4 ms·

Totally agree. Many of the most impressive people I've met were fuckups in HS, which pretty much blocks you from a great college. Google is basically selectin

Totally agree. Many of the most impressive people I've met were fuckups in HS, which pretty much blocks you from a great college. Google is basically selecting for people who either grew up really fast or had parents bully them into academic performance. Of course, they are also selecting for people who have a great work ethic, aren't stupid, and largely play by the rules. Out of curiosity, how would you thin the applicant herd? Say you have 10,000 resumes sitting on your desk for a CS job. You can't read them all so you need to set a few automatable/arbitrary rules to get the pile down to 50 or so. What rules do you use? Years of experience? Google HR can't take the time to get to know 10,000 people. What Google does is incredibly imperfect, but to trim their resume flow down to a smaller number they haven't made a terrible choice. What's a better one?

SwellJoe 17y ago
I don't know. I just ask questions. I don't have any good answers. I've tried to figure it out every time I've had to hire someone. The best luck I've had is with prior knowledge of the person (worked with them in the past, knew them from an Open Source project, etc.). I'm suspicious of the network hiring process, though, as it seems to narrow the pool too much, and certainly doesn't scale. I think it can also bring about quality degradation over time as people bring in people they like rather than people that are the best. I just have a sneaking suspicion that some of the things that Google does wrong could possibly be attributed to hiring predominantly from the "teacher's pet" archetype.
- lacker 17y ago
  I think you are confusing different parts of Google's hiring process. Keep in mind this guy started in tech support. When you describe Google as requiring a "top-tier degree" you are thinking of software engineer positions. If you want to get a job at Google doing tech support, or working in a datacenter, the hiring bar is lower.
  - SwellJoe 17y ago
    That's true. And, contractor positions are also easier to get hired for than full-time positions. It's a very common "back door" for folks who don't meet all the requirements into a job at Google to start as a contractor...I know several people who got their Google job that way. I question how readily one can move between those positions at Google, and the more rarefied positions, though. So, maybe Zeke is an exception at Microsoft, too, and this really is just some straight up astroturfing. I'm sure one could easily find a few dozen team leads at Google that don't sport a fancy degree. But, if Microsoft doesn't actually want to hire more people like Zeke, it seems like a poor choice of story to tell.
    - litewulf 17y ago
      Anecdote time: I have a friend at Google who started there as basically a glorified tech while he was attending a community college (so, no degree at all). Google has been paying for large chunks of his tuition, enabling him to scrape together enough money to go to UC Berkeley. He recently graduated, and simultaneously shifted from his technician position into engineering based on feedback from the engineers he worked with. Mind you, it took him a pretty long time to do so, and lots of things could have gone wrong on the way, but its definitely possible.
  - philwelch 17y ago
    But will that get you into a software engineer position? Of course, that might not get you into a software engineer position at Microsoft anymore, either.

SwellJoe 17y ago

I don't know. I just ask questions. I don't have any good answers. I've tried to figure it out every time I've had to hire someone. The best luck I've had is with prior knowledge of the person (worked with them in the past, knew them from an Open Source project, etc.). I'm suspicious of the network hiring process, though, as it seems to narrow the pool too much, and certainly doesn't scale. I think it can also bring about quality degradation over time as people bring in people they like rather than people that are the best. I just have a sneaking suspicion that some of the things that Google does wrong could possibly be attributed to hiring predominantly from the "teacher's pet" archetype.

lacker 17y ago
I think you are confusing different parts of Google's hiring process. Keep in mind this guy started in tech support. When you describe Google as requiring a "top-tier degree" you are thinking of software engineer positions. If you want to get a job at Google doing tech support, or working in a datacenter, the hiring bar is lower.
- SwellJoe 17y ago
  That's true. And, contractor positions are also easier to get hired for than full-time positions. It's a very common "back door" for folks who don't meet all the requirements into a job at Google to start as a contractor...I know several people who got their Google job that way. I question how readily one can move between those positions at Google, and the more rarefied positions, though. So, maybe Zeke is an exception at Microsoft, too, and this really is just some straight up astroturfing. I'm sure one could easily find a few dozen team leads at Google that don't sport a fancy degree. But, if Microsoft doesn't actually want to hire more people like Zeke, it seems like a poor choice of story to tell.
  - litewulf 17y ago
    Anecdote time: I have a friend at Google who started there as basically a glorified tech while he was attending a community college (so, no degree at all). Google has been paying for large chunks of his tuition, enabling him to scrape together enough money to go to UC Berkeley. He recently graduated, and simultaneously shifted from his technician position into engineering based on feedback from the engineers he worked with. Mind you, it took him a pretty long time to do so, and lots of things could have gone wrong on the way, but its definitely possible.
- philwelch 17y ago
  But will that get you into a software engineer position? Of course, that might not get you into a software engineer position at Microsoft anymore, either.