5 ms·

And then people that aren't part of that network of trust (like minorities or women) can't get work.

lowbloodsugar 9y ago
And likewise, we get cliques of bullshit artists. Literally this guy just proposed "It's not what you know, its who you know" as the solution.
- BjoernKW 9y ago
  No, he didn’t. I said ‘network of trust’, not ‘cronyism’. - People starring your GitHub repository. - Someone following you on Twitter. - Someone linking to a blog post you wrote. - Someone recommending you to someone else because you did a great job on a project. These are all examples of informal networks of trust. I fail to see how that’s a bad thing.
  - Retra 9y ago
    Fuck that would be awful. I have 0 stars on Github. Don't use twitter. Don't have a blog. Only a few coworkers I even talk to. I spend my time writing code and interacting with my family, not trying to win popularity contests. Now if you're looking to hire celebrities instead of programmers, you're maybe onto something. I'm not a self-promotion artist. If I were, I would work in advertising.
    - BjoernKW 9y ago
      Being trusted by your peers is different from trying to win shallow popularity contests. That kind of aversion towards self-promotion might be a reason why we arrived at absurd phenomena like homework assignments for interviewing processes in the first place. With no way to draw upon previous work results or third party trust how else is someone supposed to assess a candidate’s skills?
      - salvar 9y ago
        Number of Twitter followers is now an indication of third party trust?
        BjoernKW 9y ago
        For the software industry ( for other industries or use cases that might certainly be different) I think it is. It’s just one possible indicator but an indicator it is. If I come across or meet a new person from this industry and that person has a Twitter account I routinely check the follower count. A somewhat large number says to me: “Many people seem to think that person has something relevant to say.”
        sincerely 9y ago
        More realistically, a somewhat large number (>1000) says to me "this person spends time and energy on self-promotion". Some of the smartest people I know have Twitter accounts with just 100-300 followers because they don't aggressively blog or anything.
      - Retra 9y ago
        If people did previous work, you should look at it. There's a way to do that. Now, if you can't because of the industry's propensity for using the law to hide information, then it seems that may be the cause of the industry's inability to find relevant information about potential employees.
    - kraigie 9y ago
      Twitter and blogs would be an excellent approach for hiring marketers/growth hackers
BjoernKW 9y ago
That’s whataboutism. Is there racial or gender-based inequality? Yes, unfortunately there is. Should we therefore resign and stop trusting each other altogether? No, we shouldn’t. We should rather try and extend our trust to others. Inequality isn’t caused by trust but by a lack of it.
- slimshady94 9y ago
  That's not whataboutism, that's valid criticism of a flaw in your idea. >Should we therefore resign and stop trusting each other altogether? This is a strawman, that was not suggested. What was suggested was to have an interview process which doesn't involve informal/subjective trust. The best programmers don't have huge twitter networks or github stars - some might, but not all. That's no criteria for filtering.
typon 9y ago
Bingo. You end up becoming like all the other industries dominated by white men at positions of power (Law e.g.)
- BjoernKW 9y ago
  Even if that were the case, which I don’t think it is because the underlying problem is something else, the current predominant interviewing process does little to alleviate that problem as well. I don’t think we can magically solve inequality by trying to fix the interviewing process or by denying there are social networks.
  - kraigie 9y ago
    Actually there are historical examples of where changing the interviewing process solved inequality. All it took was a curtain. You see there where few women in orchestras and it was said that this was because they didn't have the talent so couldn't get expirence, rather than being unable to get expirence due to prejudice. Then blind auditions started, interviewers would sit in front of a curtain, candidate would come in behind and play their music. Suddenly when the interviews could only judge on performance the same women that they said didn't have the talent where the ones they were choosing and that inequality was fixed. Now there might not work if the underlying cause is something else but it has worked.
    - chrisbennet 8y ago
      It is great that it worked for musicians but I was surprised that it doesn’t necessarily work for resumes. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-30/bilnd-recruitment-trial-to-improve-gender-equality-failing-study/8664888 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-30/bilnd-recruitment-tria... ”Professor Michael Hiscox, a Harvard academic who oversaw the trial, said he was shocked by the results and has urged caution. "We anticipated this would have a positive impact on diversity — making it more likely that female candidates and those from ethnic minorities are selected for the shortlist," he said. "We found the opposite, that de-identifying candidates reduced the likelihood of women being selected for the shortlist." The trial found assigning a male name to a candidate made them 3.2 per cent less likely to get a job interview. Adding a woman's name to a CV made the candidate 2.9 per cent more likely to get a foot in the door. "We should hit pause and be very cautious about introducing this as a way of improving diversity, as it can have the opposite effect," Professor Hiscox said.”

And likewise, we get cliques of bullshit artists. Literally this guy just proposed "It's not what you know, its who you know" as the solution.

BjoernKW 9y ago
No, he didn’t. I said ‘network of trust’, not ‘cronyism’. - People starring your GitHub repository. - Someone following you on Twitter. - Someone linking to a blog post you wrote. - Someone recommending you to someone else because you did a great job on a project. These are all examples of informal networks of trust. I fail to see how that’s a bad thing.
- Retra 9y ago
  Fuck that would be awful. I have 0 stars on Github. Don't use twitter. Don't have a blog. Only a few coworkers I even talk to. I spend my time writing code and interacting with my family, not trying to win popularity contests. Now if you're looking to hire celebrities instead of programmers, you're maybe onto something. I'm not a self-promotion artist. If I were, I would work in advertising.
  - BjoernKW 9y ago
    Being trusted by your peers is different from trying to win shallow popularity contests. That kind of aversion towards self-promotion might be a reason why we arrived at absurd phenomena like homework assignments for interviewing processes in the first place. With no way to draw upon previous work results or third party trust how else is someone supposed to assess a candidate’s skills?
    - salvar 9y ago
      Number of Twitter followers is now an indication of third party trust?
      - BjoernKW 9y ago
        For the software industry ( for other industries or use cases that might certainly be different) I think it is. It’s just one possible indicator but an indicator it is. If I come across or meet a new person from this industry and that person has a Twitter account I routinely check the follower count. A somewhat large number says to me: “Many people seem to think that person has something relevant to say.”
        sincerely 9y ago
        More realistically, a somewhat large number (>1000) says to me "this person spends time and energy on self-promotion". Some of the smartest people I know have Twitter accounts with just 100-300 followers because they don't aggressively blog or anything.
    - Retra 9y ago
      If people did previous work, you should look at it. There's a way to do that. Now, if you can't because of the industry's propensity for using the law to hide information, then it seems that may be the cause of the industry's inability to find relevant information about potential employees.
  - kraigie 9y ago
    Twitter and blogs would be an excellent approach for hiring marketers/growth hackers

BjoernKW 9y ago

That’s whataboutism. Is there racial or gender-based inequality? Yes, unfortunately there is. Should we therefore resign and stop trusting each other altogether? No, we shouldn’t. We should rather try and extend our trust to others. Inequality isn’t caused by trust but by a lack of it.

slimshady94 9y ago
That's not whataboutism, that's valid criticism of a flaw in your idea. >Should we therefore resign and stop trusting each other altogether? This is a strawman, that was not suggested. What was suggested was to have an interview process which doesn't involve informal/subjective trust. The best programmers don't have huge twitter networks or github stars - some might, but not all. That's no criteria for filtering.

typon 9y ago

Bingo. You end up becoming like all the other industries dominated by white men at positions of power (Law e.g.)

BjoernKW 9y ago
Even if that were the case, which I don’t think it is because the underlying problem is something else, the current predominant interviewing process does little to alleviate that problem as well. I don’t think we can magically solve inequality by trying to fix the interviewing process or by denying there are social networks.
- kraigie 9y ago
  Actually there are historical examples of where changing the interviewing process solved inequality. All it took was a curtain. You see there where few women in orchestras and it was said that this was because they didn't have the talent so couldn't get expirence, rather than being unable to get expirence due to prejudice. Then blind auditions started, interviewers would sit in front of a curtain, candidate would come in behind and play their music. Suddenly when the interviews could only judge on performance the same women that they said didn't have the talent where the ones they were choosing and that inequality was fixed. Now there might not work if the underlying cause is something else but it has worked.
  - chrisbennet 8y ago
    It is great that it worked for musicians but I was surprised that it doesn’t necessarily work for resumes. http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-30/bilnd-recruitment-trial-to-improve-gender-equality-failing-study/8664888 http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-06-30/bilnd-recruitment-tria... ”Professor Michael Hiscox, a Harvard academic who oversaw the trial, said he was shocked by the results and has urged caution. "We anticipated this would have a positive impact on diversity — making it more likely that female candidates and those from ethnic minorities are selected for the shortlist," he said. "We found the opposite, that de-identifying candidates reduced the likelihood of women being selected for the shortlist." The trial found assigning a male name to a candidate made them 3.2 per cent less likely to get a job interview. Adding a woman's name to a CV made the candidate 2.9 per cent more likely to get a foot in the door. "We should hit pause and be very cautious about introducing this as a way of improving diversity, as it can have the opposite effect," Professor Hiscox said.”