5 ms·

I am not, nor have I been a team lead, but will pitch in with a couple ideas. It sounds to me like the other managers don't believe that the metrics you are us

I am not, nor have I been a team lead, but will pitch in with a couple ideas. It sounds to me like the other managers don't believe that the metrics you are using will result in higher productivity faster. This could be because they just don't understand or haven't fully internalized the benefits of passion etc., but I suspect it's more likely that they're feeling the pressure to higher someone, anyone. Assuming you have enough autonomy on your team to make a hire based only on the merits you list above, have you been able to demonstrate to your higher-ups that your method is more effective? If the higher-ups understand what's better about your approach and that other teams aren't following it, they may be able to start changing the culture or putting pressure to change interviews. I'd also recommend re-examining the "must be better than the last hired engineer" point. Different engineers excel in different areas and I suspect you'll run into problems like "well they're much better at algorithms than the last hire but they didn't ask the requirements questions I'd like", etc. To me it seems like a weak link that your peers may focus on to the detriment of your other goals. Again, not a team lead, just suppositions and suggestions based on the engineer side. Mostly just sounds like a company culture issue, gotta make the superiors understand why haste makes waste.

canterburry 8y ago
Thanks for the feedback. Luckily I do have some autonomy and can onboard who I feel is a strong candidate. It's more when I participate in hiring for other teams and object to certain candidates that I just want to slap my palm to my forehead. It only affects my team when we depend on deliverables from other teams. "must be better than the last hired engineer" - This is definitely more aspirational than a hard rule and in fact financially unfeasible in the long term. However, it's a useful measuring stick when you comparing candidates. I typically use existing team members as reference points and try to imagine where the candidate before me will fit in the range of talent we already have.
- AnimalMuppet 8y ago
  Then that's maybe a long-term way you can fix it. Your team needs to visibly out-perform other teams. Then you can go over the heads of the other team managers to impose better hiring practices. Note that this is primarily a political problem, not a technical one. Truly fixing it may not happen when the other team managers are still in their positions.

canterburry 8y ago

Thanks for the feedback. Luckily I do have some autonomy and can onboard who I feel is a strong candidate. It's more when I participate in hiring for other teams and object to certain candidates that I just want to slap my palm to my forehead. It only affects my team when we depend on deliverables from other teams. "must be better than the last hired engineer" - This is definitely more aspirational than a hard rule and in fact financially unfeasible in the long term. However, it's a useful measuring stick when you comparing candidates. I typically use existing team members as reference points and try to imagine where the candidate before me will fit in the range of talent we already have.

AnimalMuppet 8y ago
Then that's maybe a long-term way you can fix it. Your team needs to visibly out-perform other teams. Then you can go over the heads of the other team managers to impose better hiring practices. Note that this is primarily a political problem, not a technical one. Truly fixing it may not happen when the other team managers are still in their positions.