

Best Way to Screen Future Employees? Play Sports.  - sinzone
http://startuphoodlum.com/2010/03/30/best-way-to-screen-future-employees-play-sports/

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matrix
This article is vapid, banal at best. The author's theories are completely
without substance or merit. I doubt he's ever actually hired anyone.

Save yourself some time and read something else.

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keefe
I was going to write about how this article is the biggest crock of shit that
I've ever seen, but you capture the point more eloquently. I'm fine with those
people that enjoy sport for fun (just as I enjoy WoW) but both WoW and Sports
are fucking stupid. They have nothing to do with coding ability. If you can't
tell from your interview how your candidate will perform, YOU AREN'T FUCKING
INTERVIEWING RIGHT. I've only participated in a few interviews, but I can have
a conversation with someone and very quickly determine their coding ability,
at least in broad strokes.

~~~
evanreas
it is not to test "coding ability" at all! it tests, drive, passion,
competitiveness, motivation... the skills that are more important in a startup
than raw ability to code.

the coder who tries his hardest on every second in sports, is, more likely
than not, going to be the better colleague because he/she will do whatever it
takes to win.

~~~
scott_s
My sport of choice is Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu. The person who "tries his hardest
on every second" is thought of as a spaz, and is inexperienced. Such people
try to overcome their lack of skill with brute force. On an experienced
person, it fails.

Part of any sport is knowing when to push as hard as you can. In BJJ, it means
using your strength when you have leverage, and not trying to force something
when you don't have leverage. I think that has transfer to other areas.

~~~
d4ft
I've spent a bunch of years in the sport, and I do indeed try my hardest every
second. That doesn't necessarily mean I'm trying to neck crank a dude from the
guard, but it does mean that I am always working. If you watch some of the
great practitioners of our sport, Marcelinho comes to mind, they are almost
always moving, always improving. Although he's not brute forcing his way into
a position, I guarantee he is trying his hardest every second.

Maybe this is purely a semantic argument, but I hate when people say that as
you advance you work less hard. You work just as hard, you just work in
different ways.

~~~
scott_s
It's semantics. I equate "tries his hardest every second" with people who are
using all of their effort all of the time. I am not doing that, yet I am
always working hard. I would call that "doing the best that I can every
second" to differentiate it from someone going wide-open all the time to make
up for lack of skill.

Knowing when and how to conserve energy is an important part of the game as
well.

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Zot95
Agree with others that this seems like a really bad idea. I'll throw another
reason into the ring - the "Make terrible Foul calls on him" part. An
interview is a two-way process. If my would-be co-workers are calling Mickey
Mouse, ticky-tack fouls, _I'm_ going to think that _they_ are (to use a word
from the article) dicks and less than fun to work with.

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kilian
I'd be all for a friendly (competitive) game every now and then, but if you
intentionally play foul on me just to shit-test me, it means I don't want to
work for you :)

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peteforde
This is hilariously bad advice. If you go to an interview and they want to
start quizzing you about sports, run the fuck away. Jesus!

~~~
evanreas
To be clear, I am not advocating playing sports as a mandatory part of any
interview process.

What I am saying is that IF a prospective employee does play a sport, it is a
HUGE value add to watch/play with them to be able to see and judge their
personality in that context.

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EliRivers
What of those who play for the love of the game? Those who think a good match
is one in which everyone enjoyed themselves? Those for whom the score exists
only as a by-product of what they see as the point - to have a good time?
They're not competitive and they it more fun for everyone else. If that
translates into their work, they'd surely be far better employees than hyper-
competitives.

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icey
This whole article seems like terrible advice to me; and then there's this:

[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_with_Disabilities_Act...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Americans_with_Disabilities_Act_of_1990)

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lsc
hah. wow. my first thought is "you know, you need Engineers at a startup, too;
not just sales people" -

It certainly doesn't sound like the sort of place I would want to work, but it
might not be as bad of an idea as I initially thought; if you have an office
full of people who play sports, I imagine that organization could translate to
other kinds of teamwork.

On the other hand, you are shutting out a whole lot of really good Engineers.
(not to say there aren't good engineers who play sports, there certainly are,
but there are a lot more good Engineers who don't.)

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microcentury
This guys seems like he'd be a total nightmare to work with. And that's NOT
BULLSHIT.

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j_baker
So... what about people who don't do sports? Or what about people who are
disabled? Not only is this a bad idea, it could be a potential lawsuit.

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gte910h
And this _really_ fall afoul of ADA rules on hiring those with disabilities.

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evanreas
agreed that it doesn't work for all employees and i don't mention it as a way
of finding employees, rather a way to screen potential employees if they do
happen to play sports.

i'd also mention that i play ultimate with a bunch of engineers on a weekly
basis so they are out there...

~~~
LeBleu
You completely left out the "if they do happen to play sports" in the actual
article, which heavily colors non-sports players view of the article. I
definitely agree that many engineers and programmers play sports... but I also
strongly suspect that on average, an engineer or programmer is less likely to
play sports than the average person, and more likely to be the kid who always
was picked last to play sports as a kid and hence have negative views of
sports.

