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Anecdotal of course, but in my experience, when hiring professional engineers, neither I nor anyone I know would judge someone for not having a Github page to l

by mwfunk 9y ago

Anecdotal of course, but in my experience, when hiring professional engineers, neither I nor anyone I know would judge someone for not having a Github page to look at. If they have one, great, I'll take a look, but if not, no big deal. It's not an expectation at non-startup tech companies. I've heard some people here on HN occasionally say that if an applicant doesn't have a Github page to look at, they will think less of them and maybe not even give them an interview. I always imagine the people who say this as being guys in their early-to-mid-20s who are fresh out of school, never worked anywhere outside their comfort zone, are still within a comfy bubble of friends and family, and went directly to the startup path where they are learning about stuff like recruiting and management in real time (if not outright making it up as they go along). I don't know if that's a fair characterization- it probably is unfair and inaccurate. But that's the stereotypical person my subconscious imagines those posts come from. The silver lining is, if someone doesn't give you an interview because you lack a Github page, you probably don't want to work for them anyway.

Sir_Substance 9y ago
>It's not an expectation at non-startup tech companies. Not true in the slightest. Before you get to talk to the engineers like this, you must first pass the HR filter. HR are not engineers, but they think they see a parallel to their own work. In HR, all HR applicants are expected to have a linkedin page, because linkedin makes HR's life a lot easier. I have Strong Opinions about this state of affairs, but none the less, there is a hovering perception in most HR offices of "if you don't have a linkedin page, how good at your job can you really be?". So then HR hears the engineers talking about github and profiles and sharing code and they dig a bit, and they often decide that github is basically linkedin for engineers. Lets be real, they're kinda right in some ways. But they're dead wrong in others. Lets not get sidetracked, but just say there are valid reasons some people don't use it. Engineers have the full picture and know this. Like you say, most professional engineers won't judge you for not having github. However, HR lacks the context to understand this, and so they increasingly throw out engineering CV's that don't include a github link. It's a growing problem.

by mwfunk 9y ago

Sir_Substance 9y ago

>It's not an expectation at non-startup tech companies. Not true in the slightest. Before you get to talk to the engineers like this, you must first pass the HR filter. HR are not engineers, but they think they see a parallel to their own work. In HR, all HR applicants are expected to have a linkedin page, because linkedin makes HR's life a lot easier. I have Strong Opinions about this state of affairs, but none the less, there is a hovering perception in most HR offices of "if you don't have a linkedin page, how good at your job can you really be?". So then HR hears the engineers talking about github and profiles and sharing code and they dig a bit, and they often decide that github is basically linkedin for engineers. Lets be real, they're kinda right in some ways. But they're dead wrong in others. Lets not get sidetracked, but just say there are valid reasons some people don't use it. Engineers have the full picture and know this. Like you say, most professional engineers won't judge you for not having github. However, HR lacks the context to understand this, and so they increasingly throw out engineering CV's that don't include a github link. It's a growing problem.