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Disclaimer: I co-founded Dev Bootcamp and still spend my time in this "space." I assume @Kalium is talking less about technical expertise and more about signal

by jfarmer 11y ago

Disclaimer: I co-founded Dev Bootcamp and still spend my time in this "space." I assume @Kalium is talking less about technical expertise and more about signaling, like a VC who invests in a company but then won't invest in a follow-on round. This fails the "raised eyebrow" test and, while it might not be an automatic disqualification, it will invite extra scrutiny. See http://blog.ycombinator.com/pro-rata http://blog.ycombinator.com/pro-rata for how YC handles this. A hypothetical interviewer or recruiting manager might be thinking things like... "If IBM won't extend an offer to a gradate of this program, why should I? Doesn't IBM know these students better than any other possible employer? Do they know something about this candidate that I don't?" I think it's easy to overstate the impact of this signaling, but students of this program should definitely be aware of it. Fair or unfair, rational or irrational, this context will be present in every interview. In fact, if I were a student, I might avoid interviewing at IBM entirely so that I could answer "Do you have an offer from IBM?" with "No, because I've decided not to interview there." and keep a straight face. This is a very easy story to tell unless you're interviewing at companies similar to IBM, e.g., HP. Conversely, it would be smart of IBM to create some kind of firewall to address these issues preemptively. I'm not 100% what that would look like, though.

Kalium 11y ago
There's a signaling component, but I'm also thinking about content. A company like IBM controlling the curriculum will tend to lead to the program being geared for IBMs needs. The needs or desires of other companies won't be weighted as heavily, if at all. If all someone knows is IBMs internal technologies, they can be expected to have a difficult time outside the IBM-o-sphere. IBM stands to benefit significantly from this kind of curriculum shaping. It gets them a pool of talent they can skim the cream from cheaply. Neither the schools nor the students will be positioned well to resist this, either. It's a terrible position for the students, because many of them will have done this school for lack of other options.

by jfarmer 11y ago

Kalium 11y ago

There's a signaling component, but I'm also thinking about content. A company like IBM controlling the curriculum will tend to lead to the program being geared for IBMs needs. The needs or desires of other companies won't be weighted as heavily, if at all. If all someone knows is IBMs internal technologies, they can be expected to have a difficult time outside the IBM-o-sphere. IBM stands to benefit significantly from this kind of curriculum shaping. It gets them a pool of talent they can skim the cream from cheaply. Neither the schools nor the students will be positioned well to resist this, either. It's a terrible position for the students, because many of them will have done this school for lack of other options.