5 ms·

This is my experience as well. A large portion of hires can barely program. There is also a portion of hires that are 20-40% more than market, but yield more th

This is my experience as well. A large portion of hires can barely program. There is also a portion of hires that are 20-40% more than market, but yield more than double the outcome. There are a large number of SWEs that are not worth keeping but the incentive structure is misaligned to deal with it. If tomorrow you realize more than half of your staff should be cut and replaced, how much effort would it be to do it, what do you gain and how much risk do you put on yourself if it back fires? I recently watched a fellow leader try to go down this path to get stonewalled by HR about respect, moral and cultural values. Disclaimer: Own personal opinions.

solardev 4y ago
I wonder how much of this is just commonplace in any industry. Isn't mediocrity to be expected if people are, on average, well... average? When I walk into a bank I don't expect them all to be the best bankers in the world. Most of the restaurants I go to are fine, not earth shattering. Houses are built by crews of various competence. Government is run by the inept. Militaries are staffed with cannon fodder. Etc. Why is it a problem that some people do the bare minimum? By and large they still contribute in some small way to the project, hopefully. I'd much rather work with people who are less competent but easy to get along with than someone who is above average but also cocky and inapproachable and won't take feedback well. Most software and business problems aren't that hard. You don't need the best people to work on them. Superstar devs are sometimes just a pain in the ass and not worth the small improvements to code they can bring if they are a thorn in everyone's sides. Coding is just routine groupwork, not an Olympic sport. My 2c as someone who's slightly below or slightly above average, can't really tell and don't really care lol.
- tharkun__ 4y ago
  I don't think anyone is saying that being average is bad. At least I'm not. My problem with these people is that the average is such a low quality of work and work ethics. I want to be able to set a certain bar of quality and work ethics and I want the average developer to meet that bar, not for them to be so far below it that I have to hire way above average people just to reach the bar. I agree with you that you want people that you can work with. The star developers with the attitude you describe is not someone I want to hire. However doing the bare minimum is so way below the bar that this better not be what the average developer does. I want those people to be the exceptions - way below average.
  - SamuelAdams 4y ago
    Do you not have internal coding standards / guidelines? Ideally this is what a PR process is for - reviewing new code and making sure it adheres to the team’s expectations. If code is not where you want it to be, reject the PR, leave specific comments about what was done well and what was done poorly, then repeat the cycle until code is where you need it to be.
    - tharkun__ 4y ago
      I don't know why you mention this in reply to my comment. I don't see how this is related. Now with that said, of course we have standards. That's the bar ;) The point I was making is that it seems that the average developer is so far below the bar, that I don't want to hire average developers. Of course there are some juniors (and even some seniors) that will take to code review comments, pairing with them, mentoring them, giving feedback etc. and will improve. Many many don't. Like mentioned elsewhere in the threads here, I think at least some of that has to do with the fact that so many developers have entered the market but they actually aren't good at it. They're in it for the money. They pull the average so far down that hiring average developers is excruciatingly frustrating.
  - solardev 4y ago
    Maybe I've just been lucky, but I've never actually seen one of these in the wild (a supposed programmer who can't code even mediocrely). Even the interns at my current job are pretty proficient (and better at some things I am!). And in the right cultural atmosphere, people support each other and help them learn and grow... they don't stay a beginner for long. These people with terrible work quality and work ethics... how do you end up with them to begin with? There can't be THAT many of them. Are you working for a huge company that hires by the hundreds and just don't have time to properly vet/interview individual hires? I don't even mean LeetCode, just casual questioning, code samples, etc. I believe you, I just have a hard time understanding how somebody so terrible gets onto your teams to begin with. None of the coworkers I've ever worked with have ever been like that, and though all we all start at different skill levels for different things when we start, that tends to equalize itself after a few months of working together.

solardev 4y ago

I wonder how much of this is just commonplace in any industry. Isn't mediocrity to be expected if people are, on average, well... average? When I walk into a bank I don't expect them all to be the best bankers in the world. Most of the restaurants I go to are fine, not earth shattering. Houses are built by crews of various competence. Government is run by the inept. Militaries are staffed with cannon fodder. Etc. Why is it a problem that some people do the bare minimum? By and large they still contribute in some small way to the project, hopefully. I'd much rather work with people who are less competent but easy to get along with than someone who is above average but also cocky and inapproachable and won't take feedback well. Most software and business problems aren't that hard. You don't need the best people to work on them. Superstar devs are sometimes just a pain in the ass and not worth the small improvements to code they can bring if they are a thorn in everyone's sides. Coding is just routine groupwork, not an Olympic sport. My 2c as someone who's slightly below or slightly above average, can't really tell and don't really care lol.

tharkun__ 4y ago
I don't think anyone is saying that being average is bad. At least I'm not. My problem with these people is that the average is such a low quality of work and work ethics. I want to be able to set a certain bar of quality and work ethics and I want the average developer to meet that bar, not for them to be so far below it that I have to hire way above average people just to reach the bar. I agree with you that you want people that you can work with. The star developers with the attitude you describe is not someone I want to hire. However doing the bare minimum is so way below the bar that this better not be what the average developer does. I want those people to be the exceptions - way below average.
- SamuelAdams 4y ago
  Do you not have internal coding standards / guidelines? Ideally this is what a PR process is for - reviewing new code and making sure it adheres to the team’s expectations. If code is not where you want it to be, reject the PR, leave specific comments about what was done well and what was done poorly, then repeat the cycle until code is where you need it to be.
  - tharkun__ 4y ago
    I don't know why you mention this in reply to my comment. I don't see how this is related. Now with that said, of course we have standards. That's the bar ;) The point I was making is that it seems that the average developer is so far below the bar, that I don't want to hire average developers. Of course there are some juniors (and even some seniors) that will take to code review comments, pairing with them, mentoring them, giving feedback etc. and will improve. Many many don't. Like mentioned elsewhere in the threads here, I think at least some of that has to do with the fact that so many developers have entered the market but they actually aren't good at it. They're in it for the money. They pull the average so far down that hiring average developers is excruciatingly frustrating.
- solardev 4y ago
  Maybe I've just been lucky, but I've never actually seen one of these in the wild (a supposed programmer who can't code even mediocrely). Even the interns at my current job are pretty proficient (and better at some things I am!). And in the right cultural atmosphere, people support each other and help them learn and grow... they don't stay a beginner for long. These people with terrible work quality and work ethics... how do you end up with them to begin with? There can't be THAT many of them. Are you working for a huge company that hires by the hundreds and just don't have time to properly vet/interview individual hires? I don't even mean LeetCode, just casual questioning, code samples, etc. I believe you, I just have a hard time understanding how somebody so terrible gets onto your teams to begin with. None of the coworkers I've ever worked with have ever been like that, and though all we all start at different skill levels for different things when we start, that tends to equalize itself after a few months of working together.