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Hire people who aren’t proven

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Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#131

Post by mixmastamyk »

maxxxxx wrote: post #6

I think hiring has become more difficult now that programming has been discovered as a well paying mainstream career. When I started in the 90s most people I worked with had a passion for the craft but now I find we interview a lot of people who have a CS degree just for the career prospects but not out of interest for the craft. I find it much easier to deal with someone who has no relevant experience but cares vs s…

> Now someone who has 10 years AND cares is rare but pure gold.

Pertinent to the article, most of those folks are unhireable today because they can't code with a gun to their head (ala swordfish).

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#132

Post by lvh »

chrisseaton wrote: post #21
lvh wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could, instead of relying on a resume to determine if someone can do X, ask them to do some X instead of an interview, and then use an objective rubric to decide if they did X to some level of satisfaction. This is called work sample testing and it works great.

I think that only works for the most trivial things. You can do a work sample test for 'can this person add a view to a Rails app', but not for example for 'can this person build a team and develop a solution to a complex technical problem in a specific domain'.

Matasano used to bet the farm on it, I did it at my last job, and Latacora's doing it again. I don't think what those companies do is trivial. (Disclaimer: I'm a Principal at Latacora.)

In my experience, when you think you can't measure a thing in a work-sample setting, it means you haven't analyzed it. And, if you have no idea what that thing means, how could you possibly hope to interview for it?

For example: "can this person build a team and develop a solution to a complex technical solution" (that's several things, but OK, let's take a stab at it):

- Someone who can build a solution in a specific domain has to be able to analyze the problem into bite-size pieces. Given a complex problem description, write out tickets that need to get done. Can they identify sensible milestones, objectives and key results? Are the tickets roughly equally sized? Are the tickets self-contained? Do they come with an objective measure of "done"?

- Someone who can build a team to deliver a solution has to be able to estimate appropriate resourcing for a project. Given a complex problem description and a current set of resources, come up with a plan forward. Measurements include: a) Did they identify missing roles? b) Did they write clear job reqs with evaluation and hiring plans? A gazillion hiring managers couldn't write a clear job req to save their lives. c) Did they consider which positions may be effectively contracted out? d) Can they estimate what the P&L impact of this hiring plan is? Knowing how to read P&Ls and cost of development is a skill. e) Can they identify within their own plan which roles are really critical and which ones are nice-to-have? Being able to negotiate in the face of limited resources is a skill.

- Someone who can lead a team to deliver a solution to a complex problem has to be able to analyze when things go awry on a low-level. Put them in front of a PR where someone has subtly misunderstood a poorly-written ticket. Give them the context they need to understand why the PR is wrong. See how they tell people the PR is wrong, and how they react when people persist?

- Put them in a position where they have to talk to an employee who isn't doing well. Can they figure out how to be empathic while remaining professional? Did they say something that will get you sued? Opposite situation: put them in a room with a rockstar developer who's been harassing or badgering one of your employees. Can they speak to that person professional? Can they write an HR file note with a follow-up plan?

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#133

Post by scarface74 »

busterarm wrote: post #115
parthdesai wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And what about when companies these days exploit the term "caring"? I like programming as much as the next person here but i'm not going to code 80 hours a day. I also like going to gym and working out, riding my bike, playing soccer and hanging out with friends. Companies these days expect you to have side projects or contribution to popular open source libraries while having a job. Oh and did i mention asking you q…

Related point, some companies don't intentionally exploit this but end up hiring someone who works and commits code cowboy style 14 hours a day. The company thinks that person is amazing while the person's coworkers hate working with them.

I’ve worked crazy hours for weeks at a time learning a new to me technology or trying to figure out something. I purposefully, don’t tell anyone that I’m working late or on weekends and I don’t send or respond to emails outside of office hours. When I was Dev lead, I recommended no one send or respond to emails outside of normal office hours. If they were really having an issue or wanted to work late to figure out something and they had a quick question, I would sometimes answer over Skype but I would never communicate outside of the team or with management outside of office hours unless something was blowing up. Even then, my manager would have to call me or Skype me. I told them that I don’t have work email on my personal phone.

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#134

Post by onion2k »

chrisseaton wrote: post #28
onion2k wrote: post #14

I read " You must have 10 years experience of " as shorthand for " Have you stopped learning new things? Come and work here. "

That's ridiculous. Why does learning new technology mean you need to stop using the old technology?

It doesn't, obviously. My point was about how companies advertise jobs. A company advertising a job with a requirement of 10 years experience in a technology wants someone who's able to tackle pretty much any problem from the outset. They're not open to people learning.

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#135

Post by mirko22 »

parthdesai wrote: post #35
maxxxxx wrote: post #6

I think hiring has become more difficult now that programming has been discovered as a well paying mainstream career. When I started in the 90s most people I worked with had a passion for the craft but now I find we interview a lot of people who have a CS degree just for the career prospects but not out of interest for the craft. I find it much easier to deal with someone who has no relevant experience but cares vs s…

And what about when companies these days exploit the term "caring"? I like programming as much as the next person here but i'm not going to code 80 hours a day. I also like going to gym and working out, riding my bike, playing soccer and hanging out with friends. Companies these days expect you to have side projects or contribution to popular open source libraries while having a job. Oh and did i mention asking you q…

On the other hand imagine how much you would learn if you could spend all you gym and bike time learning computer science and other things (not saying you should but the more time you out into something usually you know more about that thing).

Also I think knowing data structures is essential cos you are using them ALL the time you just don’t know it cos you never bothered to learn them. But they are corner stone of every program.

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#136

Post by iamdave »

dasil003 wrote: post #110
iamdave wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find it much easier to deal with someone who has no relevant experience but cares vs someone who had 10 years experience but doesn't care Why? This is a legitimate, but deeply opinionated "why". You employing me and me working for you is a business transaction. Why should I care about your mission beyond giving enough 'care' to produce great work that helps you run your business, run it well, so much that you'll wa…

That's legitimate, and I would take you any day over someone who cared a lot but had no relevant skills. However caring about the business is absolutely a value-add. Don't get me wrong, you should be careful to avoid being taken advantage of, but generally you will have better career progression if you can inhabit the space between emotional disengagement and being a kool-aid drinking doormat—it's actually a pretty w…

However caring about the business is absolutely a value-add.

I can dig this, it absolutely is. It's definitely supplemental (emphasis critical).

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#137

Post by ktta »

amorphous wrote: post #125
maxxxxx wrote: post #6

I think hiring has become more difficult now that programming has been discovered as a well paying mainstream career. When I started in the 90s most people I worked with had a passion for the craft but now I find we interview a lot of people who have a CS degree just for the career prospects but not out of interest for the craft. I find it much easier to deal with someone who has no relevant experience but cares vs s…

> someone who has 10 years AND cares is rare but pure gold. One way to attract those people: choose to build your product using a rather exotic language (e.g. Clojure or Elixir). You take a substantial risk because the language is rather unproven and you will have a hard time finding experienced developers. BUT if someone with 10+ years experience makes the effort to learn a language that does not have an immediate p…

Not sure if I'm getting the joke here, but this seems to be a great way to spent most time on development rather than actually building a product.

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#139

Post by droidist2 »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #131
maxxxxx wrote: post #6

I think hiring has become more difficult now that programming has been discovered as a well paying mainstream career. When I started in the 90s most people I worked with had a passion for the craft but now I find we interview a lot of people who have a CS degree just for the career prospects but not out of interest for the craft. I find it much easier to deal with someone who has no relevant experience but cares vs s…

> Now someone who has 10 years AND cares is rare but pure gold. Pertinent to the article, most of those folks are unhireable today because they can't code with a gun to their head (ala swordfish).

Gun to the head = the pressure of an interview?

Re: Hire people who aren’t proven

#140

Post by microtherion »

> "Don't hire like FAANG companies"

I work for a FAANG, and we don't hire like that either. The motto is often "hire for potential, not track record".

The dark pattern lurking in that is age discrimination: A motto like this can easily be taken as an excuse to completely dismiss track record, or even consider it detrimental.

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