6 ms·

Double edged sword. Certainly helps to find great talent and build a cohesive team. Also tends to perpetuate our biases, create cliques and echo chambers. Mak

by jaaron 6y ago

Double edged sword. Certainly helps to find great talent and build a cohesive team. Also tends to perpetuate our biases, create cliques and echo chambers. Makes it harder for new talent to break in. When I build my teams, I try to balance referrals with newly sourced talent far outside my network.

nogabebop23 6y ago
everyone also has a pretty shallow pool of quality talent, so it doesn't scale well. Once you've been involved in hiring you see why a company will pass on a likely good candidate to avoid a maybe bad experience. In the longer term it's way less work.
- bluedino 6y ago
  Works well for the first 20-100 employees. After that you’re bound to get a solid chunk of bad ones no matter what you do.
closeparen 6y ago
Judgement, taste, sensibility, intuition - this is what human professionals are for. The value of an experienced worker is in the biases he has accumulated.
- jaaron 6y ago
  Do you really not understand that when I say "bias," I mean prejudices against people that are irrespective of their qualifications for the job? Of course I want to hire people for their technical and professional judgement. That's the whole point of the interview process: to attempt to measure technical knowledge and its application (ie- judgement). It's hard, but we have to try. But if we google "bias in hiring [1]," all the results are around prejudices that have nothing to do with their performance on the job. In this context, bias means discrimination against certain genders, races, religious beliefs, cultural backgrounds and so on. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt: perhaps you are unfamiliar with the generally understood definition of bias when talking about hiring practices. Alternatively, you're selectively and intentionally feigning misunderstanding to advance a position that such prejudice and discrimination is acceptable. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=bias+in+hiring https://www.google.com/search?q=bias+in+hiring
dpoochieni 6y ago
So basically you see yourself as so irredeemably biased (racist or sexist?) that the network you keep is also this badly biased?
- scarface74 6y ago
  Most people hang out with people who are like them.
  - blaser-waffle 6y ago
    "people like them" is relative. Most of my crew are programmers -- but are Chinese, Indian, and German.
    - scarface74 6y ago
      Or you know we could look at statistics instead of anecdotes. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/08/25/three-quarters-of-whites-dont-have-any-non-white-friends/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/08/25/three...
      - dpoochieni 6y ago
        > There are a number of factors driving these numbers. Simple population counts are one of them: There are more white people than black people in the United States, so it makes sense that the average American is going to have more white friends than black friends. That's the major factor but I guess if one tries hard enough they can see the angels dancing on the head of a needle. Why would they dismiss it in the 2nd paragraph to come up with some holier-than-thou babble. Of course, and then one could do some math and figure out that in a graph where 75% of nodes are X and 25% are Y and random relationships occur, the average Y will have a higher proportion of X friends than the average X will have of Y friends. ? Where does one jump from this to some kind of moral argument? It's like saying the avg kitesurfers has more non-kitesurfer friends than the avg non-kitesurfer has kitesurfer friends. F*, this grouping and deindividuation of people that the American left has degenerated to, has truly has become a post-modern religion with it's requisite self-flagelation and utopic symbolism.

by jaaron 6y ago

nogabebop23 6y ago

everyone also has a pretty shallow pool of quality talent, so it doesn't scale well. Once you've been involved in hiring you see why a company will pass on a likely good candidate to avoid a maybe bad experience. In the longer term it's way less work.

bluedino 6y ago
Works well for the first 20-100 employees. After that you’re bound to get a solid chunk of bad ones no matter what you do.

closeparen 6y ago

Judgement, taste, sensibility, intuition - this is what human professionals are for. The value of an experienced worker is in the biases he has accumulated.

jaaron 6y ago
Do you really not understand that when I say "bias," I mean prejudices against people that are irrespective of their qualifications for the job? Of course I want to hire people for their technical and professional judgement. That's the whole point of the interview process: to attempt to measure technical knowledge and its application (ie- judgement). It's hard, but we have to try. But if we google "bias in hiring [1]," all the results are around prejudices that have nothing to do with their performance on the job. In this context, bias means discrimination against certain genders, races, religious beliefs, cultural backgrounds and so on. I'll give you the benefit of the doubt: perhaps you are unfamiliar with the generally understood definition of bias when talking about hiring practices. Alternatively, you're selectively and intentionally feigning misunderstanding to advance a position that such prejudice and discrimination is acceptable. [1] https://www.google.com/search?q=bias+in+hiring https://www.google.com/search?q=bias+in+hiring

dpoochieni 6y ago

So basically you see yourself as so irredeemably biased (racist or sexist?) that the network you keep is also this badly biased?

scarface74 6y ago
Most people hang out with people who are like them.
- blaser-waffle 6y ago
  "people like them" is relative. Most of my crew are programmers -- but are Chinese, Indian, and German.
  - scarface74 6y ago
    Or you know we could look at statistics instead of anecdotes. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/08/25/three-quarters-of-whites-dont-have-any-non-white-friends/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2014/08/25/three...
    - dpoochieni 6y ago
      > There are a number of factors driving these numbers. Simple population counts are one of them: There are more white people than black people in the United States, so it makes sense that the average American is going to have more white friends than black friends. That's the major factor but I guess if one tries hard enough they can see the angels dancing on the head of a needle. Why would they dismiss it in the 2nd paragraph to come up with some holier-than-thou babble. Of course, and then one could do some math and figure out that in a graph where 75% of nodes are X and 25% are Y and random relationships occur, the average Y will have a higher proportion of X friends than the average X will have of Y friends. ? Where does one jump from this to some kind of moral argument? It's like saying the avg kitesurfers has more non-kitesurfer friends than the avg non-kitesurfer has kitesurfer friends. F*, this grouping and deindividuation of people that the American left has degenerated to, has truly has become a post-modern religion with it's requisite self-flagelation and utopic symbolism.