421–430 of 545 posts
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If you asked a musicians to perform an audition before you hired them, would you accept the response, "Sorry, I don't work for free." Would you expect a musician to practice their instrument in their free time or only play their instrument during paid gigs?
That is a bad analogy. Supply/demand ratio of musicians is way higher then for developers.
I’m not mad at you, but as the dude on the other side of the desk, I have to decide whether you can cut it and I’m fine saying no. I could make you do some whiteboard problems, but I think whiteboard problems are pretty far removed from your day to day development and I am uncomfortable relying on them as a proxy for your ability to ship code. I don’t really disagree with your philosophy of working while you’re worki…
So, are architects and engineers expected to have built side-houses, and side-bridges, and side-cars?
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I feel the same whenever I have this discussion. The "Look man, I have a life and I don't want to do extra unpaid work just to get a job" attitude is misunderstanding the motivations (to be fair, there are some situations where they are not). I look at what people do outside of work that isn't writing code. Having something means you are probably healthier, less likely to be burned out and more likely to have experie…
> Having something means you are probably healthier, less likely to be burned out and more likely to have experiences that let you better understand what solves real customer/client/user problems. I didn't learn to write code until my late twenties. I have a fine arts degree. My early and mid twenties were focused on activities unrelated to technology. I have a reasonably large amount of life experience unrelated to…
As to how that helps: it doesn't help you solve implementation problems, it helps in designing the software to do what the client wants in a way they will like.
It is hard to put yourself in the shoes of a different person to design something for them if you only hang out with people like you and only use software built for people like you.
As a concrete example: what would a piece of software for artists be like if your only-engineering coworkers designed it vs. you having some input? By the way, it would definitely be either a portfolio hosting service or some kind of art database software. What problem do artists have that could use some software help that they aren't even aware exists?
It's funny that the tech industry is so insistent on side projects. I mean - would you hire a marketing person based on their 'side projects' or a corporate lawyer purely based on their pro-bono work? Likewise, who on earth asks a building contractor if they have any side projects? You would ask for references or find a contractor via someone you know. What about recruiters themselves? How does one judge if a person…
Side projects are for software what a portfolio is for other creative industries. You don't hire a designer sight unseen -- usually you ask for a sample. It makes perfect sense to expect the same of technology.
Perhaps the best solution would be a unionized right to proper credit to developers like in the film industry.
I’m not mad at you, but as the dude on the other side of the desk, I have to decide whether you can cut it and I’m fine saying no. I could make you do some whiteboard problems, but I think whiteboard problems are pretty far removed from your day to day development and I am uncomfortable relying on them as a proxy for your ability to ship code. I don’t really disagree with your philosophy of working while you’re worki…
> I’m not mad at you, but as the dude on the other side of the desk, I have to decide whether you can cut it and I’m fine saying no. I could make you do some whiteboard problems, but I think whiteboard problems are pretty far removed from your day to day development and I am uncomfortable relying on them as a proxy for your ability to ship code. So, are architects and engineers expected to have built side-houses, and…
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This. Not once has a potential employer ever said to me: "Based on your Github, you can obviously fizzbuzz with the best of them, and know a for-loop from an if-statement. Let's skip the phone screen/homework assignment and get you onsite directly."
Speaking of FizzBuzz, I had never heard of the fizzbuzz test until recently in interview. In 15 years of frontend work I've never needed to find if a number is divisible by another number, so I forgot about the modulus operator '%', and stumbled on that question. Apparently not knowing about that made me unqualified for the job, above all other evidence of my frontend work and achievements. It takes less than 10 seco…
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The next time I'm interviewing in front of a hiring manager who asks me about my side coding projects, I'm going to ask them about their side managing projects.
Haha. That's called my kids and if you want them at your interview, I'll be more than happy to bring them.
It's funny that the tech industry is so insistent on side projects. I mean - would you hire a marketing person based on their 'side projects' or a corporate lawyer purely based on their pro-bono work? Likewise, who on earth asks a building contractor if they have any side projects? You would ask for references or find a contractor via someone you know. What about recruiters themselves? How does one judge if a person…
The next time I'm interviewing in front of a hiring manager who asks me about my side coding projects, I'm going to ask them about their side managing projects.
> The silly art project that I launched in Austin. My dog business. Running, painting, writing.
Take any of these hobbies and write a small application related to it. Don't do it because "code speaks to you", do it because it's important to get a job. Do one application, spend some hours on it, and be done with it.
> It's important to me that these attributes be valued by my workplace.
I don't think that's reasonable. I have many great people at my workplace, some of them have become good friends. But really nobody gives a damn I do 3D modeling in my spare time and I don't see how that would make things better. People know I enjoy designing visual stuff, and they always come to me for advice on colors and UIs, but that's about it. And my design hobby is valued because it brings value to the team and the project.
Interviewing is a contest. Some people prepare more than others. Some learn body language, some study the company before interviewing, others prepare side projects to show. If you're unwilling to do anything that puts you one step ahead of the crowd, don't complain about the interviewing process. It's a game. Within reason optimize for success. Don't just complain about how unfair it is.
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I would expect my doctor to read papers, news, etc to keep abreast of the latest medical advances though.
This! And similarly, software developers should keep abreast of latest technical advances. What makes software engineering different from surgery is that when a surgeon learns something new, he does not have a live patient at his home to practice the new thing he has learnt, but as software engineers, most of the times we can immediately fire up an editor and write a PoC or a toy project to practice the new thing we…
I do not get this obsession with putting everything out there. I have a huge local directory with my old test programs, PoCs, started but abandoned ideas, etc. I regularly try new stuff, new libraries, programming languages, what have you. But my github account is empty.
The internet needs less stuff on it, not more.