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>> Hiring Based on Side Projects: Unfair, But Good For the World I don't see how hiring based on side projects is unfair in any way. Ignoring people's side pro

>> Hiring Based on Side Projects: Unfair, But Good For the World I don't see how hiring based on side projects is unfair in any way. Ignoring people's side projects is essentially a punishment for those who do invest a lot of time in them. It's not like the side project built itself. We should not punish people by ignoring their surplus efforts. There are two ways to go about it: 1. Reward people for building real stuff and improving their skills in an area which is relevant to the position that they're applying for. 2. Reward people for being good at taking whiteboard tests, social scheming, rehearsing job interviews and solving pointless abstract puzzles that have nothing to do with the position that they're applying for. I can't imagine how anyone could justify #2 as being the better option. It's disturbing that this article even needs to be written. Do people actually think that the second option is even viable? Now I understand why there are such huge social problems today. There is an army of type 1 people who were badly hurt and who are still struggling and now they're smarter and more determined than ever to make things right.

JohnBooty 6y ago
That's an awfully false dichotomy and I'm also not sure you checked out the linked article. I'm not a fan of whiteboard interview nonsense either. Probably for all the same reasons as you. Enough said there. I also really life to see folks' side projects. I think they are a good substitute for work experience - if somebody doesn't have relevant professional experience in a field, but they've been doing it in their own time, that's good & impressive and should be rewarded. I've been hired myself partly on the strength of a large side project I did. However, the linked article is about essentially demanding that hires have side projects, as a demonstration of their passion. Rejecting folks on the basis of a lack of side projects is going to be at least as disastrous (in terms of throwing away people who'd be great at the job) as rejecting candidates who flunk a whiteboard test or silly logic problem... and for some of the same reasons. Specifically, neither of those things is necessarily similar to the thing you're actually hiring them to do. There is an inverse correlation between "time a person has for side projects" and "the demands of their day job." The folks with the most time for side projects are the folks who are either underemployed or unemployed, or don't really do the whole "friends and family" thing outside of working hours. Also -- and keep in mind I'm saying this as a big fan of side projects and following one's passions -- the act of following one's passion in one's spare time is profoundly different from getting shit done at a 9-to-5. The purpose of a day job is directly or indirectly make money for one's employer. Often that means doing shit one does not want to do. It is a grind, even in "cool" jobs that overlap with one's passions to a large degree. In short, seems to me the gulf between "following your passions" and "actually getting shit done for your employer" is about as big as the gulf between "passing a whiteboard exam" and "actually getting shit done for your employer."
moron4hire 6y ago
This. It's one thing to say "don't be biased against people who don't have public GitHub profiles full of stuff they can show off". It's very clear that there are a variety of reasons why that would be the case. But it's an entirely different thing to say "side projects have no correlation to job skill". Which is literally what a lot of people in the article's referenced tweet are saying, and even what a few people here are saying. The reality is, most of the resumes you're going to get for any particular job posting are going to be garbage. Poor performers are over-represented in the open job market, both because they stay in the job market a lot longer (can't stay very long at one place) and because they need to apply to lots of places in the hopes of playing the numbers. The resume is completely broken. But it's all we get from "open" job positions. If the resume is all I have to go on, most of the ones I get I have to throw away because they have nearly zero match for the posted position. Of the few that are left, the ones that somehow show they aren't a hot-potato are going to the top of the stack. If all you have is enterprise Java experience and you're applying to my VR project in C#, and you have nothing to show, not even side projects, that you have any experience writing C# or game code, I'm not going to even give you a call. And that sort of thing is the majority of resumes you'll receive. If you want a particular job, you need to be able to show some kind of ability to do it. If that's your actual, professional experience, that's the best. But if you're trying to change industries, you gotta have something that correlates. So what is it going to be, if it isn't a side project? The better way of evaluating candidates is to start from referrals, but that has its own issues of gatekeeping, either conscious or unconscious. If we're talking about open job listings, getting nothing but a cover letter and a resume (and you're lucky to even get a cover letter), how else are you supposed to do it? You can't interview everyone. There are people who will be a complete waste of time.

JohnBooty 6y ago

That's an awfully false dichotomy and I'm also not sure you checked out the linked article. I'm not a fan of whiteboard interview nonsense either. Probably for all the same reasons as you. Enough said there. I also really life to see folks' side projects. I think they are a good substitute for work experience - if somebody doesn't have relevant professional experience in a field, but they've been doing it in their own time, that's good & impressive and should be rewarded. I've been hired myself partly on the strength of a large side project I did. However, the linked article is about essentially demanding that hires have side projects, as a demonstration of their passion. Rejecting folks on the basis of a lack of side projects is going to be at least as disastrous (in terms of throwing away people who'd be great at the job) as rejecting candidates who flunk a whiteboard test or silly logic problem... and for some of the same reasons. Specifically, neither of those things is necessarily similar to the thing you're actually hiring them to do. There is an inverse correlation between "time a person has for side projects" and "the demands of their day job." The folks with the most time for side projects are the folks who are either underemployed or unemployed, or don't really do the whole "friends and family" thing outside of working hours. Also -- and keep in mind I'm saying this as a big fan of side projects and following one's passions -- the act of following one's passion in one's spare time is profoundly different from getting shit done at a 9-to-5. The purpose of a day job is directly or indirectly make money for one's employer. Often that means doing shit one does not want to do. It is a grind, even in "cool" jobs that overlap with one's passions to a large degree. In short, seems to me the gulf between "following your passions" and "actually getting shit done for your employer" is about as big as the gulf between "passing a whiteboard exam" and "actually getting shit done for your employer."

moron4hire 6y ago

This. It's one thing to say "don't be biased against people who don't have public GitHub profiles full of stuff they can show off". It's very clear that there are a variety of reasons why that would be the case. But it's an entirely different thing to say "side projects have no correlation to job skill". Which is literally what a lot of people in the article's referenced tweet are saying, and even what a few people here are saying. The reality is, most of the resumes you're going to get for any particular job posting are going to be garbage. Poor performers are over-represented in the open job market, both because they stay in the job market a lot longer (can't stay very long at one place) and because they need to apply to lots of places in the hopes of playing the numbers. The resume is completely broken. But it's all we get from "open" job positions. If the resume is all I have to go on, most of the ones I get I have to throw away because they have nearly zero match for the posted position. Of the few that are left, the ones that somehow show they aren't a hot-potato are going to the top of the stack. If all you have is enterprise Java experience and you're applying to my VR project in C#, and you have nothing to show, not even side projects, that you have any experience writing C# or game code, I'm not going to even give you a call. And that sort of thing is the majority of resumes you'll receive. If you want a particular job, you need to be able to show some kind of ability to do it. If that's your actual, professional experience, that's the best. But if you're trying to change industries, you gotta have something that correlates. So what is it going to be, if it isn't a side project? The better way of evaluating candidates is to start from referrals, but that has its own issues of gatekeeping, either conscious or unconscious. If we're talking about open job listings, getting nothing but a cover letter and a resume (and you're lucky to even get a cover letter), how else are you supposed to do it? You can't interview everyone. There are people who will be a complete waste of time.