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The case for language agnostic hiring

alphalist.com

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Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#61

Post by schroeding »

wiseowise wrote: post #53
schroeding wrote: post #8

Elixir, Haskell et al. require concepts that are not required at all in e.g. Java. The functional programming module at my university had the highest failure rate after the math and statistics classes. Even something like C can require new concepts. I was a tutor for a university C programming course and students that had no problems with Java struggled hard with direct memory manipulation, pointer arithmetic etc., b…

> You can't expect Devs to self-teach each other those concepts on the side, that (advanced, third-year) CS students struggle with hard. You imply that Devs are lower on a hierarchy level than third-year CS students.

Sorry, I formulated this a bit unclear, advanced in the "advanced into their studies" sense. Not freshmen. (Thus, "advanced, third-year")

I don't think Devs are lower on some kind of "hierarchy level" than CS students. But they have less time. That is all. The article wants devs to learn completly new CS concepts without also saying that they need payed time to do so, as they otherwise have to learn in their free time for their job.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#62

Post by wiseowise »

mguerville wrote: post #17
dontlaugh wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps if workers were treated and paid better, they'd have less incentive to leave every two years.

My former CEO invested significantly in training (I personally received well over $250k worth, including leadership lessons from 2 weeks reliving D Day with military men, rowing with National champion coaches at Yale, etc.) and used to say people challenged him with « what of you spend all this money to train them and they leave? », to which he replied « what if we don’t train and develop them and they stay, isn’t th…

You know what would be even better? If you received those 250k in cash.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#63

Post by ottoflux »

100%

i always have pushed to hire based on how the developer approaches problems and thinks about logic.

the hype around memorizing referenceable facts about a specific language/stack has always been overblown.

i’ll take a hacker who learns and digs in quickly over a recalcitrant developer stuck in their ways any day.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#64

Post by oytis »

julik wrote: post #36
oytis wrote: post #29

I hate requirements about experience with specific technologies a lot as I enjoy learning new things normally, not doing what I have already done thousand times before. But what's missing from such rants are good hiring criteria. Leetcode performance? Verifiable successful projects? Being able to appear as a smart guy to team members? All of these are problematic in one way or another.

How about "you have some knowledge of stack X and you are committed to learn that particular stack and finding joy in using it"?

That's the happy case, yes. But now hiring is a competitive process, and you need criteria to compare candidates. Once you eliminate leetcode, and also eliminate biases related to candidate's class and background what you're left with? You'll have to compare how close their experiences are to the job they want. Still better than considering lack of experience with technology X a deal breaker of course

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#65

Post by schroeding »

wiseowise wrote: post #55
schroeding wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, "advanced" into their studies, they weren't freshman but almost done with their bachelors degree. And yeah, I believe that most developers can learn pointers and FP, sure, but on the side with pair programming and "mob programming", while still working a full time dev job ?

Yes.

Without using their free time?

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#66

Post by wiseowise »

gpjanik wrote: post #52
oytis wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am a C developer and would probably be able to do that, but definitely not something I enjoy (so you won't be able to hire me :) )

I don't doubt C programmers' ability to understand or use webpack (it's tedious, annoying, and often hard to debug, but not conceptually difficult - definitely easier than day-to-day problems solved by C programmers), the question is this the best use of their time & the most cost efficient way to do it (and IMHO the answer for both is that it's clearly not). It looks like we directionally agree.

They interview for your company already, so they know what type of job you do. Unless they’re idiot.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#67

Post by q-big »

celdon25 wrote: post #5

All other things being equal, I’d rather hire someone who knows four languages that we don’t use, over someone who knows only one language that happens to be the one we use. Selecting for adaptability and breadth is a better predictor of success IMO. Among other benefits.

> I’d rather hire someone who knows four languages that we don’t use, over someone who knows only one language that happens to be the one we use.

The more programming languages one knows well, the more opinionated one typically becomes because one has seen a lot of different approaches to programming. The strong opinions that the respective programmer has are not necessarily identical to the company's desired approach to programming.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#69

Post by sarchertech »

_tardigrade wrote: post #44
imgabe wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A working dev should be well beyond the understanding of a third-year CS student. This is not "advanced" from the perspective of someone in practice, it is the requirement to get in to the practice. (I know people get programming jobs without CS degrees, but if you can do that, you can teach yourself how pointers work)

I don't have CS degree but I do have 7 years commercial experience with Python/Django Rest Framework and I have no idea how pointers work.

If you need to understand what Python is doing under the hood, you’ll have to have some understanding of pointers.

Not having a decent mental model of what’s happening a few levels below severely limits the kinda of problems you can solve.

Re: The case for language agnostic hiring

#70

Post by q-big »

gpjanik wrote: post #28
roland35 wrote: post #18

I agree to an extent. A good software engineer should understand the fundamentals and be able to adapt to most environments. Unless... your team is doing something very unusual. I like to think of it as a professional sports team (let's say basketball). If you have a chance to sign a skilled player who is an all-star, 7 feet tall, and can hit 3 pointers you sign him and it will probably work out!

In a football team, if you sign a fantastic player and you place them in a position where they can't thrive, they will leave after a counterproductive year. There are plenty of historical examples of it... Just imagine Neymar playing as a center back ;) The same happens if you hire a C developer for a Node.js gig, game developer for writing a mobile app, or someone who's been building React design systems all their l…

> This whole article is assuming that smart people can and want to learn anything, which can be true, but for most of cases, it isn't.

I consider it as quite plausible that smart people can and want to learn anything. The problem rather is that this does not imply that these people will like or prefer this newly learnt approach.

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