3 ms·

A few years back I interviewed a mixed race post-operative transsexual for a developer position in our startup. At that point in my life, I had not been expose

by nugget 13y ago

A few years back I interviewed a mixed race post-operative transsexual for a developer position in our startup. At that point in my life, I had not been exposed to much diversity at all. The candidate had been referred by a friend of mine who offered the personal bio ahead of time, probably to filter out any polite but intolerant employers. Before the interview started I forcefully reminded myself to keep an open mind and conduct the interview as I would any other. Half way through the interview it sort of suddenly dawned on me that I really didn't care, at all, about this person's personal orientation, preferences or lifestyle; as long as they could code, I would be happy to have them on board (as a co-worker and friend, as co-workers tend to become in such close quarters). And I felt intuitively confident that my co-founder would feel the same way. A lot of folks probably repeat this sentiment every day, but I wonder in how many industries they really, truly mean it. I think tech is a very special industry in terms of its ability to focus on substance, as you say, over form or perception.

glanch 13y ago
Were they qualified? Did you hire them?
ionforce 13y ago
Good on you for being open-minded. Also, diversity bingo!
nemesisj 13y ago
This is why we're always adamant that our first interview is a phone screen focused on a few coding problems and discussion about them. Yes, you can still tell some basic things like gender, accent, and so forth, but removing as much of the "first impression" BS that we can is important to us. We save the "culture fit" of the interview process to a later stage, while trying to provide as much transparency about our culture to our candidate as possible. We've ended up hiring some of our best employees that might have not done as well on an in-person interview this way. Yeah, these things shouldn't matter but they tend to. Well done for ignoring the unimportant and focusing on substance!

by nugget 13y ago

glanch 13y ago

Were they qualified? Did you hire them?

ionforce 13y ago

Good on you for being open-minded. Also, diversity bingo!

nemesisj 13y ago

This is why we're always adamant that our first interview is a phone screen focused on a few coding problems and discussion about them. Yes, you can still tell some basic things like gender, accent, and so forth, but removing as much of the "first impression" BS that we can is important to us. We save the "culture fit" of the interview process to a later stage, while trying to provide as much transparency about our culture to our candidate as possible. We've ended up hiring some of our best employees that might have not done as well on an in-person interview this way. Yeah, these things shouldn't matter but they tend to. Well done for ignoring the unimportant and focusing on substance!