Comment by kohanz | Hacker News Reader

Comment by kohanz | Hacker News Reader

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Your reasoning makes perfect sense, but the answer is a bit dry and, I don't know how to describe it, robotic? As someone who has sat in the hiring chair, if I heard "You'll make more money from my work than I'll cost in salary and benefits.", I'd get the impression of that person someone who maybe views themselves as a profit-generating widget in the grand scheme of the company. I'd wonder a bit what enjoyment/passion that person gets from their work. I know that's completely unfair, but it's just not a very natural-sounding response. I just think there are, I don't know, "warmer" ways to phrase it?

Keep in mind, the person deciding to hire you is often somewhat removed from the bottom line of the company's financials. Even though the end-goal is to make the company more money, the hiring manager is often not primarily motivated by that. They're looking for someone who will deliver quality work while fitting in well with the rest of the team (this part is so important).

So my advice would be to add a tinge of enthusiasm and a display of personality that you believe would mesh well with the "vibe" of the existing team. Something like "Given that you're working on projects A, B, and C, I think my experience with X, Y, and Z can really help improve both the velocity of the team, as well as the quality of our output". You're saying basically the same thing, but more in manager-speak (depends on the manager, of course).

I know these are all qualitative/subjective things whereas your statement is very objective, but that's because I don't believe the hiring process is all about technical merit and productivity. As much as we might dislike it, it's about "fit", whatever that means.

I'd wonder a bit what enjoyment/passion that person gets from their work.

Why can't someone just be a professional who generates value?

Because your enthusiasm is your most valuable asset. Enthused employees tend to be a lot more productive, and also drive up the morale among their peers.

Because your enthusiasm is your most valuable asset.

Wow, no, that's not even remotely true. My years of experience and track record of delivering completed products is my most valuable asset.

Enthusiasm doesn't get the job done. Enthusiasm and passion are fleeting.

Honestly, I cannot express how horrified I am by your reply.

I've had to deal with enough code fueled by enthusiasm. I much prefer working with code fueled by best practices, focus, and competence.

Horrified? Lol

Reminds me of the creative Dr. Suess poem someone came up with http://www.hometheatershack.com/forums/attachments/chat-box-...

Sorry, I should have said: besides your competence, your enthusiasm is your most valuable asset.

You have had your entire interview to demonstrate your competence. At this stage of the interview, if you have not yet demonstrated competence, no answer to this question is going to get you hired.

If that were true, interns would be worth $300k and 30 year experienced devs would work for free over the summer.

I've given co-workers a bit of push-back in the past when they've wanted to give too much weight to passion-related questions when we interviewed candidates.

Not that it can't be important; it can, but the downside is that passion often evaporates when things get difficult. So I'd rather hire someone who is driven by determination and discipline, and uses passion as a nice boost when they can.

It's frustrating to work with someone who gets sulky when we have to slog through the non-fun development tasks that are part of nearly every project. Yes, those parts are no fun, but the faster we buckle down and power through them, the better off we are.

Interestingly, I've found that the best developers I've worked with were the stone cold professionals who just powered through everything, whether it was enjoyable or excruciating. They weren't a bunch of grumpy old farts, either. They were some of the most friendly, jovial people I've had the pleasure of working with over the years.

True.

I've seen employers describe their projects/startups and then they just wait for a reaction to gauge if it's something I would consider "fun", they seem surprised when I say I'm game for pretty much anything that solves someone's problem/has active users.

I even love taking care of the un-sexy tasks that nobody else really likes/there's a fight for, especially documentation -- I've written so many internal wiki pages I'm actually kinda sorry they're all locked up behind a login screen.

Any other task that sparks the brain, for whatever reason, is just a nice bonus.

Thank you. What's with this expectation that unless we have sweet passionate love for web portals or accounting app middleware, or whatever the product is, we won't be competent professionals?

Are you saying that you don't dream of Express middleware, and that that you don't sing songs about the joy of promises and generators?

Have you not accepted Babel into your heart?

  To transpile or not to transpile, that is the question:
  Whether 'tis nobler in the open-plan office to suffer
  The slings and arrows of EcmaScript 5
  Or to take Arms against a Sea of callbacks,
  And by asyncing, end them

Just kidding, I'm with you. I think that enthusiasm and passion are most useful when layered on top of competent professionalism.

Why can't someone just be a professional who generates value?

Because fit. Because duty has limits, but passion can be exploited. In the words of Leonard Cohen: "He taught that the duty of lovers / is to tarnish the golden rule."

Yeah, the "passion" term is a loaded one and I regret using it. I don't require someone to be "passionate" about the product we're working on to see them as a good fit. In fact, as someone who works in medical devices, when someone came in and said they really wanted meaningful work and that's why they wanted to switch to medical devices, I'd slightly roll my eyes to myself because I saw a younger version of myself in them, knowing that they would quickly realize how far-removed they and their work are from the bed-side or OR and that feelings of making a meaningful contribution are a lot more rare than they might imagine.

Personally, I wouldn't ask the "why should I hire you" question, because it's a dumb question IMHO, but if I did and someone answered "Because I will make you more money than you'll pay me" and left it at that, I'd have some misgivings about that answer. It's tough for me articulate exactly why, but I just can't say I'd be thrilled with that answer. Someone who optimizes themselves for "make the company more money than I'm paid" doesn't really say much about what it's like to work with them. The statement doesn't do a good job of "selling yourself", IMHO.

>Your reasoning makes perfect sense, but the answer is a bit dry and, I don't know how to describe it, robotic?

A good answer to a bullshit question just demonstrates your skill at bullshitting. If that's what the company is looking for, hopefully you can find employment elsewhere.

My advice, when you get asked a stupid interview question, tell them why you think it's a stupid question. You'll either blow the interview, or find a place that values your opinion.

Second piece of advice, don't follow the advice of random idiots on the internet.

What's your biggest weakness?

"Kryptonite."

Then thank the interviewer for their time, and end the interview; They've failed your counter-interview.

Agreed, it sounds scripted.

When interviewing I look for people that just don't sit back and do what they're told. Someone proactive who can think of different ways of doing things. I would like to hear an answer like "Compared to other developers I've worked with in the past, I make more of an effort to talk with end users and try to target the system to make it more usable rather than just getting the functionality done." That shows something that might appeal more than the last guy we just interviewed.

I know other people like predictable developers who can crank out code from a big Jira list. Maybe they would like an answer about productivity over costs.

As you can tell it depends on the people, there is no right answer. :)

I intended it to be more prescriptive than descriptive, more of an idea that people should take and adapt to fit their circumstances.

I fear I did a horrible job of describing it in those terms, though. Or perhaps the thoughtful responses like yours have just helped me clarify my thoughts on the topic. Because in reality, I'm a huge proponent of the creative side of development. I think it's often so underrated by many companies and interviewers.

Creativity is absolutely part of the value a good developer provides, and creative developers shouldn't hesitate to discuss that in interviews.

It'll sometimes be the case that the company of person interviewing you won't value creativity. Which is actually super useful to find out, because interviews are a two-way process. If you're a creative developer, and an interviewer makes it clear they don't care about that, they've helped you by letting you know unequivocally that you don't want you work for them.

You're right; the delivery should definitely be tailored to the audience.

In the past, I've interviewed with some early stage startup founders and CTOs who are intimately familiar with the company's bottom line, and who appreciated simple, direct answers.

It's probably smart in most cases to reiterate the value you'll deliver. Working well with the rest is the team is absolutely part of that value.

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