I don't hire unlucky people • Hacker News Board

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#51

Post by raganwald » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:03 PM UTC

emmett wrote: post #43

This is the opposite of my experience. When we greatly narrowed the pool of applicants from "people who want to work on live video" to "people who want to work on live video for gaming", we saw a huge uptick in how many people were interested in working for us. TwitchTV is more attractive for programmers than Justin.tv ever was. There is something to be said for appealing to a smaller group of people more strongly.

Great comment. May I suggest for discussion the following proposition:

There is a difference between narrowing the pool of applicants by being specific about things directly relevant for the job and narrowing the pool of applicants by being specific about things only indirectly related to the job.

“We’re looking for Haskell Programmers” is not the same thing as, “We like to hire MIT Graduates."

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#52

Post by rmk2 » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:05 PM UTC

mathetic wrote: post #20

The article summarizes the difference between British and American college entrance system as well. When you apply for CS in Britain (and I'm talking about Oxbridge), they care only about your experience with computers and mathematics. However, in HYPMS [1] the qualification is based on your irrelevant grades and your extracurriculars. You might be the most active guy and get a place but a poor programmer. [1] Harvar…

I wrote something very similar today in a response to another comment on another article..., also about the british/american divide (and it might also be about Oxbridge)

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3802440

The quoted parts are actual quotes from the individual application processes, for what it's worth.

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#53

Post by rizzom5000 » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:11 PM UTC

While I enjoyed the article and its message, I found the spelling error on the resume example underwhelming. A professional's resume is the veneer they present to strangers. It's like the login page for your app. Do you want a spelling error there when it is so easy to avoid? It screams sloppy and lazy in the same sentence. Maybe the general quality of professional devs is so bad that sloppiness and laziness are better than the alternative... ?

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#54

Post by terryk88a » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:13 PM UTC

stcredzero wrote: post #48

Just this morning, I was thinking about metrics. It should be possible to develop a set of metrics for code quality that would apply to apps using particular languages and libraries. These metrics would be general and very imperfect, but they would still have some utility. For example, it would be fairly easy to develop an automated metrics program to run on a given Ruby on Rails app. Things like depth of nesting in…

No No NO. There really Really REALLY has never been a satisfactory set of metrics for code quality. Not for COBOL and not for rails.

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#55

Post by zavulon » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:13 PM UTC

idan wrote: post #4

This is exactly what we've been thinking about for the last year while we've been building http://skillsapp.com . Exactly. Love it when lucid, articulate writers take my mess of a brain and put the right words to it.

Something that wasn't clear to me - as an employer - what do I get when I sign up? Do you have candidates' profiles like the sample one in the system, or I will have to provide my own candidates to filter through your system to get a profile like that?

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#56

Post by swang » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:17 PM UTC

karamazov wrote: post #39

mathetic wrote: post #20

The article summarizes the difference between British and American college entrance system as well. When you apply for CS in Britain (and I'm talking about Oxbridge), they care only about your experience with computers and mathematics. However, in HYPMS [1] the qualification is based on your irrelevant grades and your extracurriculars. You might be the most active guy and get a place but a poor programmer. [1] Harvar…

In the US, you don't apply to a school for CS - you just apply to the university as undergraduate. It's quite common for undergraduates to not know what they want to study as freshmen, and to change their minds over the course of university. That being said, HYPMS do want you to have good grades overall and solid extracurriculars, it's immensely helpful to be world-class in some activity; the particular activity does…

That is not true at all schools in the US. At least not when I applied around 10 years ago. A lot of schools, especially the top tier CS programs told me that I would not be allowed to go in undeclared and then transfer into their CS program. I had to declare as a CS or I wouldn't get in. I knew some people were able to get away with not declaring and transferring in but I didn't want to risk it.

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#57

Post by raganwald » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:17 PM UTC

rizzom5000 wrote: post #53

While I enjoyed the article and its message, I found the spelling error on the resume example underwhelming. A professional's resume is the veneer they present to strangers. It's like the login page for your app. Do you want a spelling error there when it is so easy to avoid? It screams sloppy and lazy in the same sentence. Maybe the general quality of professional devs is so bad that sloppiness and laziness are bett…

What is the difference between a spelling mistake and failing to wear a tie to an interview? I suggest nothing except for cultural standards. Once upon a time, they were both punishable by immediate removal from the process. Today one is tolerated but the other not tolerated.

they both signal the same thing: “I meticulously went over my presentation to ensure that it meets your expectations.”

Let’s be clear: I think that everyone looking for a job should present the best possible face, including the appropriate spelling and grammar. It’s just that when hiring, I can easily overlook a spelling mistake if I think the candidate may be that one in one hundred.

ANOTHER THOUGHT: To be fair, spelling mistakes are a lot closer to the line than cultural fit or politics or things like gender and race. You can’t change your race to suit the job. Things like your politics are changeable, but unless you have a strong ethical objection to the company’s line of business (I have declined to work on contract with a Tobacco company), it’s in society’s best interests for you to be able to keep your political views without being swayed by your employer.

Spelling on a cover letter is a different matter. Most people don’t have a disability that prevents them from getting it right, and there is no greater benefit to society in forcing employers to ignore spelling. It’s a matter that is narrowly restricted to your interaction together, so it isn’t asking a great deal of a candidate to get the spelling correct.

So, I guess I don’t have a violent objection to your point of view, even if I’m espousing a different one in this post.

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#58

Post by K2h » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:18 PM UTC

rizzom5000 wrote: post #53

While I enjoyed the article and its message, I found the spelling error on the resume example underwhelming. A professional's resume is the veneer they present to strangers. It's like the login page for your app. Do you want a spelling error there when it is so easy to avoid? It screams sloppy and lazy in the same sentence. Maybe the general quality of professional devs is so bad that sloppiness and laziness are bett…

My opinion on spelling errors as an indication of quality of the candidate has changed. I use to use it as a first pass approximation to polish, professionalism and to a degree education and presentation.

I came to the realization that I'm not hiring writers, PR people, or salesmen.

All things being equal, I prefer someone that can spell, but at the end of the day - my best performers bring a much bigger skillset to the table.

Minor spelling is a nuisance, but no longer a show stopper for me... with that said, maybe I'm just looking for more people like me. you will notice my disregard for proper formatting and spelling in some areas as I honestly have better places to waste my time.

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#59

Post by reinhardt » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:19 PM UTC

DarkShikari wrote: post #10

This article is superb. We tried placing ads for ninjas, rock stars, and so on, but I discovered this was the cultural equivalent of advertising for white males who drink dry martinis. Not that white males who drink dry martinis can’t do the job, but there’s no real difference between advertising for a Ninja and throwing half your resumés away because you don’t like unlucky people. Either way, you end up with fewer r…

Ironically, a job seeker that rejects an ad based on a keyword or two is exactly the shallow reasoning this article criticizes; it's just the other side of the same coin. I'm pretty sure there are actually good startups that put out "cool" (lame) ads just, like good programmers that let a typo slip by.

Re: I don't hire unlucky people

#60

Post by lawnchair_larry » Thu, Apr 05, 2012, 9:22 PM UTC

cookiecaper wrote: post #31

DarkShikari wrote: post #10

This article is superb. We tried placing ads for ninjas, rock stars, and so on, but I discovered this was the cultural equivalent of advertising for white males who drink dry martinis. Not that white males who drink dry martinis can’t do the job, but there’s no real difference between advertising for a Ninja and throwing half your resumés away because you don’t like unlucky people. Either way, you end up with fewer r…

Indeed. My ad scoring program deducts 5 points and transparently kills off ads that contain terms like "ninja" and "rock star" because to my mind they indicate a propensity for either abuse ("a rock star should be able to code this in three days!!") or fad-following ineptitude ("rock stars are the coolest kind of programmers, I must have them! also, we write EVERYTHING in Ruby, it's like the Mac of programming").

Personally I think those terms indicate feeble attempts at psychological manipulation. I feel like responding to job ads like that would be like admitting you're a gullible fool. They're trying to recruit and stroke egos, not people.