I Won't Hire People Who Use Poor Grammar • Hacker News Board

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

#261

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:07 PM UTC

pka wrote: post #190

sampo wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

Absolutely agree. I would never be able to take anybody seriously (in terms of hiring them) who can't spell or get basic grammar right in my native tongue, but this tends to be quite common in written English. How much can one infer from the fact that a native speaker mixes up "they're" and "their"?

[deleted]

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

#262

Post by philsnow » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:10 PM UTC

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…

first edit: take it or leave it

I have a "zero tolerance approach" should be: I have a "zero tolerance" approach.

your third edit, which I also don't agree with, isn't quite right, it should be: people who mix up "its" and "it's".

fourth edit: I've always hated this jamming of words together with an em-dash: it appears that "job" and "even" have something to do with each other, but they don't.

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

#263

Post by gawker » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:13 PM UTC

Goronmon wrote: post #186

gawker wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Watching how someone makes their bed shows their behaviour towards paying attention to detail. Even if they don't know how to do it, if someone chooses not to do or chooses to give up, it's clear sign that the person will probably not do something out of their domain. If you're in a startup, you wear many hats. You do what it takes to succeed. If you have no clue how to do sales, find a way.

>Watching how someone makes their bed shows their behaviour towards paying attention to detail. Even if they don't know how to do it, if someone chooses not to do or chooses to give up, it's clear sign that the person will probably not do something out of their domain. I'm really not trying to be argumentative here, but this seems really silly. Replace "make a bed" with something like "kick a 40 yard field goal" or "…

Sure it might sound silly but sometimes it's not whether you can actually do the task or not. It's more of how will you approach something that you are not expected to do. Different people have different approaches.

I agree that if you're hiring a programmer strictly to program and do nothing else, that's fine. But if you're looking for someone who thinks outside of the box, is capable of coming with ideas and solutions when the solutions are yet to be known, having tests like these is probably a way to figure out how a person thinks. Whether it's a good way or not, I'm not so sure as I've never had to administer one of these tests.

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

#264

Post by re » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:13 PM UTC

l3amm wrote: post #225

The comments have become a firestorm of grammar-as-a-filter for programmers. While this is an interesting debate, I think there are three things about this filter that give it value: 1) Grammar serves as a cultural touchstone in the company, so using a grammar test in hiring is a strong signal to employees and future employees about what we as a company stand for. If you apply to this job and you disregard grammar fr…

> The test is objective

Less so than you might think. http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/001863.h...

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

#265

Post by nirvdrum » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:15 PM UTC

nessus42 wrote: post #259

nirvdrum wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn't downvote you, but my guess is you were downvoted for making a rather tenuous and almost insulting relationship. There's a big difference between someone with an actual disability and those that just don't care about what they write. And I don't think anyone is even advocating for a zero tolerance policy. People make mistakes all the time. But calling it a "typo" or a triviality or otherwise getting defensive…

I've never been diagnosed with a disability, and now I am supposed to jump through hoops to try to prove to people that I should be given some sort of special exemption? As if I need more humiliation in my life than to notice after the fact that what I've written is riddled with unintended little mistakes? As to people caring about what they write: The litmus test should be whether they can effectively communicate, n…

Whenever you confuse the two, you cause me to have to reparse the sentence. "it's" becomes "it is" and then I have to determine that that doesn't make any sense and go back to substitute it. Vice versa. I also have a linguistics background. So I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

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

#266

Post by gergles » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:18 PM UTC

mamoswined wrote: post #239

bguthrie wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is very much a cultural fit test. If people who use poor grammar are going to drive the author nuts, then as the the person running the company I think he's perfectly justified in treating the candidate as a poor cultural fit. Additionally, as someone who employs writers as well as programmers, he might reasonably want to hire a programmer who is also a writer for the same reason that you'd want to hire a progra…

as Tokenadult's comment points out, such "cultural fit" tests may be illegal http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4270768

Writing skills are clearly a BFOQ for an organization where your entire work product is written; there is absolutely nothing illegal about a writing test for a programming job.

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

#267

Post by Alex3917 » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:18 PM UTC

fishtoaster wrote: post #256

rprasad wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take any "meta-analysis" with a large grain of salt (or better yet, and industrial size vat of salt). Meta-analysis suggests that men under the age of 26 have a 60% chance of being sex offenders. This same type of meta-analysis is also the reason that all sex crime offenders (including drunk people pissing in a park and amorous couples getting it on in a dark parkin glot) are lumped together for sex offender registra…

Would you care to elaborate on what, specifically, is flawed about meta analysis? I'd definitely be interested in a source on that 60% number and how that source arrived at a number that seems, on it's face, so incorrect.

"I'd definitely be interested in a source on that 60% number and how that source arrived at a number that seems, on it's face, so incorrect."

I'd be curious to see if anyone has actually done a study on this, but to me this number actually seems quite low. I would guess that it would easily be 90+%.

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

#268

Post by derleth » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:26 PM UTC

The problem is that most people who rail against poor grammar haven't the slightest clue what grammar actually entails, and are instead peeving on stylistic issues that vary both due to the region the applicant hails from and how old the applicant is. In a lot of cases, they may as well be basing a hiring decision on whether the applicant says 'bubbler' instead of 'water fountain' or 'pop' instead of 'soda'.

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

#269

Post by lukejduncan » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:27 PM UTC

Personally, I've found my grammar degrades after a day of coding. I can write well formed sentences in general, but by the end of the day my mind is working in a much different day and my emails drift towards an embarrassing place.

I don't think there's anything wrong with having your own particular standards for hiring. If it works for you in solving your particular problem: great! One of the things I began to appreciate when I first starting interviewing in the Valley is how much companies did or didn't care about nuance in their interviews. If the interview was too easy, it generally signaled to me that they don't sweat the details and maybe don't hire people that are going to stretch me professionally.

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

#270

Post by derleth » Fri, Jul 20, 2012, 6:32 PM UTC

terryk88a wrote: post #192

irahul wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's more like I am applying for a programming job, and I don't see why I have to subject myself to your whims. Consider that instead of grammar, I am advocating I will only hire people who can do 50 push-ups. After all, what can I expect from people who are sloppy towards something as important their own bodies. What's so bad about 50 push-ups? Any fit person(excluding extenuating circumstances) should be able to do…

Absolutely you do not have to subject yourself to his whims. You would be free to walk out the door if you found the grammar test offensive, or the push-ups test, or the rope-skipping test. You do not deserve respect. Ever. You must always earn it.

> You do not deserve respect. Ever. You must always earn it.

Hm. If you don't have my respect, I may well feel justified in stealing from you. Is that really the kind of 'lack of respect' you think should be the default state?