
IRC as a Hiring Filter - whaley
http://www.jasonwhaley.com/blog/2015/2/13/irc-as-a-hiring-filter
======
kristoffer
Pretty ridiculous. Aren't we having problems finding candidates? Why care if
they use the most leet irc client or write irc bots?

Recruiting people you find on irc in coding related channels I'm all for that.
But it doesn't scale obviously.

~~~
raverbashing
Yes, today "we can't find candidates" means usually "we can't find someone
that fits our biased hiring filter determined by the personal preferences of
the senior developer"

And yes, make senior people write FizzBuzz on a whiteboard, they find it
thrilling.

~~~
vidarh
It's great when people make up these filters - it gives those of us who have
no problems finding a job an easy way to identify places not worth working at
during the interview process.

I've told potential employees "no" more than once due to sequences of hurdles
during the hiring process that were easy to pass, but told me very clearly I
didn't want to work there.

The more bullshit, the more likely it also is I'll receive and say yes to
another offer while they're busy playing.

------
SCHiM
I'm very technical, I've written hacks for online games, boot loaders, my own
micro-operating system, accounting software, http servers. I've written
patches for snort (the ids, not public) and a ton of other stuff.

Yet I'm not on irc, I'd be a hire you'd miss if you used irc as a screening
filter.

> "and I have actually decided not to work with specific developers before in
> a professional setting because they literally could not figure out how
> connect to freenode and join a keyed channel"

How about you just talk to people in the way they're used too? Instead of
deriding them for not using <insert favorite means of communication here>. I
know how to use irc, so this scenario does not completely apply to me, but
it's very possible that a very technical person has never seen it before and
has trouble with the irc commands or w/e. Especially since irc is really
becoming a relic of the past, and newer hackers/programmers might never have
used or seen it.

~~~
mariusz79
" very technical person has never seen it before and has trouble with the irc
commands "

technical person having trouble with the irc commands - isn't that oxymoron?

~~~
GeneralMayhem
No. If you don't use it regularly, there's a _lot_ of commands to learn. It's
not hard per se, but I wouldn't want to be judged on it within a few minutes
of being introduced to it.

~~~
blfr
Two. /connect and /join. Maybe /quit afterwards.

Irssi will lift your nickname from the username. It may even come with
freenode pre-configured.

------
munificent
One (of the many) problems with using IRC as a signal is that it's biased
towards people with large chunks of predictable free time.

I spend a _lot_ of time communicating with people online, but IRC isn't a
channel I use. The problem is that I have a family that naturally consumes a
lot of my time. That means I don't control when I'm available to communicate.
I get a decent amount of total time, but it's in bits and pieces spread
throughout the day (mostly early morning or at night).

That's perfectly fine for asynchronous communication like email, SO, here,
etc. But it doesn't work for synchronous things like IRC.

So, using "are they on IRC" as a hiring signal, I believe, effectively
punishes people who have families, busy work schedules, or otherwise complex
lives. In other words, I think it ends up favoring affluent young people.
That's not something I'd personally be keen on biasing for in my hiring
process given how much of an advantage that group already has in technical
jobs.

~~~
MicroBerto
How do you know that's not an unstated goal of his?

From a hiring manager's standpoint, isn't more free time a benefit?

The same thing could go for using GitHub code as a signal. People with no free
time are less likely to contribute to the community there too.

~~~
vidarh
For me, Github is most interesting as a signal in terms of the actual code
available.

Lack of Github means I'll have to find another way of seeing example of the
persons code, but that's ok. I wouldn't dismiss anyone as a candidate for
that.

But someone with a Github repository or ten might be at an advantage because
it serves effectively as lowering the threshold: I don't need to find their CV
interesting enough to decide to ask them for an example of their code, just
interesting enough to look at what's already there.

------
aiiane
Another proposed hiring metric that is likely to favor the stereotypical
coding-since-childhood male developer. IRC channels are often just as bad if
not worse than mailing lists when it comes to providing a welcoming space for
minorities.

~~~
akerl_
Maybe it's because of the channels I do and don't use, but I've found IRC
communities to be mostly unwelcoming in general, and not more-so towards any
specific race/gender/religion/etc groups. It's hard to be racist against
somebody whose race you do not know, because your only insight into their
physical existence is their chosen nick.

This article is a pretty solid point of evidence that IRC communities are
insular against every non-member, regardless of who the non-member is.

~~~
mariusz79
If you go to a dark alley, you can expect to get mugged, but that does not
mean that the whole city is out to get you.

------
feld
I would highly value the ability of someone to use IRC and interact with the
authors of the open source software your company is using.

------
rndmize
I feel like it would easy to rewrite this post with a focus on just about any
other arbitrary technical metric; like, say, how you host your blog. I mean,
hosting your blog on squarespace? Isn't that like using some kind of basic,
user-friendly chat service instead of IRC? What kind of real developer isn't
deploying something to AWS or linode these days?

------
apetresc
I feel like the author recently learned the word "shibboleth" and just wanted
an excuse to use it as many times as possible in an article.

~~~
jamestomasino
Pretty sure I didn't see a single correct usage of the word in that article,
actually. :/

shib·bo·leth

SHibəliTH,-ˌleTH

noun

a custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of
people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer
important.

"the party began to break with the shibboleths of the left"

------
edcastro
I once did an interview on IRC for Opera and it was one of the most positively
interesting interviews I did to date. There was a couple of people on the
channel and the whole thing was very dynamic and organized. I loved it. Wish
more companies did the same.

------
cbhl
If the OP finds that knowing how to use IRC correlates well with the kind of
people that the OP wants to hire, then I think it is reasonable to OP to test
for basic IRC skills in their hiring process. For example, maybe IRC is the
preferred communication medium during an emergency at OP's company, because it
is more reliable than email or Skype when a data center goes down.

But as a general practice, I don't see why this would be more beneficial than
presenting a candidate with a rotary telephone and telling them to make a
phone call with it.

~~~
vidarh
> presenting a candidate with a rotary telephone and telling them to make a
> phone call with it.

I felt terribly old the other day, as one of my younger co-workers overhead a
conversation where rotary telephones were mentioned and turned around to ask
us "what is a rotary telephone?"

Then again, I don't think my 6 year old son has actually seen a wired
telephone yet (we do have a land line, but it's wireless too) before, so I'm
sure said co-worker will get the pleasure of feeling old soon enough.

------
bicknergseng
On the other hand, I'd probably not want to work for someone who thought IRC
was the best solution for team communication in 2015, and certainly not for
someone who thought it was better to bang your collective head against all of
IRC's problems instead of paying a small amount for Slack or Flowdock or
another solution that works well out of the box.

IRC is still useful and relevant for a lot of OSS, but it's definitely not
something relevant for screening people.

~~~
mariusz79
What problems are you referring to?

------
twiss
I agree that you shouldn't hire someone who is unable to learn to use internal
tools, for one because then you use them and they don't.

However, if you wanted to create an easier to use version of IRC/git/whatever,
would that be easier if you didn't understand the original or if you did? I'm
on the fence about this. I'm glad I remember one thing that confused me about
git, although I probably forgot others.

------
nimbix
To me, nothing sums up IRC of today better than the following line:

* No one in your notify list is on IRC

------
Thriptic
Is IRC still a widely used protocol? I used it for years about 10-15 years
ago, but I rarely hear of people around me using it currently.

~~~
fintler
I work for a company in Alexa's top 20. We use IRC for almost everything.

Something I find really useful is Jira integration with IRC. When something
goes wrong, an IRC channel will open up with the name of the Jira ticket --
then status bots and logging bots will join automatically. It really helps to
organize everything, especially when multiple problems are happening
concurrently. It's also great for building post-mortem timelines after things
are resolved.

In addition, most teams also have their own channel, so you can generally join
it and ask questions for a quick response.

~~~
Domenic_S
> _When something goes wrong, an IRC channel will open up with the name of the
> Jira ticket -- then status bots and logging bots will join automatically._

I built Slack integrations like this for ongoing development, but your use
case for troubleshooting sounds _amazing_. I would love it if you wrote a blog
post about it.

------
ajarmst
I know that as recently as about five years ago, Google recruiters were
contacting people being helpful in the C++ chatroom on Freenode.

------
chippy
#hackernews on irc.freenode.net

Over 100 or so already idling in the channel.

I'll see you all in there!

------
pimlottc
This is one of those tests where it's a positive if the applicant passes it,
but if they don't, you can't really hold it against them. Good for you if
you've found one of the true old-school hackers, but not, it doesn't mean they
are a bad candidate. Simply a different kind.

It's a pretty easily pattern to fall into - people who work like I do must be
pretty smart because I try to do what works best. It's hard to evaluate
someone whose mindset and approaches are different than your own. But when
you've been around for a while, you realize there are so many different ways
of solving problems and areas of expertise that there's no one right answer.

So ultimately, I don't think these kinds of filters are that useful. It's
basically a yes or no question, where a "yes" reinforces your existing biases
and a "no" doesn't really gain you any information.

------
vidarh
Maybe 20 years ago.

If you gave someone time to figure it out, and they seemed unwilling or unable
to figure out how to get on IRC, then yes, that'd indicate someone
unwilling/unable to figure out a relatively simple tool.

But expecting them to already (or still) be IRC users today is a bit like
expecting them to still spend lots of time on USENET.

Looking at the drastic decline in user numbers on the major IRC networks as
numbers of internet users have skyrocketed should be enough to make it clear
going by irc usage is likely to be a stupid idea.

Then again, I'm biased - I've not used IRC seriously for a decade at least,
and did most of my IRC usage (including customizing irc-ii) about 20 years
ago.

------
rdtsc
I forgot what the word meant so here is the definition for anyone else:

\---

A custom, principle, or belief distinguishing a particular class or group of
people, especially a long-standing one regarded as outmoded or no longer
important.

\---

Besides the mentioned Github and open source project participation other
shibboleth I use is some experience or knowledge of functional languages --
Scala, Haskell, Lisp, Erlang, F# and such.

I don't use them as hard guidelines but these just proved to be good
heuristics in the past. Chances are high if someone is good at Haskell they
will be good at many hard problems we throw at them.

------
Sir_Cmpwn
Though I fully agree on every point, I worry that IRC has fallen more and more
into disuse and finding candidates who use it is going to be more and more
difficult over time.

~~~
mariusz79
But the candidates will be much better :)

~~~
Iftheshoefits
Please provide evidence for your assertion.

~~~
mariusz79
If your filter is based on the irc, and the number of people there is
declining, basically it means that only the most hard-core users are
remaining. And usually that means that they know how to use it.

~~~
munificent
Sure, if you're hiring people to be skilled IRC users.

But, I think what you're trying to hire are skilled _software developers_.
It's apparently been left as an exercise for the reader to demonstrate any
correlation between these two skills.

------
hackerhasid
"A simple `/ctcp $nick version` would be quite insightful to the tastes and
possibly technical floor of the user."

insightful? it tells you if the person uses irc on a regular basis already (in
which case they might have a native client) or whether they use something else
usually (in which case they might use the simplest web-based client they can
find on google).

------
imsofuture
This is one of the worst ideas I've ever heard. IRC is an extremely narrow,
exclusive and whitebread club. I'm personally kind of skeptical of most
diversity-based complaints about improperly biased screening in hiring -- but
_man_ , this would really take the cake. As a daily IRC user, it would still
be off putting to me.

~~~
Gracana
Yeah, this definitely seems like a bad idea. Behavior on irc might be worth
noting, but irc usage itself or client preference seems like the perfect way
to hire only the "technically entitled."[1] I don't see any reason to limit
myself to only hiring people who grew up in the same culture I did... there
are plenty of paths to technical savvy, and "chats with people on irc" isn't
even necessarily one of them.

1\.
[http://tessrinearson.com/blog/?p=400](http://tessrinearson.com/blog/?p=400)

~~~
mariusz79
IRC is full of the "technically entitled"? While this may be true, I don't
believe it is. To use IRC all you need is a 386dx, and a little time. No need
for a new computer so you can run app that requires 1gb of ram, or a newest
cellphone. You don't need broadband connection, 14k modem will suffice. You
don't need to pay a dime to use it. You can create/join any chat room you
want, you don't need to share who you are, what are your sexual preferences,
what color is your skin.. It's how the Internet was meant to be.

~~~
Jetrel
It's not about financial means; it's about social groups. Many older
technologies (USENET, commercial unices, IRC, etc) were limited only to people
with the extreme privilege to be connected to certain groups who were aware of
the existence of a technology, and had the knowledge to know how to set it up,
what was available to connect to, and how to deal with problems (often
consisting of orally-transmitted secrets and esoterica).

I've personally struggled with this; as a young teenager, I tried to learn C++
without any access to the internet, any mentor; just a few old books. I
struggled with it for years and ultimately failed because certain technical
obstacles couldn't be overcome without "in-group" knowledge that didn't exist
in the meager documentation I could find. Either you were part of the social
group that could help you out of your problem, or you effectively were not
privileged to use the technology.

IRC is symbolic to me of this sort of old-school "it works fine for us"
mentality that poisoned the early tech enclaves - their myopic failure to
include anyone who didn't win the social lottery of knowing the right people,
or growing up in the right place. It's not that it worked for them that I
begrudge - it's their assumption that things must also be working for the rest
of humanity, since they themselves were doing just fine. It's the same
sentiment that made people hate the classic "let them eat cake" line.

(As a corollary, this is why Stack Exchange is maybe the best thing to happen
to tech since the internet - a system specifically designed to incentivize
people to document all of those "undocumented secrets" that are necessary to
actually get any work done in a given field.)

------
samstarling
"Being a prick is generally not a good thing, but it is conditionally
necessary" – this is where I stopped reading!

------
pain
I feel you may be judged for using their literacy and biteracy as a form of
sorting and bitcism.

Finding sensitivities to diversities of technical literacies is troublesome
but teachingsome.

That means identity issues are social issues, and language choices, changes,
modus, and tools are important to address if we are serious about giving all
forms of identity a chance.

------
slipstream-
I've used IRC for years, but some of the statements made in this blog post
make some assumptions.

For example, I usually only register my nickname with nickserv when I know I'm
going to be a (semi-)regular user of network X. Same with setting up my BNC to
connect to that network.

------
seomis
What do college-age stoners sound like on IRC? Do they type "whoa" and "dude"
a lot or something?

------
lucian1900
IRC is terrible. It's a bad protocol and the user experience is pathetic for
almost all clients.

It's true that we sadly don't have a significantly better alternative, but
that doesn't mean one can't have good reasons to avoid it.

------
acheron
Uh, IRC? Really? Now I know the 90s are back.

Let me know if you have a position open for a Gopher developer.

~~~
mariusz79
[http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/](http://gopher.floodgap.com/overbite/)
Start by writing gopher plugin for chrome. :)

------
fifthesteight
I haven't used IRC since middle school, back when I was 31337. Way back from
the days when there was a leading '3.'

It's great you mention 'being a prick,' because that's what I said out loud as
I read your article. I was tickled by the fact that you mentioned it, so I do
respect that you know your strengths.

This might work for you, and for the projects you work on, and I think it's
not a bad recommendation for positions that need... that kind of stuff.

~~~
toast0
If people judged me based on my IRC behavior, I would be in big trouble. I'm
pretty sure staying off IRC when I moved to a 4-year college was a good choice
for me (circa 2000).

That said, experience causing net splits by CTCP flooding #quebec on undernet
was helpful for understanding a situation where Erlang/OTP pg2 was flooding
itself into oblivion. :)

------
juancastro
This is awesome!

------
wyldfire
I think shibboleth is a shibboleth.

------
mewwts
I thought we all used Slack by now?

