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We created a fake language to root out resume liars

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Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#721

Post by lsh123 »

NalNezumi wrote: post #58
lsh123 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was (and still am) interested in hiring people who would challenge manager, TL, ... and speak up if they think something is not right. That was just one of the filters.

If the company you worked at was big/popular enough that you needed a strong filter then I can see the merit of this. But otherwise, I can't fathom how anyone that is willing to "speak up their mind, challenge manager" would ever consider to apply for a position that radiate manager/HR/recruiter incompetence (and no tech team feedback on the posting?) People who challenge manager, TL, speaks up because it's their bus…

A few people I hired this or similar ways became my friends and we still connect, get coffee, etc. Your mileage may vary. If you want to hire warm bodies to write code then this is not a good way. If you want to hire people who will make strategic difference to your startup/company, then it is one of the possible ways.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#722

Post by lsh123 »

grogenaut wrote: post #54
lsh123 wrote: post #20

Long long time ago in a galaxy far far away I used requirement in job postings “10 years of Java experience” (when Java was about 7 years old) as a filter: people who wrote me complaining about unrealistic requirement got interviews; people who sent resumes with 15 years of Java went into /dev/null

I would have immediately sorted your posting into a bin with "doesn't know enough about the tech they are hiring for". I saw many resumes at the time that had impossible requirements like that. Unlike you were say James Gosling. And I know you weren't hiring him with a post like this.

Well, you would have made an assumption without knowing facts or trying to ask questions.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#723

Post by lsh123 »

zero_deg_kevin wrote: post #629
lsh123 wrote: post #20

Long long time ago in a galaxy far far away I used requirement in job postings “10 years of Java experience” (when Java was about 7 years old) as a filter: people who wrote me complaining about unrealistic requirement got interviews; people who sent resumes with 15 years of Java went into /dev/null

I see things like that and assume that everyone involved in writing, reviewing, and processing the position it advertises is either incompetent, negligent, or playing a game. Ultimately, I don’t care to know why, because there are other jobs with better teams at better companies.

I’ll repeat my reply above: you would have made an assumption without knowing facts or trying to ask questions

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#724

Post by lsh123 »

8ytecoder wrote: post #45
lsh123 wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was (and still am) interested in hiring people who would challenge manager, TL, ... and speak up if they think something is not right. That was just one of the filters.

I wouldn’t waste my time if I thought the hiring manager/recruiter is so incompetent. I’d have read that and bucketed the company as one of those looking to tick the boxes in years of experience.

I’ll repeat my reply to another comment: you would have made an assumption without knowing facts or trying to ask questions

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#725

Post by lsh123 »

Animats wrote: post #32
mssundaram wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's really lousy, I wouldn't have even bothered applying to that because I'd assume you had unrealistic expectations or no idea what you are talking about.

Yes. I've seen job ads asking for N years of experience in something < N years old. The assumption is that the ad is from a bottom-feeder headhunter.

I’ll repeat reply to another comment: you would have made an assumption without knowing facts or trying to ask questions

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#726

Post by brigandish »

jcpham2 wrote: post #404
brigandish wrote: post #77

> That way, when candidates were pitched to us with "X years of MOVA experience", we knew that somebody was full of it. I'd put my money on the recruiter. I once had an excruciatingly awkward interview at a company on an industrial estate in the middle of nowhereland with no train station nearby that took me bloody ages to get to… which was actually going well until they asked me about my long experience with Exchang…

Exchange 4.5< admin popping in to say hi. The management interface to 2000 was basically the same as 2003 & 2007, it wasn’t until 2010 iirc that the web based interface + everything is cloud doctrine hit.

Where were you when I needed you in the interview? ;-P

I don't remember the year it happened but it could even have been 2001, even 6 months to a year at that time would count as "extensive", I suppose. Can't say I had extensive 5.5 experience at that point either, to be fair.

They were probably concerned about their upgrade path from NT to 2000 and active directory more than just the mail server. I'll never know!

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#727

Post by brigandish »

zikduruqe wrote: post #314
brigandish wrote: post #77

> That way, when candidates were pitched to us with "X years of MOVA experience", we knew that somebody was full of it. I'd put my money on the recruiter. I once had an excruciatingly awkward interview at a company on an industrial estate in the middle of nowhereland with no train station nearby that took me bloody ages to get to… which was actually going well until they asked me about my long experience with Exchang…

Now days recruiters are lazy, they just put the word "DevOps" in and call it the day.

I wonder if that's a factor in the rise of new industry terms - I think devops is quite a good descriptor but it's still quite unnecessary, operations (or the like) is perfectly good - but, for a while at least, it does help mark you out from the crowd.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#728

Post by lsh123 »

prepend wrote: post #130
lsh123 wrote: post #20

Long long time ago in a galaxy far far away I used requirement in job postings “10 years of Java experience” (when Java was about 7 years old) as a filter: people who wrote me complaining about unrealistic requirement got interviews; people who sent resumes with 15 years of Java went into /dev/null

Seems odd to filter for people who have time and inclination to seek out the job poster and complain that they’re stupid. I guess if you want argumentative detectives that’s good. If I insert a joke into a job spec, I don’t want it to seem like I’m an idiot. I assume that any competent people I want to work with will value non-idiots and not want to work with idiots. In this case you weren’t an idiot, but just testin…

There is a difference between being argumentative and being a person to question things.

Let me give you an example. I am a pilot and I was flying to Long Beach a few weeks back. It was morning with a low marine layer so there was only one option - ILS 30. The controller was doing a harD job of merging small planes like myself and big iron (Southwest, Delta, etc) going to the same runway. The Cessna in front of me got vectors (and accepted!) to fly 10 miles into the ocean for spacing. When I heard it on the radio my first thought the was “their engine quits and they better know how to swim”. When controller asked me to follow that Cessna, my reply was “unable, don’t have my swimsuit today, but I can do left or right 360 for spacing”. The Cessna pilot accepted controllers directions without asking any questions putting himself and passengers at risk. Very few software engineers face life or death decisions, but I still like people who ask questions ;)

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#729

Post by NalNezumi »

lsh123 wrote: post #721
NalNezumi wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the company you worked at was big/popular enough that you needed a strong filter then I can see the merit of this. But otherwise, I can't fathom how anyone that is willing to "speak up their mind, challenge manager" would ever consider to apply for a position that radiate manager/HR/recruiter incompetence (and no tech team feedback on the posting?) People who challenge manager, TL, speaks up because it's their bus…

A few people I hired this or similar ways became my friends and we still connect, get coffee, etc. Your mileage may vary. If you want to hire warm bodies to write code then this is not a good way. If you want to hire people who will make strategic difference to your startup/company, then it is one of the possible ways.

>A few people I hired this or similar ways became my friends and we still connect, get coffee, etc.

Becoming a friend or not is not a causal relation to competence, but rather to your preference. And in this context makes me doubt that what underwater said in his comment might be the real goal: >They're good for determining if the test taker is the test author, and not much else.

More plausible that you only wanted to hire, well, people just like you (and that's why you became friends). Not withstanding the glaring obvious survivor bias. But if it worked, who am I to question it.

> If you want to hire warm bodies to write code then this is not a good way.

Yea but my point wasn't (or yours either) to hire warm bodies, but people that "speak up their mind, challenge manager". And we are talking how efficient(or inefficient) this is, and how many false negatives this method produce. and if your pool of applicants is big enough, it will produce true positives anyway, irrelevant of the efficiency of the filter.

Personally I think even "agreeableness" personality test mumbo-jumbo would be a better metric/filter for gaining people with "speak up their mind, challenge manager" characteristics.

Re: We created a fake language to root out resume liars

#730

Post by ficklepickle »

Pxtl wrote: post #295
winfred wrote: post #288

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I've been to plenty of interviews where my CV hasn't been given more than a glance. I have a fake programming language on my resume, has been there for years. To top it off, I used a well known video game cheat code. I've been hired several times with that on my resume, so far no one has ever mentioned it.

So what, you've listed like 5 years experience in UUDDLRLRBA?

"iddqd" maybe? IIRC that is god mode in doom. It's been like 20 years, its getting a little foggy.

Edit: I recalled correctly, IDDQD was the cheat code for god mode in the original doom.

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/iddqd

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