• (cs) in reply to Russ
    Anonymous:
    If you let HR do the first round, far too much crap gets through the filter.


    And I think they turn away qualified people because of silly requirements.  I twice saw ads for positions requiring five years of experience with Windows 95 when it had been out for only three years.

    One company that I applied to had a couple of general tests which was followed by three interviews.  This was for a co-op position!  The co-op co-ordinator for my program got some very negative feedback from them regarding my interview.  I actually asked her if that was their wording because it was so off the wall.  One mild bit was that they were concerned that I would be bored (due to my experience).  A pity that they did not think to ask about that in the interview!  One of my classmates made it all the way through the interview; then they kept him hanging for weeks.  He ended up working elsewhere.

    You get what you reward / test for.

    I also dislike the statement used by some companies that only those applicants who are called for interviews will be contacted.  If you advertised for responses, you owe the courtesy of a response.  I will generally not apply to such a position if the first thing they are going to do is be rude to me, I am better off elsewhere.

    Sincerely,

    Gene Wirchenko

  • Runtime Error (unregistered) in reply to cconroy
    cconroy:
    <font size="2">I can hardly wait for Episode VI: Return of the PaulaBean.

    </font>


    Coming soon to a company near you... :S
  • (cs) in reply to Volmarias
    Volmarias:
    Gobfucking christ, can we PLEASE turn the edit time limit on for like a minute or something so I can clean up the mess that happens when I believe that the fucking forum software can work?
    <font size="5">N</font>o!  I like it when posting becomes a crapshoot.  From experience, I never touch the Design/HTML tags.  The lack of a previewing button also gets my heart beating like a rabbit....Here goes...
  • (cs)

    if(project.isOverdue()) { return paula; // bloody hell! }

  • (cs) in reply to Satanicpuppy
    Satanicpuppy:
    I know a guy who's a terrible test taker. He flops all the time, and he had issues getting a job because people kept trying to test his skills, and he'd freeze up and appear incompetent. He finally got a shot with a place for three months, and after three WEEKS they hired him permanent, and made a special exception for him so he'd never have to attend department meetings (got some social anxiety issues). Hell of a coder.
    <font size="5">H</font>mmm.   "Social anxiety issues."  What does that mean?  He comes to meeting's naked?  He bursts into tears if anyone mentions his name?  He pulls out a gun at the least provocation?  He wets himself when it is his turn to speak?


  • james (unregistered) in reply to ferrengi

    I find it somewhat absurd that hiring managers these days actually accidentally let these kind of idiots through the door. I assume they are stuck in the age old assumption that experience == skill.I have worked in the past with people like Paula who somehow had about a good 5 years of "experience", yet somehow nothing to show for it.

    I think employers should take the same kind of hiring process my current employer takes. The prospective employee meets with the 3 department managers, goes to lunch with the XP coach, then pairs up with someone for a 2 hour session to do some actual coding. They then get to meet with 3 people from the teams that the position is open (if it is 2 teams, they will meet with both seperately) and get to endure an hour of questions (mostly technical). At the end of the day they meet with the VP and are either offered a position, or told they didn't get it and why.

    But the even larger problem here is that one important aspect of the project was given to ONE person. If they were doing pair programming and swapping pairs enough, someone would have known on the first day that Paula was bullshitting.

  • (cs)

    The only thing I can imagine is that Paula is a hottie and so her multitudinous sins are ignored.

    Certainly, there's a dearth of hotties in the programming industry.

    I wish I could remember the password or e-mail address of my old account (DrPizza).

  • Jonathan (unregistered) in reply to stonguse
    stonguse:
    I fail to see how someone can be hired in a technical job without demonstrating their abilities.


    There is this thing called a "diploma" or "certification" that managers believe in unconditionally, simply Brillant.
  • Kiss me, I'm Polish (unregistered) in reply to Runtime Error

    That reminds me of a summer internship candidate at my last job.
    We were looking for someone to copy some images and text from paper into an Access database. Simple work, simple needs - the job consisted of one form to fill hundreds of times. We had about 10 candidates (through an unemployment office), all females. The company is rather small, so that there were just me and the HR manager to choose one.
    The overall impression was quite bad, but one of the candidates made me laugh. She pointed in her CV that she knew Windows, Word and Lotus. 'Lotus what' - I asked, as unagressively as possible. 'You know, Lotus' - she replied to me. 'Yes, but is it Lotus Notes, or 1-2-3 or something else? Just curious' - I asked gently, I can't believe how a nice person I was those days. 'Actually I have no idea, it was in class, but I wasn't there that day' - said my personal Paula's clone.
    I can't tell if I love or hate the recruitment process.

  • Mike K. (unregistered) in reply to Satanicpuppy
    Satanicpuppy:
    Code review I agree with, but I spent two years working for a company, developing applications under serious stress conditions, and walked out the door two years later without one single piece of production code that I could legally show to a prospective employer (It was proprietary, nda'd, and SECRET, being corporate, corporate, and military). Then I applied to another, similar job, and had no code to show. Does that make me an employment risk? I had a ton of references, I knew my stuff...But I couldn't show real, production-quality code at an interview without some pretty serious paperwork, which would never have been approved.

    There is no magic formula to getting a good employee. Showing code just proves that someone can rip off OSS, or copy from the internet.

    I agree with what you said about not being able to have a code sample to show during an interview. But that shouldn't be the end of it. I don't require code samples from the developers I interview. But I do make them write code.

    How much? About 20-30 minutes worth. Give them a simple problem. Give them some code to start with. Give them a simple test case to pass. Don't require that the code compile. As a matter of fact, we do it on the whiteboard. Generally, I have them write a simple depth-first search alogrithm. But I don't tell them that's what I want them to do.

    I'm not interested in their style, or their knowledge of any language. I'm interested in how they attack and try to solve a problem. I've hired people who didn't get it right, and I've helped almost every one of them along during their solution.

    Bottom line is: it's irresponsible to hire a developer without seeing them write code. You wouldn't hire a graphic designer without seeing a sample of their work, would you?

    (aside: a developer is very much the same as a graphic designer. They are both craftsmen.)

  • TuxGirl (unregistered) in reply to ferrengi

    I have no idea how people like this get hired, either. 

    Last year, i went through the application process for an internship at a company.  This company has a pretty good way to handle applicants for programming positions.  For an internship, the applicants each interview with two developers.  These interviews are technical in nature, and don't spend time on the "what is your greatest weakness" types of questions.  They ask about your previous experience with other internships and with classes, ask you to write out code for various functions (on paper), and they have you come up with ideas for algorithms to solve a variety of different types of problems. 

    For the full-time positions, the interviews are a bit more involved, from what I've heard.  The company considers an internship to provide enough information for them to make a full-time hiring decision.  However, for others looking for full-time positions, the important parts of the application decision (the interviews and such) are handled by developers. 

    Even if you have moderately technical HR people (the ones for this company have enough understanding to take part in a conversation with a bunch of devs, and understand most of what's being said), it's still important to have developers make a decision as to whether the person's a competent programmer.  The developers are the ones who are going to have to deal with the person's code, and they're the ones that are going to know if it's good or horrid..... 

     * Anonymous stops ranting....

    ~TuxGirl

    (what's wrong with the captcha?)

    --
    http://www.tuxgirl.com/

  • Mike K. (unregistered) in reply to Satanicpuppy
    Satanicpuppy:
    Code review I agree with, but I spent two years working for a company, developing applications under serious stress conditions, and walked out the door two years later without one single piece of production code that I could legally show to a prospective employer (It was proprietary, nda'd, and SECRET, being corporate, corporate, and military). Then I applied to another, similar job, and had no code to show. Does that make me an employment risk? I had a ton of references, I knew my stuff...But I couldn't show real, production-quality code at an interview without some pretty serious paperwork, which would never have been approved.

    There is no magic formula to getting a good employee. Showing code just proves that someone can rip off OSS, or copy from the internet.

    I agree with what you said about not being able to have a code sample to show during an interview. But that shouldn't be the end of it. I don't require code samples from the developers I interview. But I do make them write code.

    How much? About 20-30 minutes worth. Give them a simple problem. Give them some code to start with. Give them a simple test case to pass. Don't require that the code compile. As a matter of fact, we do it on the whiteboard. Generally, I have them write a simple depth-first search alogrithm. But I don't tell them that's what I want them to do.

    I'm not interested in their style, or their knowledge of any language. I'm interested in how they attack and try to solve a problem. I've hired people who didn't get it right, and I've helped almost every one of them along during their solution.

    Bottom line is: it's irresponsible to hire a developer without seeing them write code. You wouldn't hire a graphic designer without seeing a sample of their work, would you?

    (aside: a developer is very much the same as a graphic designer. They are both craftsmen.)

  • (cs) in reply to K

    Anonymous:
    Apparently they wanted to compare by value, not by reference.

    Worst.  Joke.  Ever.

    I actually Laughed Out Loud, though.

  • (cs) in reply to Kiss me, I'm Polish

    I remember a couple of years back we were hiring for a programming position. We had one guy in for an interview who had listed his previous employer on his C.V., and said he didn't mind if we asked them for a reference. This is in New Zealand, where lawsuits are scarce and references tend to be fairly verbose. We got back this:

    "Andrew showed up for work on some days. I would not hire him again."

    Word for word. We let him down gently.

  • MadCow (unregistered) in reply to Eric

    Are you all sure that this 'Paula' is in fact a single person? Perhaps Paula is an entire sub-race...

    "We are the Paula.
    Your project is futile.
    We are all brilliant."

  • EternalGeek (unregistered)

    It's sad when legitimate developers get excluded early in the screening process so liars can take their place. I was lead in a small programming group several years ago that hired a new guy who supposedly was a coding expert and held an IT degree. He was put to work initially on a simple reporting module, but suspicions were arroused after he nothing to show after a couple of weeks. A few days later I asked if I could help with whatever was holding him up, to which he agreed. Our suspicions were completely verified when he revealed the main problem is he can't work out how to convert a negative number to a positive number.

  • Arrogant C Man (unregistered) in reply to Mike K.

    Bottom line is: it's irresponsible to hire a developer without seeing them write code. You wouldn't hire a graphic designer without seeing a sample of their work, would you?

    (aside: a developer is very much the same as a graphic designer. They are both craftsmen.)



    Having been both, I wholeheartedly agree.

    But, it I show you my code, you'll have to sign a non-disclosure agreement. :)


  • Drake2k (unregistered)

    I dont believe this one

  • FallenGhost (unregistered)

    This story strikes me as something that was made up because there were no real WTFs to post today.
    Anybody with me?

  • (cs) in reply to Volmarias

    Volmarias:
    So, apparently no one checks references anymore?

    would be pretty hard in my case. Of all the places I worked in the past none exists anymore because of takeovers and bankruptcies...

  • (cs) in reply to Mike K.

    Anonymous:
    There are two big WTF's here, and they aren't Paula's fault. #1 - "Paula" should never have been hired. The hiring manager *must* have the ability to review the applicant's skills by issuing some kind of test. A coder should NEVER be hired unless the hiring manager has seen the person's code. Ok, so there are pitfalls in that. The applicant might have *one* piece of good code that they've written; or they might have stolen an former co-worker's nice code. But still, DON'T HIRE PROGRAMMERS WITHOUT SEEING THEIR CODE!

    If a programmer were to come to me at an interview (which they won't as I'm not involved in that process) I'd immediately end the interview and call our lawyers if (s)he showed me some code they wrote for a previous job.
    Too much risk of being sued for IP theft. And of course no guarantee it's even their own.

    #2 - Paula's manager or supervisor should not have gone weeks or months without reviewing her actual work. When you have a new employee, there is no trust. You need to build trust with that person. This can only be done by reviewing their work early on in their employment with the company. Paula's manager should have given her x days to write the new workflow, and had her submit the code to him. He then should have reviewed it on day x, providing feedback, help, tips, etc. If after 10 days, she could not produce working code (even buggy code), she should be reprimanded, and her code reviewed by a senior programmer. In this case, the manager would have seen that all she'd done in weeks of employment at the company is a simple search and replace. That's grounds for being fired on the spot.

    Better way is to give them a period of say a week to come up with a critique of a piece of code already in place you know needs improvement (and already have a plan on how to improve it).
    If the new person comes up with something similar or better you know they're up to your standards, and they've not had a chance to damage anything yet.

  • (cs) in reply to ammoQ

    ammoQ:
    Anita Tinkle:
    I disagree with just having good references.  Code samples are a must, and you must get the developer to explain what the code does and specifically why it was written this way and why they chose to present this in the interview.


    IMO code samples are nearly useless. You never know it the code sample was really made be the programmer; even if, was it made from scratch or is it more-or-less a clone of existing code?
    Additional problem: If the code looks odd, is the programmer to blame or is it just the strange coding standards of that project?
    Additional problem: The copyright of the code goes to the employer. It may contain trade secrets. For that reason, I would not show real-world code from former projects. I could show some artificial samples or my private toy projects, but that means little.

    Well said. Even if I had access to code from previous employers (which I don't, I don't take code home that I wrote for work as it isn't mine except when I work from home once in a while and then it's deleted after sending it back to the office) I'd never show it to anyone for those reasons.
    It doesn't belong to me so it's not mine to show.



    A written test is also paramount to knowing how the developer approaches problems and how they wrap their head around a solution (or not).  It sometimes also gives important clues to how they will react in a pressing situation when you provide them a problem that has a very difficult answer (do they bullshit their way through it, or do they ask you for questions and more information?).


    Tests are always an artificial situation. Some people fail at tests but shine in real world. Other people are good at tests but not at work.

    Indeed. I do poorly at tests, often very poorly. During practice sessions for an exam or whatever using questions used in the past on the real exam I typically do 20-30% better than during the real thing.
    Doesn't mean anything for my abilities in the real world.

    Besides, the typical test given during employment interviews is useless to assess peoples' skills. It's the famous "aptitude test", which some people pass with flying colours by learning the answers by hart from a book while others flunk them who would be better suited for the job in real life if they ever got a chance to prove themselves.



    It's a shame that these litmus tests don't apply to contractors.  I've encountered way too many "brainless" outsourced coders that had excellent coding skills and knowledge of the programming language, but had very poor ability to solve actual problems well.


    Good references means: Successfull projects in the pasts. Many of them.

    Hard to tell in many cases. Most projects I worked on in the past for example no longer exist either because they were shortterm things that served their purpose and went away and/or because the companies they were done for no longer exist.
    In all cases the people involved would be next to impossible to track down as most of them were contractors themselves.
    Heck, I've worked as a contractor hired by another contracting firm which in turn placed me with a company to work on a team of contractors from several other places to create software for departments which now no longer exist (and the contracting companies in question no longer exist either).
    The projects worked, but the people involved are impossible for anyone to find by now (and the companies the projects were for won't have any reference I was even there by now except maybe on some old backup of the building security system a form for issueing me an access badge).

  • (cs) in reply to Gene Wirchenko

    Gene Wirchenko:
    Anonymous:
    If you let HR do the first round, far too much crap gets through the filter.


    And I think they turn away qualified people because of silly requirements.  I twice saw ads for positions requiring five years of experience with Windows 95 when it had been out for only three years.

    One company that I applied to had a couple of general tests which was followed by three interviews.  This was for a co-op position!  The co-op co-ordinator for my program got some very negative feedback from them regarding my interview.  I actually asked her if that was their wording because it was so off the wall.  One mild bit was that they were concerned that I would be bored (due to my experience).  A pity that they did not think to ask about that in the interview!  One of my classmates made it all the way through the interview; then they kept him hanging for weeks.  He ended up working elsewhere.

    You get what you reward / test for.

    I also dislike the statement used by some companies that only those applicants who are called for interviews will be contacted.  If you advertised for responses, you owe the courtesy of a response.  I will generally not apply to such a position if the first thing they are going to do is be rude to me, I am better off elsewhere.

    Sincerely,

    Gene Wirchenko

    It can get worse. Saw a job requirements list last year demanding 15 years experience with EJB...
    Ex-colleague once applied for a job with an airline as an IT project lead. The department heads and future coworkers performing the interviews wanted him badly but HR demanded an "aptitude assessment". This turned out to be some role playing session with candidates for every other position, mostly wannabee flight attendants. The result of that was that he was unsuitable for a customer centric role and therefore should not be hired (not only did his role not include customer contact except once in a while other company departments but he'd worked for over a decade in public radio as a producer before entering IT, a role where he had quite a bit of contacts with the outside and did well).

    I'd appreciate if companies put in a statement that only people invited for an interview are contacted at all. Most don't react but never state such.
    Worst of all I've experienced though was at one point being called for an interview and finding the rejection letter on the doormat coming home predated several days in the past [:P][:(]

  • (cs) in reply to Mike K.
    Anonymous:
    I agree with what you said about not being able to have a code sample to show during an interview. But that shouldn't be the end of it. I don't require code samples from the developers I interview. But I do make them write code.

    How much? About 20-30 minutes worth. Give them a simple problem. Give them some code to start with. Give them a simple test case to pass. Don't require that the code compile. As a matter of fact, we do it on the whiteboard. Generally, I have them write a simple depth-first search alogrithm. But I don't tell them that's what I want them to do.

    I'm not interested in their style, or their knowledge of any language. I'm interested in how they attack and try to solve a problem. I've hired people who didn't get it right, and I've helped almost every one of them along during their solution.

    Bottom line is: it's irresponsible to hire a developer without seeing them write code. You wouldn't hire a graphic designer without seeing a sample of their work, would you?

    (aside: a developer is very much the same as a graphic designer. They are both craftsmen.)




    Agreed. Developer applicants to my current company have to take a simple coding test as part of interview. Just some simple tasks such as reversing a string in an array and calculating mean value from values in a linked list. It does not have to compile or be exactly correct. It just shows that applicant is capable of solving problems using his/hers programming skills and has enough experience to see and avoid at least some of the usual manholes.

  • LarsW (unregistered) in reply to FallenGhost
    Anonymous:
    This story strikes me as something that was made up because there were no real WTFs to post today.
    Anybody with me?


    Yep. My first thought also. If not, I agree with the other posters who say that the WTF is with the project managers rather than "Paula".

  • (cs) in reply to LarsW

    Hehfor my current job, the requirments were basically knowledge of Microsoft products. I didn't have any knowledge of them, and I frankly stated that. I was still hired. I don't think they regret it either.

    Of course it might have helped that I was tipped on the position by a friend who already worked for the company, and who told them I was a pretty good Software Engineer.

  • (cs)
    Alex Papadimoulis:
    Management brought on a handful of new contract and full-time employees, and one of them, Paula, was assigned to work on the project. Scott was a bit reluctant; after all, the current project team could easily finish up all the tasks. But the project manager assured Scott that Paula was a J2EE expert and would have no problem handling even the most complex task on the project.
    Yet another company that needs to review their hiring process.
  • (cs) in reply to An apprentice
    Anonymous:
    I don't think Scott is to blame. It seems the greatest problem of this company is poor management. It's unreasonable to hire new development staff if the project goes on smoothly and is nearing completion as planned. Then again, stupid management, including HR, can ruin any project.


    But you see, it can't be allowed to let a project finish on schedule or, god beware, even before the deadline, since that would only provoke unreasonable expectations from the customers in the future. So in this case the decision of the management to slow down the project completion by artificially increasing the communication overhead through introduction of additional developers was the the most reasonable course of action. And in this light, choosing someone like Paula for that purpose was a true stroke of brillance
  • Shhhhhhhhhhh! (unregistered) in reply to Drak

    Paula is a contractor and therefore should not have some stupid lengthy interview process - a tough technical test over the telephone and checking references should be plenty. If a company expects me to go through an interview that takes much more than 1 hour, they can damned well pay me my full rate for it.

    TBH, the most important skill for any contractor is to interview well. In fact, only one of the last five contracts I've undertaken have required any skills beyond basic numeracy and communication.

    Also, all this "can't cope in tests/interviews" crap - if you can't cope under the mild stress of an interview, then you're not going to cope well when work becomes stressful. There's no room for Asperger's misfits in IT anymore. THIS ISN'T THE 1990s PEOPLE [8-)]

  • (cs) in reply to ammoQ
    ammoQ:
    IMO code samples are nearly useless. You never know it the code sample was really made be the programmer; even if, was it made from scratch or is it more-or-less a clone of existing code?


    My current supervisor came up with an interesting version of code-based interviewing: He'd show the candidate a piece of really bad code and ask what's wrong with it, why, and how they'd do it better.

    Good references means: Successfull projects in the pasts. Many of them.


    What if you've worked only on a few, big projects?
  • (cs) in reply to Shhhhhhhhhhh!
    Anonymous:
    Also, all this "can't cope in tests/interviews" crap - if you can't cope under the mild stress of an interview, then you're not going to cope well when work becomes stressful.


    To many, if not most people, a job interview is a VERY stressful situation, and it's a completely different kind if stress than most workplace problems.

    Anonymous:
    There's no room for Asperger's misfits in IT anymore. THIS ISN'T THE 1990s PEOPLE [8-)]


    How about you get that stick out of your ass and stop talking about things you don't understand? Why would someone who has problems with social interaction (usually mainly with people they don't know) be automatically useless - especially in software development where sitting in front of the computer alone and solving abstract problems still is the biggest part of the job?
  • (cs) in reply to Russ

    {quote}
    Second round? Too late. I'm a dev lead and responsible for the first two rounds of the hiring process where I work - first a ruthless screening of CVs (about 80% hit the bin straight away), then an hour-long telephone interview which is extremely technical in nature. I progress maybe 1 in 3 to a timed technical test in which they need to write an actual application in 2 hours (obviously not a complicated one), then a face-to-face interview with the technical architects and engineering managers. Then, and only then, do HR get a chance to talk to them. The whole process takes about a month. The best thing about this approach is that all the bottom feeders are either rejected or give up early on - we've made about 15 offers since January and every single one has been accepted, and no duds have sneaked through so far. If you let HR do the first round, far too much crap gets through the filter.
    {/quote}

    You sound the person who's phone interviewing me in two days. I'm so nervous :(

  • (cs) in reply to brazzy
    brazzy:

    My current supervisor came up with an interesting version of code-based interviewing: He'd show the candidate a piece of really bad code and ask what's wrong with it, why, and how they'd do it better.

    Good idea; probably better than letting people write a short piece of code from scratch.

    What if you've worked only on a few, big projects?

    Well, that should do the trick, too. But in my experience, people who give a competent impression often get hired without a test and without references checked. Maybe we've been just lucky not to get a Paula that way.
    brazzy:
    Anonymous:
    Also, all this "can't cope in tests/interviews" crap - if you can't cope under the mild stress of an interview, then you're not going to cope well when work becomes stressful.

    To many, if not most people, a job interview is a VERY stressful situation, and it's a completely different kind if stress than most workplace problems.

    Very true. In tests, I sometimes feel alone in a hostile environment, doing something useless just to expose my weaknesses. During work, even in the most stressfull situations, there is always some kind of team spirit and also a great feeling of responsibilty.

  • Proud Aspiette (unregistered) in reply to Shhhhhhhhhhh!
    Anonymous:

    There's no room for Asperger's misfits in IT anymore. THIS ISN'T THE 1990s PEOPLE [8-)]

    You envy aspies because they are better than you and thus get hired instead of you. Shut up your mouth, stupid zealot!!!

    Aspies Rule!!!

     

  • Russ (unregistered) in reply to sjfsjf
    sjfsjf:
    {quote}
    Second round? Too late. I'm a dev lead and responsible for the first two rounds of the hiring process where I work - first a ruthless screening of CVs (about 80% hit the bin straight away), then an hour-long telephone interview which is extremely technical in nature. I progress maybe 1 in 3 to a timed technical test in which they need to write an actual application in 2 hours (obviously not a complicated one), then a face-to-face interview with the technical architects and engineering managers. Then, and only then, do HR get a chance to talk to them. The whole process takes about a month. The best thing about this approach is that all the bottom feeders are either rejected or give up early on - we've made about 15 offers since January and every single one has been accepted, and no duds have sneaked through so far. If you let HR do the first round, far too much crap gets through the filter.
    {/quote}

    You sound the person who's phone interviewing me in two days. I'm so nervous :(


    Heh. I doubt it is, as the company I work for is a bit of an unknown gem in the tech world (since you wouldn't guess from the public face of the company that it runs one of the hottest Oracle DBs in the world - top 4 in fact, according to Oracle themselves - or that our daily transaction rate outclasses every stock exchange in Europe combined, with no downtime for reconciliation). If it was us, you wouldn't be nervous as you wouldn't know it was coming :-) Though some headhunters are starting to catch on, after getting shellshocked feedback from people who get chewed up and spit out by our process.

    If you want a free tip though, it's this - show enthusiasm. If I meet a candidate who clearly loves writing software, and doesn't regard it as simply a way to pay the bills, then I'm prepared to overlook quite a lot of shortcomings as such people tend to learn very quickly and take pride in getting it right.

  • Meh (unregistered) in reply to Proud Aspiette
    Anonymous:
    You envy aspies because they are better than you and thus get hired instead of you. Shut up your mouth, stupid zealot!!!

    Aspies Rule!!!

     

    Face facts, there are plenty of great (as good and better) software developers WITHOUT special social needs, so why take on one who's going to be harder to work with and is unpresentable?

    [:P]

  • (cs) in reply to Shhhhhhhhhhh!
    Anonymous:

    If a company expects me to go through an interview that takes much more than 1 hour, they can damned well pay me my full rate for it.

    I would disagree with this - I'm a contractor and the cash I'm going to make on a contract is well worth spending an hour, or even six if necessary, interviewing.  If a company interviews hard, then the chances are I'm going to like working there, at least they satnd a chance of having some half-decent people.  When I was back in the permanent employee rat-race, I spent a lot of time interviewing and technical testing people.  No "basic skills test" or demand for sample code, just pure hardcore interviewing and a whiteboard.

    "Aptitude tests" are pure crap unless you're looking for a trainee programmer, and the vast majority of "technical tests" are pulled word-for-word from well known books (Scott Meyers, for example; in the C++ world you used to be able to ace 99% of technical tests after reading "Better C++" a couple of times, even if you knew nothing of C++ before).  WTF-worthy code is a good interview tool, too.  If the interviewee has problems expressing their disgust, or uses phrases like "where did you _get_ this?", they're probably okay.

    Anonymous:

    THIS ISN'T THE 1990s PEOPLE [8-)]



    Damn.  I've been sleeping at my desk again.

    Simon
  • PHB (unregistered) in reply to Russ
    Anonymous:

    Second round? Too late. I'm a dev lead and responsible for the first two rounds of the hiring process where I work - first a ruthless screening of CVs (about 80% hit the bin straight away)


    That's the way!

    In fact, I always pull half the CVs from the pile and shred them without even looking at them.  I don't want anyone unlucky working for me.
  • Proud Aspiette (unregistered) in reply to Meh
    Anonymous:

    Face facts, there are plenty of great (as good and better) software developers WITHOUT special social needs, so why take on one who's going to be harder to work with and is unpresentable?

    [:P]

    A. Don't be so sure of that.

    B. Anyway, we are much more loyal to our company than you NT's and are hard-working and motivated people. We don't take breaks for personal phonecalls and other communication activities with our friends during work, we don't surf to pornographic sites in the Internet like you do, we can stay all day and night in front of the computer, and work is more important to us than family, and that's exactly what most employers want.

    But unfortunately I can bet you'll never understand it. So here, take your NT's and give them the jobs. Just don't cry and complain when they don't finish the project until the deadline because their wife wants them at home with the children every evening. [:P]

     

  • Nick (unregistered) in reply to tDog
    Anonymous:
    Alex Papadimoulis:

    Scott estimated that he could finish it in a week. Paula said that she would have this finished in a few days.
    Several weeks later, A couple weeks passed and Scott was starting to get concerned.

    Another week passed

    Are you kidding.  Scott is the real WTF here.  Ever heard of a code review???  If you wait several weeks plus a week post concern, your are several weeks from when you should have reviewed the work in the first place.  He deserves her and a late project for such poor management. 

    -- tdog



    The real WTF is that Scott aparently knew enough about this site to send this story, meaning they are familiar with the fact that bringing in a contractor at the last minute can mean disaster. And knowing that, they still let her go off on her own without ever checking up on her.  And this all could have been much worse.  Her having nothing done isn't that great of a scenario, but it shouldn't take more than a week or so to rewrite everything she had worked on.  On the other hand, had Paula written a lot of code which looked complete but contained numerous errors, they would be debugging this thing for months after it was shipped.

    My theory, management knew the project was in trouble and decided to hire Paula as a scapegoat.  Let her screw around for a few weeks knowing she would get nothing done, and then when the project misses its deadline, they have someone they can point there finger at.
  • (cs)

    The real WTF is why it took Scott several weeks (!!!) to find out that she had done nothing. With a new person on the project you would think Scott would be paying more attention to what Paula was doing.

    Wasn't she required to write a test, for the system wide unit test suite, to excersize her component?

    ...richie

  • my name (unregistered) in reply to PHB
    Anonymous:
    Anonymous:

    Second round? Too late. I'm a dev lead and responsible for the first two rounds of the hiring process where I work - first a ruthless screening of CVs (about 80% hit the bin straight away)


    That's the way!

    In fact, I always pull half the CVs from the pile and shred them without even looking at them.  I don't want anyone unlucky working for me.


    Bahh. :) You know a lot about luck and probability theory. I almost laughed but then I imagined my cv being thrown out like that. I honestly hope you are joking. I'd kill the person rejecting me in this way if I found out.

  • (cs) in reply to PHB
    Anonymous:
    Anonymous:

    Second round? Too late. I'm a dev lead and responsible for the first two rounds of the hiring process where I work - first a ruthless screening of CVs (about 80% hit the bin straight away)


    That's the way!

    In fact, I always pull half the CVs from the pile and shred them without even looking at them.  I don't want anyone unlucky working for me.


    If that was true, it said a lot about your personality. In that case, how could anybody who has to work with you not be considered unlucky?
  • (cs) in reply to ammoQ

    ammoQ:
    Anonymous:
    Anonymous:

    Second round? Too late. I'm a dev lead and responsible for the first two rounds of the hiring process where I work - first a ruthless screening of CVs (about 80% hit the bin straight away)


    That's the way!

    In fact, I always pull half the CVs from the pile and shred them without even looking at them.  I don't want anyone unlucky working for me.


    If that was true, it said a lot about your personality. In that case, how could anybody who has to work with you not be considered unlucky?

     

    That kind of stuff is actually more common than people think.

  • (cs) in reply to triso
    triso:
    <font size="5">H</font>mmm.   "Social anxiety issues."  What does that mean?  He comes to meeting's naked?  He bursts into tears if anyone mentions his name?  He pulls out a gun at the least provocation?  He wets himself when it is his turn to speak?


    You mean... I have "Social Anxiety Issues" ?  Finally, a name for this terrible afflication which mimics death!

    /joking?
  • Doctor Jekyll (unregistered) in reply to stonguse

    I have actually turned down an offer because I was not asked a single technical question during the interview. I was however asked "do you know 'C'?" during the interview.

    C was on my resume. C was mentioned in my cover letter.

    My reasoning was "if they didn't ask me technical questions then they probably don't ask other people. that means I will end up baby sitting and fixing bugs made by incompetent co-workers."

    /Jekyll

  • Gnaf (unregistered)

    the only wtf is, how can someone hire a person, then let her work on critical sections for about month, then pass the deadline and only then check, what she's doing.

    That absurd, those stories I think are fake.

  • Bob (unregistered) in reply to Russ

    "If you let HR do the first round, far too much crap gets through the filter."

    And I'll bet HR kills off half the CV's that you chose to accept.

    Gotta love the 'Require 5 years exp. in [name tech that hasn't existed for even 2 years]' adverts.

    Or, I'm waiting for this one, 'Need WEB 2.0 Experience!' Things such as this scream 'This company run by idiots' to me.

    shudder

  • Paul (unregistered) in reply to Jonathan
    Anonymous:
    stonguse:
    I fail to see how someone can be hired in a technical job without demonstrating their abilities.


    There is this thing called a "diploma" or "certification" that managers believe in unconditionally, simply Brillant.


    The best developers rarely have certifications because they're too busy working. Anything like this would be either outdated or company mandated for the very best.

    "Social Anxiety", btw, is a well recognized disorder. I expect that most of us geeks, especially the best ones and the hermits, have a large degree of this. We simply don't socialize well. I regularly find more intelligence in this box in front of me than in most co-workers. OK -- I'm going downhill here, so I'll stop.
  • (cs) in reply to K
    Anonymous:
    Apparently they wanted to compare by value, not by reference.


    That made milk come out of my nose. Well done.

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