I have no side code projects to show

> I've made it a point to add to my resume and online profiles the other things about which I am passionate. The silly art project that I launched in Austin. My dog business. Running, painting, writing. It's important to me that these attributes be valued by my workplace

Good luck mate, that's got nothing to do with software development. If you don't love software development then applying for a software job at a software firm probably isn't the best idea. Many small buisnesses need software people who are pasionate about other things. Many of these things include "Running, painting, writing" but a software shop writning software owned by people in the software industry populated entierly by people who absolutly love writing software probably isn't the place for that.

I disagree with the article and the notion that asking for a portfolio is about passion. I guess it does add insight for that, but really only shows basic proficiency. I wouldn't hire an artist, writer or designer without seeing a portfolio of their work so why would I hire a software developer?

I too have been on both sides of the hiring discussion. Because anyone can write anything on there resume, there are only two way to know if someone can code. They can write some code of they can show some code they have written. As both an interviewer and interviewer I would rather work with real world problems and discuss real world solutions.

So the choice seems to be between stupid whiteboard processes or portfolios. I suspect there is a reason writers and painters don't have auditions and perhaps that same logic maps onto programming.

If you don't believe Jeff Atwood, I'm not sure why you'd believe me based just on my anecdata, but at a previous job I gave a simple filtering programming task to interviewees (not exactly fizz buzz, but very close. Single loop, multiple 10-line solutions possible).

Out of 10, only 1 solved it well, 2-3 solved it acceptably (only edge case bugs), the rest never solved it, or had obvious bugs or code that would never pass peer review.

Of course, I could just be a shitty interviewer, but I always had a (changing) peer present during interviews, and I hope we were an honest enough company that they'd tell me if they thought I was.

I have worked at a prestigious tech company, and I know what OP is talking about.

A lot of very talented people don't have side projects, and they don't do any coding outside of work. They don't go to hackathons. They don't bother to learn the newest reactive javascript framework. They go to yoga classes after work. They talk about TV shows they watched last night during lunch.

But they EXCEL at what they do at work.

I can say that this is really a subjective thing. When you make a judgment about these people, it actually tells more about yourself than the person being judged.

When I saw these people who are super talented, but "waste away their lives" just climbing up the ladder I just couldn't sympathize. Also personally I like them but I would never think about starting a company with them.

That's why I understand where OP is coming from, and he's right in a lot of cases, but also I think he should understand that not everyone will agree with you on how you view your life. People like me can't stand not working on my own project, but there are also super talented people who are perfectly fine with living a balanced and stable life. Talent and intelligence has nothing to do with how you live your life.

So, I think no one should judge anyone else. The company who didn't hire this guy may have lost a talented person, but in many cases talent is not what companies need the most.

For large companies like Amazon (which OP seems to work at) this type of employee is the ideal choice since they get the talent AND stability.

But for startups, the concept of stability doesn't really make sense anyway so it's a different story. If I was doing a startup and had to pick the first employee, and was given a choice between a passionate, right out of the college guy, and an experienced and talented engineer who wants to live a balanced life, I would definitely choose the former. (Although the best case would be to find the third guy who's passionate AND talented)

It probably depends on the company but I think this is right. If I interview someone with little working experience it definitely helps that they have some work on Github. But it would be strange to reject a senior candidate with a great resume who did very well in the technical interview just because they didn't have anything on Github.