Lone Coder Blog - A Lone Coder in a Big Pond

[Alex Beamish]

On 6/21/06, Evan Leibovitch <evan-ieNeDk6JonTYtjvyW6yDsg at public.gmane.org> wrote:
>
> Alex Beamish wrote:
>
> > After over twenty years of working on the software industry, I'm still
> > not sure what the right answers are to some of those HR stumpers:
> >
> > [] Where do you want to be in five years? (I don't know .. In Madrid?
> > Driving a truck? Five years older?)
>
> They're trying to see if you have any vision for yourself deeper than
> next week. It's also a deliberately obscure question designed to get at
> more of you as an individual. There are lots of programmers out there
> who have good code samples and they may be looking to separate the
> candidates based on non-technical qualities. In some companies an
> ability to work to deadline, for example, is more important than the
> sheer brilliance of your code. And you know that they're trying to avoid
> anti-social BOFH types.


OK -- maybe it's just me, but when I talk about expanding my knowledge base,
writing some cool software and maintaining a good base of software, rather
than talking about leading projects, becoming a VP and conquering the world,
I get the feeling the HR types are mentally stamping 'LOSER' on my ample
forehead. I just love doing the technical stuff -- if that's a weakness, so
be it.

> [] What's the accomplishment you're most proud of? (A dual mode
> > communications module implemented using a state machine with function
> > pointers, written using Object Oriented C .. are you OK? Do you need a
> > glass of water?)
>
> They're literally giving you an opportunity to sell yourself. It's also
> another character test, in that such a description may force you to
> describe a technical task in non-technical terms -- are you up to it?


I'm up for it -- I just have to remember that when I start talking about a
favourite project, I have to tailor the response to the audience, discussing
the technical aspects with the technical people, and the management aspects
with the management people. it's very important to know your audience -- I
was facetiously describing a technical achievement to an HR person, which is
something I wouldn't do in a real-life situation.

> I'm left-brained -- that means that when someone asks me an HR-type
> > question, I usually have to stop and think about an answer. One way to
> > prepare for that is to have someone bombard you with HR type questions
> > -- you have to be ready to tell a story in 30 seconds that answers
> > that question. A yes or a no won't do it -- and a five minute
> > discourse on Captain Kirk vs. Captian Picard won't do it either.
>
> I agree, to an extent. Attitude counts for a lot, especially for those
> interviews in which they're counting for you to be caught off-guard and
> being able to react quickly to the unexpected. Answering everything with
> a too-rehearsed canned answer is only marginally better than being
> totally dumbstruck.


Of course -- if the candidate is reading from index cards, or worse,
reciting something that's obviously been memorized, that's a big mistake --
but a rehearsed topic with a couple of rehearsed bullet points is good for a
90 second response outline. My weakness is trying to cram a five minute
answer into 90 seconds -- the solution is, of course, to provide at most a
90 second answer.

> Anyway, I'm just hoping my next employer is small enough that they
> > don't have an HR department, so I can skip that part of the hiring
> > process altogether.
>
> That works, but it also means that your avenues of movement within the
> company will be limited.


That doesn't bother me so much, if I'm getting well paid to do an
interesting job in a fun environment.

-- 
Alex Beamish
Toronto, Ontario
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://gtalug.org/pipermail/legacy/attachments/20060621/23667976/attachment.html>