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I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

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Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#161

Post by dsr_ »

mgkimsal wrote: post #4
ColinWright wrote: post #2

This is the take-away point for me: > Everyone says they're detail-oriented in an > application; I just make my employees prove it. CVs are great, certifications and qualifications are great, but if you claim you can do something, I want to see the evidence. When I'm hiring I want to see that the candidate has * ... thought about what I will want and/or need, * ... makes direct claims that they can provide it/them, a…

"Show me you understand the job you're applying for, then provide evidence that you can do it." In return, I ask that an employer provide some substantive description of what I'll be doing, giving me the opportunity to think about it. Actual job posting I saw recently: ---------------- Requirements: * Object Oriented PHP * Efficient in MySQL * Experience with programming logic, great code writing style * Understandin…

Many job descriptions are actually a listing of the problems that happened with the last employee.

"Efficient in MySQL" = the current SQL queries are not performing well. "great code writing style" = the existing code is unreadable "Understanding of HTML" = they spent more time fixing divs and attributes than writing new code "Strong database architecture and implementation skills" = we can't afford to hire a DBA as well "Team Leader" = there are existing employees who we don't trust in a management role "Ability to work independently" = that last person was always asking questions that could have been Googled

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#162

Post by sampo »

nirvdrum wrote: post #85
irahul wrote: post #17

My train of thoughts: > Everyone who applies for a position at either of my companies, iFixit or Dozuki, takes a mandatory grammar test. Whoa. Who do you think you are - google? What makes you think I am going to sit through your grammar test? If I am agreeing to your grammar test, either you are one of the most desirable places to work for(never heard of you), or economy is about to collapse and this is the only job…

My issue is if you're unable to delineate between "it's" and "its" and it's the language you've been speaking natively for the past 25 years, I tend to doubt your ability to know what form of "const" to use in C++. At the very least, lack of proofreading suggests to me you might be rash with your code as well. Many disagree with me on this point of view, but routinely I've found that those that express themselves wel…

As a non-native speaker of English, I have been wondering how much signal it would be appropriate for me to infer from the kind of sloppy grammar that is typical only for native speakers of English? [1]

I learned English at school as a second language, and we would always start with the written form, and then learn how to pronounce. So my "hash table" is primarily organized based on the written form, and it would be impossible for me to mix "two" and "too", "they're" or "their" or "there", or "its" and "it's" [2]. I hadn't even realized that "too" and "two" are pronounced the same, before a native speaker pointed it out to me, as my hash table doesn't support that kind of searches.

Also my native language (Finnish) uses a (nearly) phonetic writing, so phonetic misspelling of words is mainly restricted to people with no high school level of education, and who didn't do that well in primary school either.

I do, like the writer of the liked article, get that feeling of sloppiness, when I see those spelling or grammar mistakes in English text, but I don't really know how much signal it would be appropriate for me to infer from them?

I probably should not use as harsh standards as I do with Finnish, since those misspellings seem relatively common in English in the web.

[1] Well, typical of people who learned spoken English before written English, but in the modern world this pretty much coincides with native speakers.

[2] Well, "it's" and "its" is maybe a border case, maybe not totally impossible to mix those two, just very unlikely.

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#163

Post by nirvdrum »

nollidge wrote: post #119
bane wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

good writing doesn't automatically come with proper grammar. In fact I'd say good writing usually eschews many "rules" of proper grammar.

Sure, but typically it's deliberate on the part of the author.

Right. You should know the rules so you know when to break them. Stephen King hits on this point well in "On Writing." That book is a great read and takes a very non-parochial approach to writing.

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#164

Post by bane »

einhverfr wrote: post #114
bane wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Whom" is also almost impossibly archaic and no longer considered part of modern English (having almost completely fallen out of usage around the start of the 20th century). It survives almost entirely in discussions of when to use it and almost never appears in modern writing except as a demonstration of what linguists call a "prestige form". "To whom did you give it?" vs. "Who did you give it to?" the latter is mor…

I would say "whom" today is reserved for formulaic usage. In 1912, Edward Sapir ("Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech") noted the death of "whom." The example he gave was "Whom did you see yesterday" vs "Who did you see yesterday?" Granted there are some cool things you can do with who/whom, like: 'Scots, wha hae wi Wallace bled, Scots, wham Bruce has aften led, Welcome tae yer gory bed, Or tae victorie.…

Sapir was exactly who I was thinking of.

http://books.google.com/books?id=ofgrAAAAYAAJ&printsec=f...

Chapter 7 I believe is the relevant chapter.

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#165

Post by gjm11 »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #146

Dear Mr. von Neumann: With the greatest sorrow I have learned of your illness. The news came to me as quite unexpected. Morgenstern already last summer told me of a bout of weakness you once had I am pretty sure that "already last summer" is poor English grammar. Tisk - this Godel character. Probably not worth a face to face. http://rjlipton.wordpress.com/the-gdel-letter/

From the original article:

> [...] Extenuating circumstances aside (dyslexia, English language learners, etc.) [...]

Kurt Goedel wasn't a native English speaker; he was from Austria. I think that would count as an extenuating circumstance.

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#166

Post by hythloday »

binxbolling wrote: post #144
hythloday wrote: post #126

Just to illustrate what a morass "poor grammar" is, I have, wearing my ex-professional proofreader hat, gone through the article to highlight the areas where I could find fault with the article for incorrect usage. People Who Use Poor Grammar should be: People Who Use Grammar Poorly. I have a "zero tolerance approach" should be: I have a zero-tolerance approach. people who mix up their itses should be: people who mix…

Oh, wow, someone nitpicking this guy's grammar — never saw that coming. What an unhelpful, predictable comment. FWIW, I don't believe the author was talking about style guides at all anyway. Rather, he seems to be discussing general and very basic principles of English.

Very basic in whose judgement? If it's the author's (and presumably yours), fine, but then it's not a business case, it's a shibboleth. If you're agreeing with the author's claim that there is a "silent majority" (which I always find a dubious argument) of people who have their confidence in your business impacted, then you're far better off investing in a process that catches these errors--many of which can be caused by typos, rather than ignorance--before they are seen, rather than relying on an up-front test that's never retaken.

Someone else on this thread made an analogy to push-ups. If, as a business owner, you feel that it's essential for your business that any employee can perform 20 push-ups at any time, is it better to test them before they begin employment, or to put them on a brief training course when they join and have regular check-ups on their ability?

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#167

Post by aggronn »

einhverfr wrote: post #152
leephillips wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is crystal-clear to me. What's the problem?

By Contemporary Standard American English standards comma placements are strewn throughout the sentence with very little regard for clarity (removing a few would make it clearer), and the logical relation between clauses leaves something to be desired.

Are you proposing that the constitution be re-written for grammar every couple of decades?

Re: I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar

#168

Post by einhverfr »

bane wrote: post #164
einhverfr wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say "whom" today is reserved for formulaic usage. In 1912, Edward Sapir ("Language: An Introduction to the Study of Speech") noted the death of "whom." The example he gave was "Whom did you see yesterday" vs "Who did you see yesterday?" Granted there are some cool things you can do with who/whom, like: 'Scots, wha hae wi Wallace bled, Scots, wham Bruce has aften led, Welcome tae yer gory bed, Or tae victorie.…

Sapir was exactly who I was thinking of. http://books.google.com/books?id=ofgrAAAAYAAJ&printsec=f... Chapter 7 I believe is the relevant chapter.

That's a wonderful book isn't it? Really expands your ideas of what grammar is and could be.
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