5 ms·

> if a recruiter sends us three candidates who cannot pass our coding test, we fire the recruiter is there any room to take blame for the quality of the test?

> if a recruiter sends us three candidates who cannot pass our coding test, we fire the recruiter is there any room to take blame for the quality of the test? All testing must consider its reliability and validity as a measure. If it is VALID it measures what you think it measures. EG: by passing a programming test it measures that someone CAN or CANNOT code. If it is RELIABLE it has the same results time and again. I'd suggest in their case, that they may have a test which produces a high number of false-negatives - people who can program but struggle with their specific test for one reason or another. Anyways, it's up to them to do whatever they want with respect to their hires... It's up to the rest of us to not let them get away with blowing smoke up our butts about how great their test is or the exceptionally high quality of their candidates are. Joel had a great article saying roughly "no you don't really hire the top 1% of programmers"

snarf21 9y ago
Right, or publish an (old) copy of this amazing test and let it be critiqued. Also, if someone is a "top 1%" and you want them to work 100 hour weeks, maybe $500K is just too low.
- iaw 9y ago
  > want them to work 100 hour weeks, maybe $500K is just too low. I think this is the subtext.
  - logfromblammo 9y ago
    A 7-day week is 168 hours to begin with. 56 of those must necessarily be for sleep if you want the others to be worth anything. That leaves 112 waking hours. If 100 of those are working at the office, that is 12 hours for personal business. Roughly 100 minutes per day to eat, shower, commute, exercise, etc. $500k is not enough. $500M is not enough. If you put more hours in your labor export category, you have to take some from your leisure consumption category of your time budget. Whatever you earn from selling labor time is generally consumed during your leisure hours, after you subtract all your overhead expenses. And $500k for 100hr work weeks is only about $96/hr. If you subtract $175k for taxes and $75k for overhead expenses, that gives you $250k left to spend over your 624 hours of leisure time, which means you would have to party hard at $400/hr to enjoy it all. You would have to play 4 times as hard as you work. In contrast, $150k for 40hr work weeks is $72/hr. Subtract $42k for taxes and $58k for overhead, and you have $50k left to spend over 3744 leisure hours, which is about $13/hr. If you play just 1/5 as hard as you work, you're directly enjoying all the fruits of your labor. For reference purposes, if you spend $350/mo on a cable TV subscription, that's about $1 for every non-working, non-sleeping hour. If your movie theater charges $10 per 90-minute movie, spending every minute there that you aren't working or in bed is still less than $7/hr. Most leisure time activities repackaged for sale out there are targeted to lower-income households, so it's really difficult to burn up all your disposable income (at that level) just on typical middle-class entertainments without enlisting the help of dependents. That 100hr work week essentially means that you need to have a trophy spouse and some kids that don't know you, so they can spend your money for you. No, thank you; I don't want that.
    - iaw 9y ago
      I couldn't have said it better myself. The one thing we can't buy is time.

snarf21 9y ago

Right, or publish an (old) copy of this amazing test and let it be critiqued. Also, if someone is a "top 1%" and you want them to work 100 hour weeks, maybe $500K is just too low.

iaw 9y ago
> want them to work 100 hour weeks, maybe $500K is just too low. I think this is the subtext.
- logfromblammo 9y ago
  A 7-day week is 168 hours to begin with. 56 of those must necessarily be for sleep if you want the others to be worth anything. That leaves 112 waking hours. If 100 of those are working at the office, that is 12 hours for personal business. Roughly 100 minutes per day to eat, shower, commute, exercise, etc. $500k is not enough. $500M is not enough. If you put more hours in your labor export category, you have to take some from your leisure consumption category of your time budget. Whatever you earn from selling labor time is generally consumed during your leisure hours, after you subtract all your overhead expenses. And $500k for 100hr work weeks is only about $96/hr. If you subtract $175k for taxes and $75k for overhead expenses, that gives you $250k left to spend over your 624 hours of leisure time, which means you would have to party hard at $400/hr to enjoy it all. You would have to play 4 times as hard as you work. In contrast, $150k for 40hr work weeks is $72/hr. Subtract $42k for taxes and $58k for overhead, and you have $50k left to spend over 3744 leisure hours, which is about $13/hr. If you play just 1/5 as hard as you work, you're directly enjoying all the fruits of your labor. For reference purposes, if you spend $350/mo on a cable TV subscription, that's about $1 for every non-working, non-sleeping hour. If your movie theater charges $10 per 90-minute movie, spending every minute there that you aren't working or in bed is still less than $7/hr. Most leisure time activities repackaged for sale out there are targeted to lower-income households, so it's really difficult to burn up all your disposable income (at that level) just on typical middle-class entertainments without enlisting the help of dependents. That 100hr work week essentially means that you need to have a trophy spouse and some kids that don't know you, so they can spend your money for you. No, thank you; I don't want that.
  - iaw 9y ago
    I couldn't have said it better myself. The one thing we can't buy is time.