6 ms·

Here is an alternate point of view. I recently went through the process of hiring a programmer. I probably interviewed 30 candidates. All of them had the requir

Here is an alternate point of view. I recently went through the process of hiring a programmer. I probably interviewed 30 candidates. All of them had the required knowledge and experience listed on their CV's. Guess how many could write a simple program in the language of their choice? Exactly 3. Yes, there are many people with the right credentials. In my own personal experience, many of these people can't do the work. They either don't really enjoy what they do or they simply aren't smart enough. They got into this field because of the money.

MichaelCrawford 12y ago
For the specific reason that resumes are often, if not actually outright faked, at least "enhanced", I've been contemplating starting a business in which I would perform resume screening for folks like you, for a fee. I don't really know how to structure it yet. I don't want to be a recruiter or headhunter. What I would like to do is to offer folks such as yourself, who already have resumes, my opinion as to the qualifications of each candidate. I myself got the very highest-paying job of my career, writing Mac OS X I/O Kit Kernel Extensions - what Apple calls device drivers - because I was the first candidate in six months who knew how to do synchronization in the kernel. That's a very basic requirement for writing a device driver, so it's covered in detail, and quite clearly by the tutorials on Apple's developer site. I expect lots of people figured they could get a cushy, high-paying job, so they just added fake device driver work to their resume. Ironically, the guy who asked me that question was their windows driver engineer. More or less the way it would work is that you'd send me some candidate resumes, and I would tell you which ones I think were worth your time to interview. Quite commonly, references are only checked after an interview, as the last step before making an offer. I wouldn't check their references, so as not to annoy them, but would call or email the HR departments at each of the employers the list, to verify their employment. "Did they work for you from this year to that year?" is a simple yes-or-no question. Also I would verify that those who claimed to have college degrees, really graduated. In my entire life, the only time I've been asked to supply my transcripts to anyone, was when I applied to graduate school, and so I could qualify for a discount on my auto insurance. I've never had a potential employer ask for my transcripts. Would you regard such a service as valuable? If so, have you any suggestions as to how I could get started, or how to market such a service? A lot of people have told me I'd make a good headhunter. I expect I would, but I don't want to do that, because I want the whole practice of third-party technical recruitment to just go away.
- chrisseaton 12y ago
  The only concrete things that you've suggested you would do is call colleges and previous employers' HR departments. That's both pretty trivial, and there are lots of companies that already provide that service. They're usually marketed as background checks to do just before the offer, as you say, but I'm sure they could also do it up front as you're proposing.
  - justincormack 12y ago
    HR departments normally have legal advice to say as little as possible. It would be hard to get a tech opinion out of them.
    - chrisseaton 12y ago
      He doesn't want a tech opinion - "Did they work for you from this year to that year?"
    - MichaelCrawford 12y ago
      I once worked for a company that got sued by my predecessor, and won. However they spent so much in legal fees, that the lawsuit nearly bankrupted them. The code that my predecessor wrote worked very poorly, so they got bad press reviews, lots of product returns and so on. I was hired specifically because I said I was really good at debugging. After that, the company owner had a specific policy of not providing references. He gave a very neutral answer: "Our policy is not to provide references." However he was completely cool about verifying employment. His concern of course was that my predecessor would sue him again, were the company owner to give that guy a bad reference. Ironically, that same company owner is one of my own references. He's always happy to say good things about me.
  - MichaelCrawford 12y ago
    I've never so much as heard of someone verifying employment and graduation before interviewing a candidate. If it's done at all, it's the last step, after the interview but before the offer. While it's common for references to be contacted, it's quite uncommon for employment to be verified. Note that that's quite a different thing: "Did Bart Simpson do a good job for you?" is checking a reference. "Did Bart Simpson work for your company in 1999?" is verifying employment. One's references must be people who one actually knew, usually direct managers but sometimes coworkers. The person who supplies the employment verification need not have ever met the candidate. And yes I know this is not rocket science - but consider what I just said, that AMCC interviewed candidates for six months before they found someone who actually had done what the claimed, in my case writing OS X drivers. AMCC did a background check on me, but only AFTER I got the job offer, and with my written permission. While it might still have required six months to find a qualified candidate, AMCC could have saved a lot of effort and expense by sending some emails or making some phone calls before inviting candidates in to onsite interviews. Consider that it's quite common to pay for plane fare, car rental and hotel accommodation if the candidate has to travel. The employer still pays even if they don't make an offer.
SethMurphy 12y ago
Could you provide an example of your definition of a simple program and the resources they had to write it?
- atmosx 12y ago
  Hm, I'd like to know the answer to that question too.
- nolok 12y ago
  Not parent, but I've sat though way too many interviews where the candidate failed the "FizzBuzz" test, either through super convoluted code that barely works or with complete failure to produce the expected results. And that is while sitting at a desktop computer, full internet access and no one eyeing behind them.
  - wmkn 12y ago
    So you are saying that many people failed to type "FizzBuzz code" in Google? I do not really buy that.
    - nmjohn 12y ago
      How many interviews have you conducted? If the answer is more than 0, I feel you have gotten lucky in the candidates you interview or are far more selective on who you actually interview. If the answer is 0, then you would be incredibly surprised. It isn't quite as simple as this dialog is making it sound, but essentially, yes, a not-insignificant number of candidates cannot solve problems with a fizzbuzz level of difficulty. It is something that surprised the hell out of me as well. From what I have seen, there are many people with CS degrees who have written virtually no code outside of class and never have come up with an original program on their own. It is incredibly clear that programming is just not something they are passionate about.
      - wmkn 12y ago
        I have done about a dozen or so interviews. I can totally imagine some people not being able to do a simple fizz buzz from scratch. But when they have full internet access and no one is watching them. "Solving" fizz buzz is then as simple as performing a search and copying the results. I'll probably get down voted because it seems people on HN are incredibly attached to the FizzBuzz story. Possibly I am totally wrong and I am too positive about the skills of people with a CS degree. But it seems the crazier the anecdote (full internet access, coding at home, etc.) the more eager people are to believe it.
userbinator 12y ago
3 out of 30 is still a lot better than... 1 out of 200: http://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ http://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ Having heard of some rather... dubious grading practices in universities, I'm not surprised at all that a lot of people who claim to have the knowledge actually don't.

MichaelCrawford 12y ago

For the specific reason that resumes are often, if not actually outright faked, at least "enhanced", I've been contemplating starting a business in which I would perform resume screening for folks like you, for a fee. I don't really know how to structure it yet. I don't want to be a recruiter or headhunter. What I would like to do is to offer folks such as yourself, who already have resumes, my opinion as to the qualifications of each candidate. I myself got the very highest-paying job of my career, writing Mac OS X I/O Kit Kernel Extensions - what Apple calls device drivers - because I was the first candidate in six months who knew how to do synchronization in the kernel. That's a very basic requirement for writing a device driver, so it's covered in detail, and quite clearly by the tutorials on Apple's developer site. I expect lots of people figured they could get a cushy, high-paying job, so they just added fake device driver work to their resume. Ironically, the guy who asked me that question was their windows driver engineer. More or less the way it would work is that you'd send me some candidate resumes, and I would tell you which ones I think were worth your time to interview. Quite commonly, references are only checked after an interview, as the last step before making an offer. I wouldn't check their references, so as not to annoy them, but would call or email the HR departments at each of the employers the list, to verify their employment. "Did they work for you from this year to that year?" is a simple yes-or-no question. Also I would verify that those who claimed to have college degrees, really graduated. In my entire life, the only time I've been asked to supply my transcripts to anyone, was when I applied to graduate school, and so I could qualify for a discount on my auto insurance. I've never had a potential employer ask for my transcripts. Would you regard such a service as valuable? If so, have you any suggestions as to how I could get started, or how to market such a service? A lot of people have told me I'd make a good headhunter. I expect I would, but I don't want to do that, because I want the whole practice of third-party technical recruitment to just go away.

chrisseaton 12y ago
The only concrete things that you've suggested you would do is call colleges and previous employers' HR departments. That's both pretty trivial, and there are lots of companies that already provide that service. They're usually marketed as background checks to do just before the offer, as you say, but I'm sure they could also do it up front as you're proposing.
- justincormack 12y ago
  HR departments normally have legal advice to say as little as possible. It would be hard to get a tech opinion out of them.
  - chrisseaton 12y ago
    He doesn't want a tech opinion - "Did they work for you from this year to that year?"
  - MichaelCrawford 12y ago
    I once worked for a company that got sued by my predecessor, and won. However they spent so much in legal fees, that the lawsuit nearly bankrupted them. The code that my predecessor wrote worked very poorly, so they got bad press reviews, lots of product returns and so on. I was hired specifically because I said I was really good at debugging. After that, the company owner had a specific policy of not providing references. He gave a very neutral answer: "Our policy is not to provide references." However he was completely cool about verifying employment. His concern of course was that my predecessor would sue him again, were the company owner to give that guy a bad reference. Ironically, that same company owner is one of my own references. He's always happy to say good things about me.
- MichaelCrawford 12y ago
  I've never so much as heard of someone verifying employment and graduation before interviewing a candidate. If it's done at all, it's the last step, after the interview but before the offer. While it's common for references to be contacted, it's quite uncommon for employment to be verified. Note that that's quite a different thing: "Did Bart Simpson do a good job for you?" is checking a reference. "Did Bart Simpson work for your company in 1999?" is verifying employment. One's references must be people who one actually knew, usually direct managers but sometimes coworkers. The person who supplies the employment verification need not have ever met the candidate. And yes I know this is not rocket science - but consider what I just said, that AMCC interviewed candidates for six months before they found someone who actually had done what the claimed, in my case writing OS X drivers. AMCC did a background check on me, but only AFTER I got the job offer, and with my written permission. While it might still have required six months to find a qualified candidate, AMCC could have saved a lot of effort and expense by sending some emails or making some phone calls before inviting candidates in to onsite interviews. Consider that it's quite common to pay for plane fare, car rental and hotel accommodation if the candidate has to travel. The employer still pays even if they don't make an offer.

SethMurphy 12y ago

Could you provide an example of your definition of a simple program and the resources they had to write it?

atmosx 12y ago
Hm, I'd like to know the answer to that question too.
nolok 12y ago
Not parent, but I've sat though way too many interviews where the candidate failed the "FizzBuzz" test, either through super convoluted code that barely works or with complete failure to produce the expected results. And that is while sitting at a desktop computer, full internet access and no one eyeing behind them.
- wmkn 12y ago
  So you are saying that many people failed to type "FizzBuzz code" in Google? I do not really buy that.
  - nmjohn 12y ago
    How many interviews have you conducted? If the answer is more than 0, I feel you have gotten lucky in the candidates you interview or are far more selective on who you actually interview. If the answer is 0, then you would be incredibly surprised. It isn't quite as simple as this dialog is making it sound, but essentially, yes, a not-insignificant number of candidates cannot solve problems with a fizzbuzz level of difficulty. It is something that surprised the hell out of me as well. From what I have seen, there are many people with CS degrees who have written virtually no code outside of class and never have come up with an original program on their own. It is incredibly clear that programming is just not something they are passionate about.
    - wmkn 12y ago
      I have done about a dozen or so interviews. I can totally imagine some people not being able to do a simple fizz buzz from scratch. But when they have full internet access and no one is watching them. "Solving" fizz buzz is then as simple as performing a search and copying the results. I'll probably get down voted because it seems people on HN are incredibly attached to the FizzBuzz story. Possibly I am totally wrong and I am too positive about the skills of people with a CS degree. But it seems the crazier the anecdote (full internet access, coding at home, etc.) the more eager people are to believe it.

userbinator 12y ago

3 out of 30 is still a lot better than... 1 out of 200: http://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ http://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ Having heard of some rather... dubious grading practices in universities, I'm not surprised at all that a lot of people who claim to have the knowledge actually don't.