What's going on here, with this human? • Hacker News Board

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#31

Post by dxdm » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 9:42 AM UTC

jancsika wrote: post #4

> Absent negative externalities or monopoly effects, a man receives from the free market what he gives to it, his material worth is a running tally of the net benefit that he has provided to his fellow man. Reminds me of a line from a movie, something like this: "If everyone played poker the way they're supposed to, I would win 100% of the time."

That original quote about the free market seems tautological to me: "In a perfectly fair system, the outcomes would be fair". I can see why that's an attractive ideal, but it doesn't seem very useful to me.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#32

Post by tall » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 9:55 AM UTC

“Start with an opener that makes it safe to convey private information: “Thanks for taking the time. I’m trying to find the right seat for Jane and I’m investing the time in speaking to people who know her. Everything you say will be off the record, and I don’t plan on conveying any of it back to Jane.””

1. This is deceptive you’re pretending to want to help someone to further your own goals. I.e. immoral.

2. This encourages Bad actors to script their references. Its easy to send a script to people who act as professional references it’s a cheap service. All this does is catch anyone who doesn’t.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#33

Post by tall » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 9:58 AM UTC

flpq wrote: post #30

mcbishop wrote: post #3

> One of the greatest gifts we have for each other, for our children and spouses, for our teammates, is the positive feedback loop we can put someone into purely by believing in them, by seeing their genius and their dysfunction clearly and then helping them construct conditions for the former to flourish. Beautiful.

"He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches." In general, I think a teacher classifying genius and dysfunction is putting people into boxes and may harm his students more than helping them. I've never encountered a great teacher who talks like that. I've met many people justifying their existence and positions who do talk like that.

Agreed this article is pedantic without saying much. (Not to insult the author, I write in similar fashion and so do lots of other people)

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#34

Post by bhrgunatha » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:03 AM UTC

mcbishop wrote: post #3

> One of the greatest gifts we have for each other, for our children and spouses, for our teammates, is the positive feedback loop we can put someone into purely by believing in them, by seeing their genius and their dysfunction clearly and then helping them construct conditions for the former to flourish. Beautiful.

I used to teach children whose internal state is generally easier to assess than adults.

I remember watching as one kid said to another "I believe in you" to help out in some moment of crisis. It struck me as odd - something cheesy they'd (probably) heard in a movie or cartoon.

But if they are saying that to each other then I could probably use it to communicate better with them as long as it was sincere.

I'd say it sparingly when I thought it might be appropriate or helpful. The reactions were surprising to me, not at the time I said it, but later on. I'm not suggesting I was a major influence that sets kids on the right track, but I think it helped out somewhat and for some reason that specific phrase seemed much more powerful than other forms of encouragement.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#35

Post by tall » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:08 AM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #24

> As the gaming company Valve puts it: “Hiring well is the most important thing in the universe.” Nope, Hiring is basically almost random no matter how much energy or tests you put in it, you can never know someone well until you actually work with them on a daily basis.

Bingo

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#36

Post by watwut » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:19 AM UTC

flpq wrote: post #30

mcbishop wrote: post #3

> One of the greatest gifts we have for each other, for our children and spouses, for our teammates, is the positive feedback loop we can put someone into purely by believing in them, by seeing their genius and their dysfunction clearly and then helping them construct conditions for the former to flourish. Beautiful.

"He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches." In general, I think a teacher classifying genius and dysfunction is putting people into boxes and may harm his students more than helping them. I've never encountered a great teacher who talks like that. I've met many people justifying their existence and positions who do talk like that.

> He who can, does; he who cannot, teaches.

And the one who cant teach, complains about teachers.

In my experience people who say the above are unable to teach anybody anything.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#37

Post by samvher » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:36 AM UTC

A lot of this seems like pretty typical consulting/business wisdom - be a mastermind of people, build carefully designed teams where all the personalities complement each other, ask people hard and somewhat unexpected questions during interviews (catch them off guard, intimidate them a bit, establish your dominance, see if they get shaken).

What I'm never quite sure about is whether this actually works: it always looks a bit like a confidence game. As long as you can convince people that you're able to design great teams they will give you leadership positions and pay you a lot, and until something happens that breaks the spell, you get away with it (and you get to keep believing in it yourself, as well, which makes the sell easier).

I am sure that personalities matter, but given the complexity and unpredictability of social dynamics I'm skeptical about this really working the way it's presented.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#38

Post by smnscu » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:37 AM UTC

hiq wrote: post #27

StavrosK wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have to rely on your decades-long confirmation bias. I doubt the author (or anyone) goes back to their interview notes a year after hiring the candidate to see how much they got right.

It's also hard to do unless you're hiring for several similar positions at the same time. If you hired only one guy, who's to say that the others you rejected would have performed better or worse? If you hired 3 for similar positions, you can start making guesses from interview performances and (in)validating them one year after. But as you said I don't think it's done in practice anyway.

I once hired two engineers for the same role on my team; they both seemed about the same level during the interview. After working with them for a while, one of them was perfectly adequate, the other turned out to be the best engineer I've ever worked with.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#39

Post by mdorazio » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:57 AM UTC

ekianjo wrote: post #24

> As the gaming company Valve puts it: “Hiring well is the most important thing in the universe.” Nope, Hiring is basically almost random no matter how much energy or tests you put in it, you can never know someone well until you actually work with them on a daily basis.

Partially agree. A good hiring process can boost your odds of finding the “right” people, but my personal experience has been that firing well is at least as important as hiring well. Firing well is also something that most companies do very poorly.

Re: What's going on here, with this human?

#40

Post by mpermar » Fri, Apr 30, 2021, 10:59 AM UTC

This post and the Leetcode post both today in HN are in the totally different extremes at hiring. Try to get to dissect the person's psyche or try to find the best algorithm-maker? Totally different ways of hiring. Is the right formula in between?