
Tech Hiring Lessons Learned - danielrm26
http://danielmiessler.com/study/hiring/
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tptacek
If you're a developer, and someone asks for your credit score, refuse. Inform
them that it's none of their business. If they demand it as part of their
hiring process, get up and walk out of the interview. Whatever credit scores
may signal about a candidate's future performance, the request for a credit
score signals far more about the quality of an employer. You are not going to
like working for any company that credit checks employees.

(You may get asked to authorize a credit check as part of a background check
process; background checks can be reasonable, for instance if you're going to
work for an exchange. But a background check happens _after_ an offer is made;
it's not part of the decision process.)

As always on threads like these, I like to plug our recruitment process, which
we've been tuning for 4 years or so:

<http://www.matasano.com/careers/>

There's more to it than what's on the page, but, long story short, we do two
interview phases separated by a battery of "challenges", calibrated to take
about as much time as a serious on-site tech-out interview would take, but
designed to be done in a candidate's spare time in bits and pieces if
necessary.

~~~
danielrm26
As the article points out, the credit check is supposed to be one metric among
many, and not taken as some overpowering data point. But for anyone to say
that one's credit score does not proxy dependability is, I think, naive.

I think the notion that credit score is something invasive while work history,
criminal record, GPA, determining how one got along with previous bosses, etc.
is commonplace and goes unnoticed is somewhat odd. It should be obvious that
employers have no interest in one's actual affairs, and instead are attempting
to gauge dependability through proxies. GPA, how many times you've left jobs
recently, insane rants on the internet -- these are all fair play and raise no
eyebrows whatsoever, so why is a credit score any different?

This is a simple matter of being averse to things you're not used to and
comfortable with those you are. Credit score bad! But pulling and evaluating
your GPA, stalking your online footprint, looking into your criminal record,
talking to your old bosses -- that's all fine. Sure, that will remain true
until it becomes commonplace. At that point, just as with all these other
things that most find completely unobjectionable, this won't bother anyone
either. This is especially true when it's not even being considered as any
sort of overriding decision point. Great candidates can have poor credit
scores. Poor candidates can have high ones. Everyone knows this. But that can
be said for all the other metrics gathered in an interview process as well.

And then there's the argument that credit score clearly _can_ be asked for in
certain jobs, e.g. financial services, but not others. This is highly curious.
Why is it that one asks for credit scores when a position involves working
with money? It's not a work competence question, to be sure -- it's a
dependability metric: plain and simple. So I ask you: what is the difference
between counting money somewhere and handling vulnerability data for the
internal networks of Fortune 50 companies? Very little.

If the objection is that you don't _like_ someone getting your credit score,
then sure: I don't either. But I don't like the 10 other invasive activities
that happen during any modern interview. It's all somewhat uncomfortable,
which should be expected since the entire process reduces to evaluating your
past and present to predict worthiness and fit for a given position. Complain
about that if you wish, i.e. make the argument that interviews are too
invasive to begin with, and perhaps I'll agree with you. That's a much better
premise than taking one metric among others and claiming it alone is a
problem.

~~~
tptacek
We don't even disagree, because this isn't my point.

My point is: only bad dev shops are going to pull credit reports.

Good dev shops realize that from 2007 through today, including every one of
the "RIP Good Times" months, it has been a nonstop hot- lead- flying- through-
the- air battle for the best talent, and no place that truly wants the best
talent is going to single themselves out by asking to pull credit reports to
help make a decision about a hire.

Therefore: if you are asked for authorization for a credit report, your
prospective employer is tacitly telling you: "we are second rate, don't work
here". If you're second rate too and not particularly ambitious, sure, forgive
them for their need to pull a credit report ("it's just another invasive
thing"), and go work for a second-rate firm.

 _Edit:

I asked Twitter, and someone said they believe Apple and Google both ask for
credit reports --- which is sad, but hard for me to rebut._

~~~
danielrm26
Thank you for your honesty in amitting that Google and Apple do this as well.
I simply think you're unaware of how standard this practice is in hiring today
--not just for high-end tech hiring but for any position where they're
attempting to predict reliability.

To the point of the article, though, most probably don't eject someone from
the process based on credit alone.

~~~
m0nastic
I don't know anyone from Apple, but I asked around to all of my Google peeps,
and they all stated that Google absolutely doesn't do credit checks.

I have only actually done one interview where they asked for a credit report
(and consequently the hiring manager wasn't allowed to extend me an offer
based on the result, even though they tried for several weeks to make an
exception).

I don't believe you that this is standard practice (although I can buy that it
is "becoming more and more standard").

------
mazelife
Looking at sample work is definitely a good idea. But I'd disagree with pretty
strenuously with both credit score and IQ and would walk away immediately if a
potential employer asked for these.

Re credit score: In the US this appears to be legal in some states, illegal in
others, so as an employer I'd investigate carefully before asking asking for a
credit dscore. But outside of of a banking industry job or a situation where
one is attempting to obtain security clearance, this is pretty egregious.
Plenty of families have had their credit wrecked by the recession and there
are lots of reasons (e.g. unforeseen medical problems) that could result in a
lowered score that have no predictive value whatsoever. So, even if what
you're doing is legal in your locality, it's morally dubious outside of a
certain types of jobs. Finally, it looks like this can cut both ways: "If you
do agree to let [a prospective employer] see the report, and they base their
decision not to hire you on something in it, you have the right under the Fair
Credit Reporting Act to see it, says EFL’s Meschke. This will give you an
opportunity to try to explain or rectify any issues or errors that may be on
there." ([http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31923358/ns/business-
careers/t/c...](http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31923358/ns/business-
careers/t/can-employer-ask-my-credit-report/))

As for IQ, there is literature out there on this subject
([http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/merrill-
palmer_quarterly/v047/4...](http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/merrill-
palmer_quarterly/v047/47.1sternberg.pdf)). It's not that it has _no_
predictive value, but that there are a lot of confounding factors (e.g. the
country you were raised in). Furthermore results need to be interpreted very
carefully and I don't necessarily trust an employer to do that. I think a lot
of people would rightfully see this is intrusive.

Having interviewed a fair number of job candidates in my time, I agree it's
hard and there is definitely an art to it. But if someone can't get a accurate
assessment of a candidate through sample work and direct interaction, and have
to resort to things like credit score and IQ to help them decide, then they
have no business interviewing candidates.

------
socratic
My question is: what has led current hiring practices, and specifically
interviews, to be the way they are? I've been doing a job search recently, and
to me at least, the process seems almost as arbitrary as management consulting
interviews.

The common case is: (a) a (very nice) recruiter who largely doesn't understand
your background calls to ask about which part of the company you should work
in, then (b) you have a few phone interviews where you are asked what might as
well be trick coding questions ("with some fancy bit manipulation this could
be O(n)!") that are mostly collected in a few books or online anyway, and then
(c) you do an on-site where you get another three to six of these questions,
with maybe a simple "system design" question thrown in.

My hypothesis has been that the hiring process is largely aimed at Computer
Science undergraduates with no significant prior work experience, and that the
best way to distinguish just graduated CS undergrads is by testing them on the
hardest class they are likely to have all taken: Introduction to Algorithms.
Or maybe interviewing is just rarely rewarded and thus the lowest priority for
engineers? In any case, insight into the design and implementation of this
process would be really interesting.

~~~
msg
For me, if you can't do the intro to CS stuff and write simple programs in an
interview, that serves as a proxy that you can't do the advanced CS stuff and
write complex programs on the job.

There are many many candidates who make it to the phone screen who can't
Fizzbuzz. Also it can be difficult to separate out people who actually did
significant work on a product on their resume from people who were just "on
the team" and didn't contribute effectively.

Time is limited and resumes are full of lies and BS. But you can't BS your way
through a program and make it run.

------
johngalt
While you can't train experience, the value of experience decreases steeply
over time. Sure someone at year 0 has less utility than someone at year 10,
but the difference may all but disappear when comparing year 5 vs 10.

Edit: I started out as a BBS sysop. So you can see which side of the equation
I'm on. The value of knowing how to admin door games is practically zero at
this point.

~~~
synnik
This may or may not be true... it is an example of the old statement that I
learned in martial arts"

There is a vast difference between having 10 years of experience, and having 1
year of experience repeated 10 times.

The reason there are often few differences between a 5-year career and a
10-year career is that most people find a niche after a few years, and
comfortably sit there. But if you can find someone who spent 10 year actively
learning and broadening their skills, never settling in... those extra 5 years
are immensely valuable.

------
jammus
I'd be interested to know how common credit scoring applicants is. I
understand why they'd be necessary for financial institutions but as a general
method of filtering candidates it seems rather intrusive.

------
danberger
The conclusions the author draws are very similar to the conclusions the I/O
Psychology community has proven scientifically. The best predictor of future
performance is IQ and sample work product. Period.

~~~
danielrm26
Links?

~~~
danberger
My I/O psychology class in grad school :)

Seriously though, if you're interested in this, check out Applied Psychology
in HR Management: [http://www.amazon.com/Applied-Psychology-Human-Resource-
Mana...](http://www.amazon.com/Applied-Psychology-Human-Resource-
Management/dp/0131484109)

------
scottshea
Examples make a huge difference. I try to keep a few personal projects around
for people to look at so that I do not have to worry about proprietary code
issues.

------
rickmb
Good [insert profession here] can recognize good [insert profession here] by
just having a real conversation with them, with a focus on listening.

Sure, there are outliers in the form of pathological liars and psychopaths,
but these tend to gravitate towards professions with a major ego-boost factor
(and they're often actually good at those professions).

Most of these kind of tips and "lessons" come down to: how to desperately
compensate for being the wrong person to do the hiring in the first place.

Here's another tip: any experience professional who's skill is in demand will
recognize such a flawed hiring process, understand that this is probably
pervasive in the rest of the company, and run like hell in the opposite
direction.

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artmageddon
The IQ and grades part worry me. I had maybe a 2.9 out of 4.0 in university,
and my IQ score has fluctuated between 127-134 depending on the day and test.
I'm not the brightest person around, but I can do things, damn it :(

~~~
Too
Your problem is not your iq, it's that you're too worried. 120+ is considered
very smart, even for engineers.

------
jimbobimbo
Nothing beats "work samples", agreed. However, interviews should not be
discounted. If interview is "deceptive" in your environment, you need to work
on your questions. It took me about 10 face-to-faces with candidates in order
to get my questions right. Couple of my own face-to-faces with other companies
added even more insight into what I need to focus on in order to get better
results for my questions.

Education is something that I always forget to look at while reading the
resume.

