias, you'd expect an over representation in relation to the rate graduating at the very least.

“Thing exists” does not imply “thing normal” or “thing ideal”[3]. That’s a common logical fallacy used to justify traditionalism in all forms. Also, as an aside, people are talking about inequality in the HR field, you’re just not paying attention to it (tldr it is weird that there are more women and even with the numerical advantage they’re still underrepresented in leadership which reflects in their comp) [2]. When we look at technology it’s especially strange because there is no clear mechanism (outside of social bias) that might explain why we’d see the ratios present. Despite what men on the internet like to believe there’s no evidence women that go into math or computer science are worse at it than men. Estrogen is great but it doesn’t change your ability to write code. Hell no mechanism to explain why the ratios are more skewed than medicine [5] or law[4] even.

As for women being “uncomfortable talking with you about this”, I’d suspect that has a lot to do with your fear of a nonexistent feminsit boogieman and repeated claims that they don’t deserve their jobs than any kind of conspiracy. Imposter syndrome acts across genders and this repeated narrative plays to a lot of people’s insecurities.

[0]http://oue.gatech.edu/sites/default/files/Georgia%20Tech%20C... [1] https://www.statista.com/chart/4467/female-employees-at-tech... [2] https://recruitingheadlines.com/71-percent-of-hr-professiona... [3]https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Appeal-... [4] https://www.enjuris.com/students/law-school-female-enrollmen... [5]https://www.ama-assn.org/residents-students/specialty-profil...

This was far more effort than you deserve, but, I can only hope one day the culture at some of these major tech companies start to change, if only so I don't have to hear think pieces about how hard it is to hire from people that auto exclude 50% of the population. I can't imagine why women are uncomfortable talking you, a proud sexist that openly claims there's feminist propaganda involved in their hiring. I can't think of any reason short of shame of being involved in such an obvious conspiracy.

Re: The software industry's greatest sin: hiring

#580

Post by jerrya » Tue, Apr 14, 2020, 7:49 AM UTC

laingc wrote: post #221

ramraj07 wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No sane non-narcissistic person will ever fathom doing 2 PhDs. You do a PhD to learn how to think and research things. The only reason you would imagine doing a second one (assuming you're not someone who completely misunderstood what a PhD means), is so you can boast about it.

What utter rubbish. I know several people with two PhDs - for example one guy who went from theoretical physics to economics - and they are all humble and brilliant. If I didn't have a family to support and a mortgage to pay, I'd consider doing a second PhD, given how much I enjoyed my first.

In High School, I went to a summer chemistry program. One professor had 23 degrees, for real, ranging from chemistry to religion. I don't know if he had more than one Ph.D.

But when I got to college, one of my professors had been this first guy's student, and one of my other professors had been the second professor's student.

fwiw...