4 ms·

At a couple of companies I was at, an Indian jobs shop had somehow gotten their mitts into our HR types and we were indundated with candidates who showed up wit

by kabdib 12y ago

At a couple of companies I was at, an Indian jobs shop had somehow gotten their mitts into our HR types and we were indundated with candidates who showed up with books like "Learn Java in 12 hours" or "Windows Device Drivers for N00bs" under their arms. Very junior types, without exception. Our interview questions were fed back, and I had to change them a fair amount. Not a problem. "The guy at XYZZY will ask about hash tables, so..." and I'd ask them questions about something else, like concurrency, to very obvious consternation. Halfway through an interview, one candidate even asked when I was going to ask about hash tables. "Fine. We can talk about concurrency and hash tables." There was an undercurrent of expectation. Their handler / manager (the relationship was never really made clear) called me one day and said "We expect you to give a job to several of our people. You keep changing your questions. What is the problem?" And I would explain that I wasn't going to hire someone junior, who we would have to teach how to do engineering, for a senior wage. Eventually they stopped coming, presumably having found better pastures.

jerrytsai 12y ago
I had a similar experience 7 or 8 years ago, except that I was working for a small company and doing both the recruiting and the interviewing. I would screen a person by phone, and they would pass a basic screen. Then the person would come in and be completely incompetent, openly bringing a basic book in the language that he or she was expected to already know. After this happened a couple of times I got wise to the strategy. The phone screen was useless. Someone would prompt the person with the right answer. The resume and references also useless, filled with unconfirmable or suspect information. I gained a little appreciation for what HR professionals have to do and lost a bit of my naivete that people won't try to represent expertise to someone who actually has that expertise. The language was SAS.
xxcode 12y ago
I am not sure if your response is relevant to the article, but I felt that there is some level of superiority complex that you and many fellow humans posses (in this case, about your superior knowledge and intellect). Perhaps the biggest difference between you and someone applying for the job through the h1b visa program was that they were born in a different set of circumstances than you were. They were likely born in India whereas you were born I the United States. As a result of being born in India, they went to a local school there which didn't teach them about hash tables and concurrency. Your school did, and you had a better education. This person from India is trying to make a better life for himself despite starting at a disadvantage in life(being born in a poor country with access to lesser educational opportunities than you). You are welcome to reject him for the job(you can do so at the resume screening state, especially if they don't have the relevant skills and experience) but I think it would be useful to remember that the other person is a human, likely disadvantaged, and express some human empathy.
- driverdan 12y ago
  Your response has nothing to do with his post. He said he's looking for senior devs and keeps getting sent rookies. It doesn't matter what their background is, they clearly shouldn't be applying for something they can't do.
- kabdib 12y ago
  I'm perfectly happy interviewing people for junior positions. We did this quite a bit at larger companies where junior engineers were desirable, and there was structure that let them succeed. But when I'm dealing with a professional organization that is basically trying to scam my company into doing mis-hires, that's when my empathy goes dry. I have a duty to my co-workers and my investors to not screw up hires. I see gaming the system as a legitimate opportunity to criticize someone else's behavior. I agree, these junior level people are in a tough position. They're being mis-represented and taken advantage of. It sucks. I want people to succeed. But I don't do handouts, and the practices I've seen make me mad. Everyone in this industry sees many, many resumes from people who cannot do the job. Everyone interviews people who don't pass. Probably everyone has seen people fired because they couldn't perform or were doing damage. This happens. It's not going away. And it's not pleasant. So while it might not come across in what I wrote above, every time I affect someone's life like this -- every time I send a "Sorry, we're not going to proceed" email, or tell someone in an interview that we're cutting things short today -- I feel bad about it. Sometimes a little bad, sometimes a lot. Sometimes I agonize over a resume (and we spent quite a bit of time on a candidate the other day, trying to come up with reasons to proceed). But the alternatives (job charity? keeping someone on who does negative work?) are worse. Much worse. And given all the people who should be given a chance, I won't countenance fraud. That makes me write responses that are direct and forceful and unapologetic. These job shops are poisoning the well for the individuals who are truly deserving, and that should make everyone mad.
- hemantv 12y ago
  Yes there is certain luck bestowed upon you when you are born in US. But you still need to do lots of work to get a good job. Big multinational don't care about your visa status, several of my friend has been in Zurich (Google), Dubin (Google), London (FB) if they didn't make cut in H1B lottery system after they cleared the interview process. Don't confuse empathy with competence. Are you looking for charity when you interview with the companies ? Work hard, raise your competence level and you will have no problem finding a good job in any part of the world.
jackhammer 12y ago
My first thought was: I can't image how anyone could work for a place like that. That HR person should have been fired on the spot. My tolerance for bullshit this is quite low and luckily I work for a start-up where I have to take very little of it. When stories like this come up, I keep shaking my head.
- kabdib 12y ago
  Ironically, one of these companies did a product that was HR software. :-)
aangjie 12y ago
Indian here and can confirm some of the agencies do this and is not exactly considered ethically/morally wrong,(am mentioning because some reddit Americans seemed to call it cheating). In either case, I think this coaching for interview questions is not practical strategy in the long-run. It definitely works in the short-run if you play the numbers game and interview enough number of times.

by kabdib 12y ago

jerrytsai 12y ago

I had a similar experience 7 or 8 years ago, except that I was working for a small company and doing both the recruiting and the interviewing. I would screen a person by phone, and they would pass a basic screen. Then the person would come in and be completely incompetent, openly bringing a basic book in the language that he or she was expected to already know. After this happened a couple of times I got wise to the strategy. The phone screen was useless. Someone would prompt the person with the right answer. The resume and references also useless, filled with unconfirmable or suspect information. I gained a little appreciation for what HR professionals have to do and lost a bit of my naivete that people won't try to represent expertise to someone who actually has that expertise. The language was SAS.

xxcode 12y ago

I am not sure if your response is relevant to the article, but I felt that there is some level of superiority complex that you and many fellow humans posses (in this case, about your superior knowledge and intellect). Perhaps the biggest difference between you and someone applying for the job through the h1b visa program was that they were born in a different set of circumstances than you were. They were likely born in India whereas you were born I the United States. As a result of being born in India, they went to a local school there which didn't teach them about hash tables and concurrency. Your school did, and you had a better education. This person from India is trying to make a better life for himself despite starting at a disadvantage in life(being born in a poor country with access to lesser educational opportunities than you). You are welcome to reject him for the job(you can do so at the resume screening state, especially if they don't have the relevant skills and experience) but I think it would be useful to remember that the other person is a human, likely disadvantaged, and express some human empathy.

driverdan 12y ago
Your response has nothing to do with his post. He said he's looking for senior devs and keeps getting sent rookies. It doesn't matter what their background is, they clearly shouldn't be applying for something they can't do.
kabdib 12y ago
I'm perfectly happy interviewing people for junior positions. We did this quite a bit at larger companies where junior engineers were desirable, and there was structure that let them succeed. But when I'm dealing with a professional organization that is basically trying to scam my company into doing mis-hires, that's when my empathy goes dry. I have a duty to my co-workers and my investors to not screw up hires. I see gaming the system as a legitimate opportunity to criticize someone else's behavior. I agree, these junior level people are in a tough position. They're being mis-represented and taken advantage of. It sucks. I want people to succeed. But I don't do handouts, and the practices I've seen make me mad. Everyone in this industry sees many, many resumes from people who cannot do the job. Everyone interviews people who don't pass. Probably everyone has seen people fired because they couldn't perform or were doing damage. This happens. It's not going away. And it's not pleasant. So while it might not come across in what I wrote above, every time I affect someone's life like this -- every time I send a "Sorry, we're not going to proceed" email, or tell someone in an interview that we're cutting things short today -- I feel bad about it. Sometimes a little bad, sometimes a lot. Sometimes I agonize over a resume (and we spent quite a bit of time on a candidate the other day, trying to come up with reasons to proceed). But the alternatives (job charity? keeping someone on who does negative work?) are worse. Much worse. And given all the people who should be given a chance, I won't countenance fraud. That makes me write responses that are direct and forceful and unapologetic. These job shops are poisoning the well for the individuals who are truly deserving, and that should make everyone mad.
hemantv 12y ago
Yes there is certain luck bestowed upon you when you are born in US. But you still need to do lots of work to get a good job. Big multinational don't care about your visa status, several of my friend has been in Zurich (Google), Dubin (Google), London (FB) if they didn't make cut in H1B lottery system after they cleared the interview process. Don't confuse empathy with competence. Are you looking for charity when you interview with the companies ? Work hard, raise your competence level and you will have no problem finding a good job in any part of the world.

jackhammer 12y ago

My first thought was: I can't image how anyone could work for a place like that. That HR person should have been fired on the spot. My tolerance for bullshit this is quite low and luckily I work for a start-up where I have to take very little of it. When stories like this come up, I keep shaking my head.

kabdib 12y ago
Ironically, one of these companies did a product that was HR software. :-)

aangjie 12y ago

Indian here and can confirm some of the agencies do this and is not exactly considered ethically/morally wrong,(am mentioning because some reddit Americans seemed to call it cheating). In either case, I think this coaching for interview questions is not practical strategy in the long-run. It definitely works in the short-run if you play the numbers game and interview enough number of times.