3 ms·

"Pick a “side project”, a web product, and build it from beginning to end." Maybe Marcelo's immediate concern is that this fictional developer doesn't know "HT

"Pick a “side project”, a web product, and build it from beginning to end." Maybe Marcelo's immediate concern is that this fictional developer doesn't know "HTTP, Razor, MVC 3, ASP.NET, CSS, HTML, JavaScript, jQuery, jQuery UI, Facebook Connect, Twitter API, SQL, service monitoring, and analytics" like the back of his hand, but to assume that he's never built something from beginning to end just because he works at a big company is a bit much. Anybody that's done really hard work like this fictional developer (especially if they're feeling constrained by Microsoft culture) has probably built multiple tools from beginning to end in order to make his life easier. He may even have built tools (perhaps even web tools that use a lot of the buzzword technologies in his list) that were used internally by large numbers of users. But did Marcelo ask? No, he just assumes the guy doesn't have the chops because he chose to work at the wrong place for the last ten years. Also, one of the commenters says, "Yeah let's be clear, once you hit L65 startups are not going to be interested in you. Ever." Does this really matter to people that are running startups?

jcc80 15y ago
The fact that the author previously worked at Microsoft himself leads him to draw all sorts of (potentially false) conclusions about this engineer.
- amcintyre 15y ago
  I admit that it might be tempting to automatically associate "Pete" with any not-so-capable principal devs he may have worked with at Microsoft, but that seems like a bad prejudice to be carrying around if you're interested in hiring the best people to make your business successful. At least he's open about his prejudice, which I guess is doing those job hunters from Microsoft a favor.
alexbowman 15y ago
I agree completely. And a suggestion on Marcelo's style - to identify someone listening is important. This is a general point applicable here and other situations: listen. Asd open ended questions without framing them or signalling one's own intentions. Let an individual express themselves, do not focus on technical details which can be learnt quickly but success factors in the hiring organisation, and let the candidate express their own experiences and motivations, then after the interview / informal chat match them against one's own organisation's characteristics. This is something that can and should be done across all organisation types. De-focus on immediate need - that's a contractor, or specialist in an unchanging position - focus on the longer term fit of the individual and the hiring organisation.

jcc80 15y ago

The fact that the author previously worked at Microsoft himself leads him to draw all sorts of (potentially false) conclusions about this engineer.

amcintyre 15y ago
I admit that it might be tempting to automatically associate "Pete" with any not-so-capable principal devs he may have worked with at Microsoft, but that seems like a bad prejudice to be carrying around if you're interested in hiring the best people to make your business successful. At least he's open about his prejudice, which I guess is doing those job hunters from Microsoft a favor.

alexbowman 15y ago

I agree completely. And a suggestion on Marcelo's style - to identify someone listening is important. This is a general point applicable here and other situations: listen. Asd open ended questions without framing them or signalling one's own intentions. Let an individual express themselves, do not focus on technical details which can be learnt quickly but success factors in the hiring organisation, and let the candidate express their own experiences and motivations, then after the interview / informal chat match them against one's own organisation's characteristics. This is something that can and should be done across all organisation types. De-focus on immediate need - that's a contractor, or specialist in an unchanging position - focus on the longer term fit of the individual and the hiring organisation.