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It is easy to see why having a degree is not popular here in this forum. It is probably acting as a hard barrier for some to get a job. Thus people don't like i

It is easy to see why having a degree is not popular here in this forum. It is probably acting as a hard barrier for some to get a job. Thus people don't like it. Per my experience working in a big tech shop, most of the engineer-kind co-workers DO have a STEM degree. I don't think a CS degree is required in that sense, as long as the background is relevant. Only one of them came with no college degree, but he fits in well and decent in his work. Hiring is difficult as always, degree is indeed a powerful indicator. When the amount of candidates is not that tight, and the hiring process is increasingly streamlined, its importance will only grow.

scarface74 7y ago
How much of an “indicator” do you think my degree is from a no name college that so graduated from in the mid 90s?
etripe 7y ago
When it comes to interviewing, I think the biggest problem is one of biases. When working at a company in Sweden, an applicant was braggadocious about their prior experience, which was normal for their culture (as a means of demonstrating value) but not the Swedish one (where modesty is king). He was almost excluded purely on that basis. I, as an outsider, was aware of the phenomenon, but my native colleagues weren't. At another job, a theoretically inclined colleague was grilling a junior candidate on DDD and hexagonal versus onion architectures because that interested him. I had to point out that wasn't relevant at all for a fledgling programmer's ability to write a basic web API. Self-selection is a big problem, whether it be through cultural values, personal interests or the topic at hand: degrees. Let's please stick to what a degree is: an authority argument and a semi-reliable proxy for intelligence. The rest is incidental, as you can be lazy and disorganised with a degree, or possess a broad theoretical background and be intelligent without.

scarface74 7y ago

How much of an “indicator” do you think my degree is from a no name college that so graduated from in the mid 90s?

etripe 7y ago

When it comes to interviewing, I think the biggest problem is one of biases. When working at a company in Sweden, an applicant was braggadocious about their prior experience, which was normal for their culture (as a means of demonstrating value) but not the Swedish one (where modesty is king). He was almost excluded purely on that basis. I, as an outsider, was aware of the phenomenon, but my native colleagues weren't. At another job, a theoretically inclined colleague was grilling a junior candidate on DDD and hexagonal versus onion architectures because that interested him. I had to point out that wasn't relevant at all for a fledgling programmer's ability to write a basic web API. Self-selection is a big problem, whether it be through cultural values, personal interests or the topic at hand: degrees. Let's please stick to what a degree is: an authority argument and a semi-reliable proxy for intelligence. The rest is incidental, as you can be lazy and disorganised with a degree, or possess a broad theoretical background and be intelligent without.