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Why the New Guy Can't Code
theodp writes "'We've all lived the nightmare,' writes Jon Evans. 'A new developer shows up at work, and you try to be welcoming, but he can't seem to get up to speed; the questions he asks reveal basic ignorance; and his work, when it finally emerges, is so kludgey that it ultimately must be rewritten from scratch by more competent people.' Evans takes a stab at explaining why the new guy can't code when his interviewers and HR swear that they only hire above-average/A-level/top-1% people. Evans fingers the technical interview as the culprit, saying the skills required to pass today's industry-standard software interview are not those required to be a good software developer. Instead, Evans suggests: 'Don't interview anyone who hasn't accomplished anything. Ever. Certificates and degrees are not accomplishments; I mean real-world projects with real-world users. There is no excuse for software developers who don't have a site, app, or service they can point to and say, 'I did this, all by myself!' in a world where Google App Engine and Amazon Web Services have free service tiers, and it costs all of $25 to register as an Android developer and publish an app on the Android Market."
So the idea is you didn't learn it at school, you didn't do it at work, you didn't do it as a hobby, but halfway through another career you can suddenly start doing something specialized but completely unrelated? And that requiring some example projects to prove that you really can make such a sudden shift is "so arrogant" and "bullshit"?
Well.. Good luck, but I'm sure whatever you're moving away from is completely mind-numbing if you think you can just switch a career path halfway though.
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