Slashdot Mirror
Ask Slashdot: What Portion of Developers Are Bad At What They Do?
ramoneThePoolGuy writes: We are looking to fill a senior developer/architect position in our firm. I am disappointed with the applicants thus far, and quite frankly it has me worried about the quality of developers/engineers available to us. For instance, today I asked an engineer with 20+ years of experience to describe to me the basic process of public/private key encryption. This engineer had no clue. I asked another applicant a similar question: "Suppose you wanted to send me a file with very sensitive information, how would you encrypt it in such a way that I would decrypt it?" The person started off by asking me if it was an excel file, a PDF, etc. In general, I'm finding that an overwhelming number of developers I've interviewed have poor understanding of key concepts, especially when it comes to securing data. Are other firms experiencing this same dilemma in finding qualified applicants? (Quite frankly it scares me that some of these developers are building sites that need to be secure)"
Are you going through a staffing agency? Expecting them to find you a "senior" developer who will work for 50k a year? Do you only look for resumes with decades of experience, which usually amounts to sitting in an office chair jacking off?
Why would you expect every developer to be an expert in cryptography?
Just archive it with a password, email them the archive, and phone them with the password. No need messing with keys, which the recipient probably doesn't have a clue how to do it.
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
There is a huge pool of EMPLOYED engineers. Even when they switch jobs they don't generally go through the typical application process circus. The problem is that the people who have been unemployed for months are the most likely to get an interview strictly because of motivation and availability.
It IS very hard to find good people, because they all already have jobs and aren't willing to switch to come work for you.
One good way is to chase shop layoffs (the kind where they close the whole shop, not just trim a few people), and headhunt there. Laid off people tend to be much better than fired people or people who can't get hired by anyone.
I agree with this in general. The last developer I hired hadn't ever written any code in our core language, but he demonstrated in the interview an eagerness to learn and had developed in other languages. He is a really smart guy so we hired him. Sometimes you need some folks though that have a lot experience in doing what you're trying to do with new initiatives...obviously they need to be able to learn as well, but the experience is critical for some positions.
We have had to get away from getting into looking for too specific skill-sets and instead look for overall qualities, such as how they learn over the course over an interview loop, as well as team fit, if we can find someone that shows up, demonstrates the ability to learn, and gets along well with others, if they demonstrate some level of intelligence then they should be able to pickup the specific skills in a short amount of time, that's what those 20+ years of experience should have taught those people. Don't get me wrong we do dig into the technical understanding but it's usually around design patterns, and overall good coding qualities.
Genuine answer is "most of them", but only because virtually everyone is terrible at software development. Note that even terrible developers will get there eventually and if you're developing simple software they may still be your best bet. You only need excellent software developers (which implies strong analytical and creative skills) if you're working on something interesting. If you're grinding out simple business logic you are probably better off with mediocre developers because they won't get bored. A scalpel is sharper than a bread knife, but it's not very useful for slicing bread.
In my career, out of the ~50 I've worked directly with, I've worked with maybe three developers that I'd class as excellent. A few that were "good" for various definitions of that word. The rest were marginal at best, but they still got things done after a fashion.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
I'll be frank and post anon to avoid harming my image.
I was smart enough to see that College was a huge waste of time. I dropped out of high school senior year to go move and live on my own. Wasn't about to sign up for a whole new school just to finish part of a year so I never even got a high school diploma.
However I self taught myself programming before I turned 10 years old and have been coding on a unix machine of some sorts with C/C++ for nearly 18 years now. I'm only 27.
I go to the conferences and attend every single event that I can find because I have *passion* for programming and technology. Through meeting people at conferences I was given a rather high paying developer job despite my lack of credentials. (I earn over $100K in a place where rent for a decent sized house and garage is less than $1000/month).
I decided to move awhile back and I can't seem to find anyone in a Red state that will even give me the time of day. I have 8 years of professional senior-architect level experience and tax documents proving I earned the big bucks with no degree. I had to go back to a Blue state where suddenly I got called back for interviews immediately and was visiting 2-3 in person interviews a week. 2 weeks later I was employed again.
Turns out your HR drones are likely keeping guys like me from even getting a second look. Stop taking the guys who can't see a shortcut and wasted a lot of time and money on college. Those people are the fools. I skipped doing all their hard work, skipped their debt, yet I have better skills due to my passion and I absolutely embarrass them when you get us side-by-side. I grew up coding and literally was an expert before the other guy even tried getting into college.
I now work in a Venture Capital capacity with lots of big clients who almost wouldn't believe me if I told them I had no credentials. They think I'm an MBA because I act geeky and seem to know something about almost every computer science topic.
So my advice to you is stop filtering. I only work for places that will give me the time of day when I hand in a resume with not one educational resource. That proves to me that what I can do is what matters, not how rich my parents were or what I *did*.
So focus on what people can do. Not what they did. Seriously. You'll find some crazy smart guys who this whole time weren't even being called back.
99% just poke around in whatever language they know (yeah, I'm talking about most senior devs and architects). Every architect I have met knew like one language/framework. Knowledge of: Encryption? No. Infrastructure? No. Application Servers? No. Build/Deployment? Next to none. Network Transport? No. Database? Barely. Most are totally clueless about what their software is doing really. Logging and Auditing? Blank Stares. The people who are really good and competent technically and who have a command of the above mentioned skills often get corralled into management.
I object to power without constructive purpose. --Spock
This. As someone who has 16 years under my belt I'm finding it more and more difficult to branch into areas which I've had little experience because to justify my salary I'm expected to already be an expert. Which is a shame because I have at least another 20 years of new technologies to learn before I retire.
Ascalante: Your bride is over 3,000 years old.
Kull: She told me she was 19!
I've found this to be much easier as a contractor. I have different rates for different skills that I have, versus my less-skilled areas, and my less skilled employees. One major problem with W2 style employment is that it is inflexible. People can become rapidly more, or less, valuable based on their skills (attitudes, or whatever), and their compensation doesn't quickly change. Quite often, what happens with me is that a client hires me for something I am very skilled at, that I can sell them well, and then after that is finished and good, they realize they need other things too that I'm not quite as skilled at. I can have a conversation with them about giving them a discount on the rate no problem, and because of the relationship we've built up, they normally have no issue subsidizing (at a discount) my learning. Typically, I try and charge them about what an employee would make for things I'm not (yet) good at, and around 2-3x what an employee would make for things I am good at. Plus, all of this is legal. Depending on your state, there are all sorts of laws about cutting employee's salaries and/or firing them.
The downside of this flexibility is that the income is also quite flexible. If you are expecting a consistent, senior level salary, then I think you'll be consistently doing things you're already senior level at.
Or become part of a fully funded startup. That is a crazy roller coaster ride one of my buddies is getting on, and it sounds like a psychedelic combination of contracting, W2 employment, and doing everything that needs to be done, now. I've been a part of an unfunded startup, and I learned a TON quickly, but I also never got paid and (now) never expect to.
For what it's worth, the best interview I've ever had was mostly nonspecific questions. In the interest of making the world a better place, here's a few of the questions:
In retrospect, all of those questions, though sometimes posed as casual banter, were either nonspecific or relating to my own knowledge domain, rather than directly relating to the job itself. The first question gave the interviewers insight into how well I organized my thoughts and could explain a complex system on the fly. The second question is an inquiry into my work/life balance and whether I would actually enjoy my job, and the last is a chance to demonstrate problem-solving and meeting requirements.
The job in question was mostly server administration. There were a few questions about Active Directory, Linux permissions, and network design. I botched a few of those (mostly all of networking), but I still got the job because my answers showed that I was the sort of person who could recognize my own shortcomings, and learn what I need to know when it was needed.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.