8 ms·

> candidates who have worked at a top company or studied at a top school go on to pass interviews at a 30% higher rate than programmers who don’t have these cre

by staunch 11y ago

> candidates who have worked at a top company or studied at a top school go on to pass interviews at a 30% higher rate than programmers who don’t have these credentials (for a given level of performance on our credential-blind screen). Welcome to Silicon Valley meritocracy. And it's much worse for founders seeking investment, where there are no hard skills to test at all. It's almost purely about being the same class as the investor. Which is why you get only upper class people funding upper class people, which then hire upper class people. The 99% only makes it in because there aren't actually very many qualified people among the "elite". From http://paulgraham.com/colleges.html http://paulgraham.com/colleges.html > We'd interview people from MIT or Harvard or Stanford and sometimes find ourselves thinking: they must be smarter than they seem.

richardwhiuk 11y ago
Doesn't that support the fact that it is a meritocracy? Is it not reasonable to expect that top companies and top schools are more likely to employ people who have more applicable talent and skill? At the end of the day, going to a top university or working at an impressive company is always going to be a huge and relevant signal. It's difficult to see a problem with that.
- thenewwazoo 11y ago
  No, because > for a given level of performance on our credential-blind screen
  - superuser2 11y ago
    While we're in the business of doubting things that measure performance, why do you trust the credential-blind screen?
- kamaal 11y ago
  >>Is it not reasonable to expect that top companies and top schools are more likely to employ people who have more applicable talent and skill? No. Its more like a club. Join this prestigious institution X, and then you shall enjoy life long benefits of employment, higher than average salary, bonuses, stock, opportunities to travel etc. Even if the person is actually the worst possible employee, or is barely productive. Merely have X on your resume, guarantees you life long privilege. To know how worst it is you come see how it is in India. There are people who join IIT(Indian institutes of technology), a sort of a chain of colleges which is supposed to be Ivy league. Who says so? They themselves, because saying anything other wise means putting your own career in danger. There are coaching institutes, who train you just to get an entrance. Doesn't matter what you go and do there, in fact from there on you may do nothing in your life at all. The whole purpose of getting into those colleges is to enjoy lifelong privilege of having access to alumni who will ensure you a good career regardless of your performance. The day you remove the real metrics of merit and put in artificial flags. People will do no real work and try to gather as many flags as they can.
  - NotSammyHagar 11y ago
    Right, I'm shocked that everyone can't see that it's a club, to fund people who went to your school over others. I bet the original guy who posted that was in the club :-)
akhilcacharya 11y ago
Gotta say, this is incredibly discouraging for someone like me.
- staunch 11y ago
  On the positive side, no one can stop you from making lots of money using the internet. And if you have something that really takes off, those same investors will line up at your door.
  - akhilcacharya 11y ago
    Right, but it's still discouraging to be forever branded a "2nd tier engineer/human/etc" because of where I went to school (unless I get into a good grad school).
    - elliotec 11y ago
      This is very specifically the case in Silicon Valley, the insular center of the world, and not the case elsewhere. Most companies I've interviewed at couldn't care less about where I went to school as long as I could build their stuff.
    - gaius 11y ago
      5 years into your career no-one normal cares where you went to school.
- awakeasleep 11y ago
  It should be encouraging because you're being told the truth and being spoken to like an adult for once in your life.
  - akhilcacharya 11y ago
    You know, fair point. Far too many people spread the meme that school doesn't matter.
- 11y ago
runT1ME 11y ago
I don't know what other industry you have experience in, but this is fantastic compared to the rest of the world. In 'soft skill' jobs, I'd bet the house that credentials, prestige, and 'reputation' end up doing a lot more than a 30% higher acceptance rate. Should we improve it further? Absolutely, but to pretend that this isn't better than other industries is silly.
- staunch 11y ago
  I've worked for LA and NY companies (among others) and never seen anything like the elitism that exists in Silicon Valley. Silicon Valley is mostly funded by a few elite institutions, so it shouldn't be a surprise that they fund elite VCs, which then fund elite founders (and hire elite employees). The funding sources in LA and NY are much larger and more diverse, so the elitism is far more diluted. It's a market opportunity that SV investors are so biased. Crowdfunding with equity might totally upset the applecart at some point.
  - rattray 11y ago
    Are you talking about tech startups or other firms?
  - argonaut 11y ago
    You've clearly never worked in finance...
jorgecurio 11y ago
> And it's much worse for founders seeking investment, where there are no hard skills to test at all. It's almost purely about being the same class as the investor. yeah I figured this was how things happened :/ but this is just the reality when you let people feel free to choose and make their own decisions, they are going to find safety in numbers and people similar to them. This explains the disproportionate lack of African American and Latino Americans in tech and the 'Bamboo Ceiling' that many Asian Americans experience in the corporate and academic world where they cap the number of Asian American applicants in Ivy league schools. Jewish Americans were also capped and barred from attending Ivy league hundred years ago but not anymore so this probably means that change will happen soon (even if it took a fucking century for racist ass mentality to change)
ljk 11y ago
this is different than other fields how? it's the same old since the beginning :\
- potatolicious 11y ago
  It's different because other fields haven't built up an entire mythos about how it's way more meritocratic than everyone else. Tech prides itself in being more objective, more rational than other fields but in reality is no different. In other fields the effects of class and network are openly acknowledged, in tech you to even address the issue you first have to punch through the mythos. In other fields the open acknowledgment of these issues has resulted in some action to de-bias the system (see: blind auditions for orchestras, residency matching for doctors). These efforts are imperfect, but nonetheless still way further along than anything we have.
  - argonaut 11y ago
    No, in reality it is substantially more meritocratic. In most professional/white-collar industries, not having a college degree would wreck your career. The fact that it only merely disadvantages your career in Silicon Valley is not evidence SV is not meritocratic. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
soham 11y ago
Problem is, that there just isn't enough time to evaluate everyone who applies. In my last job, I was a Director of Engineering at Box. Every job post we put up, had hundreds of applicants (thanks to job-boards which let candidates apply to jobs like putting in a shopping cart). What do you think we, as hiring managers, are going to do at that point? We'll have to start forming biases. And if we have to start forming one, it's better to start with good schools and good companies. (I'm sure VCs have a more severe problem). Problem gets worse when you're hiring at scale, and you want to hire before the holiday season nears, because if you miss the season, the company is doomed. At that point, there is almost panic. A resume with brand names on it, naturally gets higher preference. Homework projects could work well if the hiring requirements are small, but won't work well when a company has to hire say 25 engineers a quarter, which we had to. At that point, the process becomes too long, and it's easy to lose good candidates to a long process. This method of interviewing has been around ever since, and is going to be around for the foreseeable future. Nobody loves it, including the interviewers, but there just isn't a better way to do it at any sort of scale. Especially when there are much bigger problems to solve when you're running a business. It's best to take the bull by the horns. I run http://InterviewKickstart.com http://InterviewKickstart.com, which is a bootcamp for preparing for such technical interviews. We do almost exactly what is in the blog post. It works. Spectacularly.
- captain_trips 11y ago
  I dunno - part of leading an eng group is taking heat to do the right thing. I've been in the growth phase a few times now, been under tremendous pressure rapidly build a team. Taking the time to find the right people is absolutely key - better to hold off then get the wrong people in. Maybe it's because I've seen complete dipsh?t Stanford and MIT grads or maybe it's because I didn't go to a marquee school, but I put a big line in the sand on that one...
  - soham 11y ago
    Taking the time to find the right people is absolutely the key, but the unwritten part of the rule, is not to do that at the cost of business. Better to hire engineers who are good enough, than to miss the holiday season. The process of DS/Algos doesn't necessarily find wrong people. It's just the fastest way to find engineers who are good enough. In some sense, they almost secretly WANT you to succeed, by "standardizing" the process.
e40 11y ago
Which is why you get only upper class people funding upper class people In my experience it's even narrower than that. In many cases, there is a pre-existing relationship between the investor/founders. I once met (in a restaurant, because we had kids the same age that were making eyes at each other!) a serial entrepreneur. When we got to know each other he confided that his investors were friends from school (some Ivy league school, don't remember which) that would give him money for some idea, he'd start the company then they'd find a buyer. He'd done this 3-4 times already, and he was about 40. I know this example is one data point, but I've run across it in other situations, too.
jroseattle 11y ago
We flat-out ignore credentials in hiring decisions. If an elite school is intended to signal competence and brilliance in someone, then those qualities should shine through in a candidate without us having to know where they attended college. Simply stated: we're hiring you, not your certificate.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
superuser2 11y ago
You're assuming that the interview is measuring skill correctly in a few hours, but the candidate's several hundred hours of course project work and exams at the forefront of his life over several years are irrelevant. This seems like a big assumption. Why do you think your whiteboard regime measures skill better than a well-designed set of CS classes?

by staunch 11y ago

richardwhiuk 11y ago

Doesn't that support the fact that it is a meritocracy? Is it not reasonable to expect that top companies and top schools are more likely to employ people who have more applicable talent and skill? At the end of the day, going to a top university or working at an impressive company is always going to be a huge and relevant signal. It's difficult to see a problem with that.

thenewwazoo 11y ago
No, because > for a given level of performance on our credential-blind screen
- superuser2 11y ago
  While we're in the business of doubting things that measure performance, why do you trust the credential-blind screen?
kamaal 11y ago
>>Is it not reasonable to expect that top companies and top schools are more likely to employ people who have more applicable talent and skill? No. Its more like a club. Join this prestigious institution X, and then you shall enjoy life long benefits of employment, higher than average salary, bonuses, stock, opportunities to travel etc. Even if the person is actually the worst possible employee, or is barely productive. Merely have X on your resume, guarantees you life long privilege. To know how worst it is you come see how it is in India. There are people who join IIT(Indian institutes of technology), a sort of a chain of colleges which is supposed to be Ivy league. Who says so? They themselves, because saying anything other wise means putting your own career in danger. There are coaching institutes, who train you just to get an entrance. Doesn't matter what you go and do there, in fact from there on you may do nothing in your life at all. The whole purpose of getting into those colleges is to enjoy lifelong privilege of having access to alumni who will ensure you a good career regardless of your performance. The day you remove the real metrics of merit and put in artificial flags. People will do no real work and try to gather as many flags as they can.
- NotSammyHagar 11y ago
  Right, I'm shocked that everyone can't see that it's a club, to fund people who went to your school over others. I bet the original guy who posted that was in the club :-)

akhilcacharya 11y ago

Gotta say, this is incredibly discouraging for someone like me.

staunch 11y ago
On the positive side, no one can stop you from making lots of money using the internet. And if you have something that really takes off, those same investors will line up at your door.
- akhilcacharya 11y ago
  Right, but it's still discouraging to be forever branded a "2nd tier engineer/human/etc" because of where I went to school (unless I get into a good grad school).
  - elliotec 11y ago
    This is very specifically the case in Silicon Valley, the insular center of the world, and not the case elsewhere. Most companies I've interviewed at couldn't care less about where I went to school as long as I could build their stuff.
  - gaius 11y ago
    5 years into your career no-one normal cares where you went to school.
awakeasleep 11y ago
It should be encouraging because you're being told the truth and being spoken to like an adult for once in your life.
- akhilcacharya 11y ago
  You know, fair point. Far too many people spread the meme that school doesn't matter.
11y ago

runT1ME 11y ago

I don't know what other industry you have experience in, but this is fantastic compared to the rest of the world. In 'soft skill' jobs, I'd bet the house that credentials, prestige, and 'reputation' end up doing a lot more than a 30% higher acceptance rate. Should we improve it further? Absolutely, but to pretend that this isn't better than other industries is silly.

staunch 11y ago
I've worked for LA and NY companies (among others) and never seen anything like the elitism that exists in Silicon Valley. Silicon Valley is mostly funded by a few elite institutions, so it shouldn't be a surprise that they fund elite VCs, which then fund elite founders (and hire elite employees). The funding sources in LA and NY are much larger and more diverse, so the elitism is far more diluted. It's a market opportunity that SV investors are so biased. Crowdfunding with equity might totally upset the applecart at some point.
- rattray 11y ago
  Are you talking about tech startups or other firms?
- argonaut 11y ago
  You've clearly never worked in finance...

jorgecurio 11y ago

> And it's much worse for founders seeking investment, where there are no hard skills to test at all. It's almost purely about being the same class as the investor. yeah I figured this was how things happened :/ but this is just the reality when you let people feel free to choose and make their own decisions, they are going to find safety in numbers and people similar to them. This explains the disproportionate lack of African American and Latino Americans in tech and the 'Bamboo Ceiling' that many Asian Americans experience in the corporate and academic world where they cap the number of Asian American applicants in Ivy league schools. Jewish Americans were also capped and barred from attending Ivy league hundred years ago but not anymore so this probably means that change will happen soon (even if it took a fucking century for racist ass mentality to change)

ljk 11y ago

this is different than other fields how? it's the same old since the beginning :\

potatolicious 11y ago
It's different because other fields haven't built up an entire mythos about how it's way more meritocratic than everyone else. Tech prides itself in being more objective, more rational than other fields but in reality is no different. In other fields the effects of class and network are openly acknowledged, in tech you to even address the issue you first have to punch through the mythos. In other fields the open acknowledgment of these issues has resulted in some action to de-bias the system (see: blind auditions for orchestras, residency matching for doctors). These efforts are imperfect, but nonetheless still way further along than anything we have.
- argonaut 11y ago
  No, in reality it is substantially more meritocratic. In most professional/white-collar industries, not having a college degree would wreck your career. The fact that it only merely disadvantages your career in Silicon Valley is not evidence SV is not meritocratic. Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

soham 11y ago

Problem is, that there just isn't enough time to evaluate everyone who applies. In my last job, I was a Director of Engineering at Box. Every job post we put up, had hundreds of applicants (thanks to job-boards which let candidates apply to jobs like putting in a shopping cart). What do you think we, as hiring managers, are going to do at that point? We'll have to start forming biases. And if we have to start forming one, it's better to start with good schools and good companies. (I'm sure VCs have a more severe problem). Problem gets worse when you're hiring at scale, and you want to hire before the holiday season nears, because if you miss the season, the company is doomed. At that point, there is almost panic. A resume with brand names on it, naturally gets higher preference. Homework projects could work well if the hiring requirements are small, but won't work well when a company has to hire say 25 engineers a quarter, which we had to. At that point, the process becomes too long, and it's easy to lose good candidates to a long process. This method of interviewing has been around ever since, and is going to be around for the foreseeable future. Nobody loves it, including the interviewers, but there just isn't a better way to do it at any sort of scale. Especially when there are much bigger problems to solve when you're running a business. It's best to take the bull by the horns. I run http://InterviewKickstart.com http://InterviewKickstart.com, which is a bootcamp for preparing for such technical interviews. We do almost exactly what is in the blog post. It works. Spectacularly.

captain_trips 11y ago
I dunno - part of leading an eng group is taking heat to do the right thing. I've been in the growth phase a few times now, been under tremendous pressure rapidly build a team. Taking the time to find the right people is absolutely key - better to hold off then get the wrong people in. Maybe it's because I've seen complete dipsh?t Stanford and MIT grads or maybe it's because I didn't go to a marquee school, but I put a big line in the sand on that one...
- soham 11y ago
  Taking the time to find the right people is absolutely the key, but the unwritten part of the rule, is not to do that at the cost of business. Better to hire engineers who are good enough, than to miss the holiday season. The process of DS/Algos doesn't necessarily find wrong people. It's just the fastest way to find engineers who are good enough. In some sense, they almost secretly WANT you to succeed, by "standardizing" the process.

e40 11y ago

Which is why you get only upper class people funding upper class people In my experience it's even narrower than that. In many cases, there is a pre-existing relationship between the investor/founders. I once met (in a restaurant, because we had kids the same age that were making eyes at each other!) a serial entrepreneur. When we got to know each other he confided that his investors were friends from school (some Ivy league school, don't remember which) that would give him money for some idea, he'd start the company then they'd find a buyer. He'd done this 3-4 times already, and he was about 40. I know this example is one data point, but I've run across it in other situations, too.

jroseattle 11y ago

We flat-out ignore credentials in hiring decisions. If an elite school is intended to signal competence and brilliance in someone, then those qualities should shine through in a candidate without us having to know where they attended college. Simply stated: we're hiring you, not your certificate.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

superuser2 11y ago

You're assuming that the interview is measuring skill correctly in a few hours, but the candidate's several hundred hours of course project work and exams at the forefront of his life over several years are irrelevant. This seems like a big assumption. Why do you think your whiteboard regime measures skill better than a well-designed set of CS classes?