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We only hire the trendiest

danluu.com

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Re: We only hire the trendiest

#21

Post by jasode »

staticelf wrote: post #12

I couldn't stand the wall of text on such a wide screen that I have. But the TLDR seems to be not to hire based of trendy skills, which I agree with.

>...the TLDR seems to be not to hire based of trendy skills,

No, the essay is not about skills but about trendy pedigree. The examples of "pedigree" being defined by being at trendy company such as Google/Facebook/Apple instead of a stodgy one like Microsoft. Or the "pedigree" is graduate of top-10 university instead of a 2nd-tier one.

One possible solution to outsmart the flawed thinking about pedigree is a "Moneyball" approach that ignores schools or past employers.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#22

Post by wolfgke »

dkopi wrote: post #11

I find that "how can he improve?" is probably a much better question than "Why don't you want him"? Ask the first - and you'll get real actionable items to improve on. Ask the second - and you'll get the recruiters equivalent of "you're cute, but I already have an imaginary boyfriend". While a company might pride itself in hiring generalists and "we do a bit of everything", very often they're just looking for someone…

> While a company might pride itself in hiring generalists and "we do a bit of everything", very often they're just looking for someone to fill a specific position for a very specific need. Those needs might change in 3 months, (and then they'll be glad you're a generalist), but they're hiring someone to fill the gap NOW.

So in other words: The startups present plain lies in their job requirements and complain that the people that submit an application don't fit what they really want.

IMHO the easiest solution would simply to be honest...

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#23

Post by staticelf »

dwb wrote: post #18
staticelf wrote: post #12

I couldn't stand the wall of text on such a wide screen that I have. But the TLDR seems to be not to hire based of trendy skills, which I agree with.

"Wall of text" is usually reserved for people who don't use paragraph breaks; such a complaint is unfair on a perfectly well-formatted page. If you want it narrower, maybe make your window smaller?

IMO, it's almost impossible to stay focused when the text is poorly formatted as it was in this article. With just a couple of lines of CSS the readability would increase tenfolds.

I shouldn't have to make the window smaller in order to be able to read the authors post. If people find the formatting too frustrating, it's their problem as they want to convey a message to me, not the other way around.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#24

Post by UK-AL »

pingec wrote: post #9

Is the anti windows/.NET bias really that common? I have been a .NET dev for 6 years because that was my job. But I don`t believe that makes me useless on any other stack. In fact lately I desire to work on something that feels exciting and fresh again but sometimes I feel like .NET devs are looked down upon and it`s not so easy to land a job or contract outside .Net land.

It's simple ignorance. People think .NET = old, not innovative, corporate

In reality its a fast moving stack, that's constantly innovating.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#25

Post by dkopi »

bluetomcat wrote: post #7

The abundance and heterogeneity of various technology stacks, frameworks, methodologies and whatnot fuels this hiring mess. Twenty-five years ago, nearly everyone who called himself a programmer knew C and an interviewer could judge the relative strength of two candidates by really examining their programming skills and not some trendy keywords.

The amount of different real world problems we solve through technology is the cause for this abundance.

25 years ago, the challenges were much different. It's "Trendy" because its relevant.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#26

Post by dkopi »

UK-AL wrote: post #16
dkopi wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't say it's an "Anti .NET" bias, as much as it's an "anti too many years in the same exact thing" bias. 1. Choose a different language for your next side project. 2. Step in the door with C#, try to help out on projects or change positions inside the company. 3. Attend hackathons, contribute to opensource projects. A good programmer can quickly feel comfortable in any programming language. Recruiters feel mor…

Changing stack usually involves a decrease in salary.

Optimizing for the short term may not give the best results in the long term.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#27

Post by UK-AL »

UK-AL wrote: post #16
dkopi wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't say it's an "Anti .NET" bias, as much as it's an "anti too many years in the same exact thing" bias. 1. Choose a different language for your next side project. 2. Step in the door with C#, try to help out on projects or change positions inside the company. 3. Attend hackathons, contribute to opensource projects. A good programmer can quickly feel comfortable in any programming language. Recruiters feel mor…

Changing stack usually involves a decrease in salary.

I would say most companies pay more for specialists, then someone who knows a little bit about everything.

I personally know many languages a little bit, but I find writing my CV to target a specific stack results in a better responsive.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#28

Post by dkopi »

wolfgke wrote: post #22
dkopi wrote: post #11

I find that "how can he improve?" is probably a much better question than "Why don't you want him"? Ask the first - and you'll get real actionable items to improve on. Ask the second - and you'll get the recruiters equivalent of "you're cute, but I already have an imaginary boyfriend". While a company might pride itself in hiring generalists and "we do a bit of everything", very often they're just looking for someone…

> While a company might pride itself in hiring generalists and "we do a bit of everything", very often they're just looking for someone to fill a specific position for a very specific need. Those needs might change in 3 months, (and then they'll be glad you're a generalist), but they're hiring someone to fill the gap NOW. So in other words: The startups present plain lies in their job requirements and complain that t…

As far as they're concerned, these aren't lies. They just have a lot of different requirements, often conflicting

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#29

Post by pingec »

dkopi wrote: post #14
pingec wrote: post #9

Is the anti windows/.NET bias really that common? I have been a .NET dev for 6 years because that was my job. But I don`t believe that makes me useless on any other stack. In fact lately I desire to work on something that feels exciting and fresh again but sometimes I feel like .NET devs are looked down upon and it`s not so easy to land a job or contract outside .Net land.

I wouldn't say it's an "Anti .NET" bias, as much as it's an "anti too many years in the same exact thing" bias. 1. Choose a different language for your next side project. 2. Step in the door with C#, try to help out on projects or change positions inside the company. 3. Attend hackathons, contribute to opensource projects. A good programmer can quickly feel comfortable in any programming language. Recruiters feel mor…

I have side projects in JS and TS (Node.js), Python, C (~500 loc projects). Mostly I care about solving a specific problem. Learning a new stack just so I can put it on my resume would require time I don`t have :(.

Re: We only hire the trendiest

#30

Post by mikro2nd »

LAMike wrote: post #6

What does a "trendy" resume look like in 2016?

If you have a resume you're not "trendy". You're "trendy" if you have a github account full of projects in Go and Node-y stuff, a twitter-stream with a few thousand followers, some medium rants and (maybe) a linked-in profile.

eta: ... and 10k+ karma on HN and SO ;)

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