Facebook recruiting and Unix systems
imgur.com
imgur.com
Also, just to be clear, I do not (and never did) hold any hard feelings towards the recruiter; in fact, it was very kind of them to point out why I was not qualified in the first place. This has been probably the most reflective of how I let my ego get the best of me at times, and I hope it might serve as a warning to those who might be tempted to do the same "devsplaining" in similar situations.
Please let me know if you have any other criticisms beyond the ones already voiced in this thread. I'm reading through the comments here as I can, and it's been a lot of good advice. Thanks again.
Here's what happened - the recruiter had a list of keywords, received a large volume of inbound resumes and filtered for == 'UNIX' and dumped everything else.
They (and the company they represent) could have done a better job if they'd taken the information given, created an actual human mental model and filtered accordingly but chose to behave like a computer program instead. Their loss - move on and don't feel bad about this.
But I want to point out that like the recruiter you too got stuck in the literal filter. You assumed, I'm guessing correctly, that the hiring team is probably looking for someone with experience working on UNIX-like operating systems.
A bit of advice: When you encounter imperfect systems like this in the future a good practice is to ask yourself if you know what the actual desired outcome is, and give the lossy filter the input it needs to get you to the next round.
Here it would have been simply updating your resume to list UNIX instead offering an explainer. This would get you through the recruiter filter, and during your actual phone screen with someone on the hiring team, you could discuss your UNIX-like experience if asked. If they did want literal UNIX experience, you could apologize for misinterpreting the requirement and move on. No harm done.
To be fair, I wouldn't expect this kind of 'recruiting by grep' to happen at Facebook of all places either.
Under the section Keyword Stuffing.
I feel like this is one of the most fundamental skills I learned in school. You don't answer the actual question, you provide the response that they are looking for, even if those are different. This is doubly true for machine graded multiple choice exams.
We had a biology teacher in high school who, in order to keep things fair, made the system very clear: when answering essay questions, he had a list of a dozen or so points he wanted you to mention, and you were graded by how many you hit. It didn't matter if you had a brilliant thesis or whatever, if you didn't recite the relevant parts of the book and lectures back, you lost credit.
The biology barely matters, but I couldn't have asked for better training in dealing with recruiter (and hard headed managers, beurocrats, etc).
From the desk of recruiters, most likely.
This is extremely condescending. The article displayed a supercilious tone towards the recruiter, clearly making it known that "I (the erudite developer) know more about how to filter candidates than you (the ignoramus recruiter). I am right, and I will only adjust my position under duress to the bare minimum which meets your requirements".
But, as a recruiter, I would be delighted to glean this insight into a candidate's mindset, and gladly put them into the "struggles with collaboration" reject pile.
Facebook employ canny recruiters. If this interaction seems odd to the "well actually" crowd, please be advised that it makes perfect sense to those involved in hiring decisions.
All I see is a human keyword grep that is clearly failing to do their job: find relevant candidates and forward them on. I say this having been in both ends of the recruiting process and have have struggled with recruiters who had no understanding of how to read a technical resume and rejected JavaScript experts on this basis that they didn't list html in their keywords.
Its not that he was factually wrong (or even wrong in etiquette) , but as my mom said you can be right and dead right, which is why he recognizes he needed a better approach to leave the most opportunities for his career going forward
What has been done has been done and there is no place for regrets. Facebook might (along with its partner and associates) be a big workplace but it definitely isn't the only launchpad for a happy & successful career.
He came a little bit snarky, true, but I yet have to see devstar who isn't snarky at least to some degree.
If this person is good, they will definitely have opportunities elsewhere.
That does not describe reality as I've lived it. I tell headhunters from Google, Apple, Amazon, FB and other huge companies to leave me alone every few years - seems like they expire their 'go away' notes after a while.
I've had zero problems finding quality employment.
It's an opportunity missed (it's a great place to have an internship or be a new grad, not so much for senior people who've worked elsewhere in industry) but the OP will certainly have no trouble applying again with some future recruiter.
No, you didn't speak out of line. To be honest, the recruiter was lucky you were willing to continue the conversation at all; if that were my experience with Facebook recruiting, I'd simply would have stopped replying as soon as it was clear that the recruiter was nothing more than checking boxes. The recruiter needs to improve before they lose more than just intern prospects.
Maybe you were a little condescending but it happens and rejecting someone on the basis of this exchange seems mad to me. If FB doesn't reverse their decision here I'd be surprised/disappointed.
* Solaris, HP-UX and AIX are Unix systems.
* FreeBSD and Debian GNU/Linux are Unix-like systems but not Unix systems.
When technology people like us are debating over this terminology, I think it makes sense to cut the recruiter some slack.
If I have a task for an intern that requires some shell-scripting, and the intern already understands what it means to pipe commands, I put my hands together in silent thanks.
Due to this, when someone is asking me whether I have experience with UNIX-like I say that yes, I had an iPhone.
Debian GNU/Linux is a Unix-like system because Linux is not Unix, but it is Unix-like and when combined with a GNU userland is POSIX compliant.
Then there are 'trademark unices', which are systems that implement the Single UNIX Specification and are certified to be compliant. Such a system does not need to be a descendant of AT&T UNIX. From your list, Solaris, HP-UX, and AIX are (trademark) UNIX [1]. Note that there is also a RHEL-deriver Linux distribution, EulerOS, that is a certified UNIX.
https://blog.opengroup.org/2017/02/14/value-of-unix-open-sta...
Then, because I'm at Facebook, I would just move on, because honestly anything that filters out one more of the 10,000 qualified intern candidates I'm going to have to look at is good for me, even if it's completely random and stupid.
Look on the bright side: automation is likely to put recruiter-as-grep out of a job soon.
Yay?
Reading, it was frustrating to see the recruiter looking for essentially an "exact string" match. They did not appear to be interested in leveling with you on UNIX vs Unix vs POSIX vs Linux or having any sort of interesting technical discussion.
Also their "thanks for the tutorial" phrasing is very unprofessional.
I do hope this thread helps FB in training + calibrating their external comms with candidates.
Best case scenario, someone from FB could say hi. Not officially (that would be a nice miracle), but rather some person working there. Then you could start chatting with them, they could figure out somewhere you could probably get in on the ground at, and give appropriate instructions. AFAIK internal recommendation is the best way to get through/inside The Great Wall of Google™, perhaps that's the case for FB as well. Note, I have no experience with either company, but in a thread like this not having contact info is wasting your 15 minutes.
Also note https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15188618 - apparently what happened to you is quite common (!?).
Good luck; here's hoping you get some emails!
You stuck to your guns and didn't just lie about Unix experience, so I commend you.
But if you really want the job, next time just lie and set them straight once you've gotten an interview. It is splitting hairs to make a big deal out of actual Unix experience vs Linux experience.
This only holds true if one is a UNIX Graybeard, otherwise, GNU/Linux is rife with pitfalls and minefields for the unwary. Shell scripting and GNU-isms or bash-isms is an example of this, or using GNU specific functions or semantics when programming yet another. There are many such landmines lying in wait on GNU/Linux, waiting to blow one's legs off. The BSD guys have been trying to raise awareness of this for years.
If you email me at thomasbao12@gmail.com. I can share your email with some other FBers or ex-FBers. Here's a screencap of some of the support: https://www.dropbox.com/s/ecq6qqzu1b88grr/Screenshot%202017-...
Even if they can't help you get back in the pipeline for an internship at FB, maybe they can get you an internship somewhere else.
Never forget who reached for who. It's FB in desperate need that they pick workers from students these days.
Also, trying to (yuck) trick you into providing names of others companies - hahaha - it's like you asking him: what's the maximum salary FB can offer or similar questions. Disgusting simply because any sane person (your friend e.g.) would suggest you never provide that to counter negotiating party. Asking for this info is not far (in effect) to asking about age/race etc. This data is intended to have more bargaining power on FB side. Unethical.
And NB: it's the recruiter who introduced 'UNIX-like' into conversation.
Take your time, they all (companies) will bend. It's an employee market.
You did a great job!
This is the most important comment in this entire thread.
Though next time you can skip the pleasantries and go right to the "Actually, it's GNU SLASH Linux."
Your comment here however indicates to me you lack confidence. That's normal too. But lacking confidence can be career limiting.
You're trying to figure out "what did I do wrong" which is a useful exercise, but as Picard said "it is possible to commit no mistakes and still lose that is not a weakness, that is life".
It's entirely possible that once you get past the inane recruiter junk you find yourself on a superb team of talented people.
Unfortunately, I have just come to accept silly HR/Recruiter practices as a negative reality of life in 2017.
But... these are exact same people the "inane recruiter junk" has selected. How good can they possibly be?
You screened the recruiter well, and he/she failed to continue. Best luck in his/her exactly-UNIX-and-not-UNIX-like engineer search!
If we all give in, the result is 2017: ignorant, arrogant recruiters, not willing to look into what they _should_ understand, since they are looking for speciality positions; and ignorant, arrogant people all around, not willing to learn anything.
This kind of advice is what will keep him from being an engineer that others want to work with, and from passing the trivial HR screens that big companies have immediately before talking with an engineer.
Soft skills and an ability to explain without condescension are much more important for educating others, rather than doubling down and being pedantic to someone who obviously isn't getting it.
Also, good on you for being able to receive criticism, that's a big step in the right direction. In time, you'll likely come to the realization that good communication skills are an important part of almost any role.
I am curious. Can you be a little specific and tell us what Linux or Unix experience do you have?
I mean can you specify the Linux distro names and the Unix brand names (AIX, Solaris, etc.) that you have worked with?
I can claim experience with developing userland applications portable across POSIX-compliant systems, as well as some understanding of lower-level operating system concepts. However, to be honest it seems I am unqualified for the role as specified, which makes the exchange all the more embarrassing. Oh well, what's done is done.
$ CROSS DRAWBRIDGE
CANNOT CROSS DRAWBRIDGE
$ TRAVERSE DRAWBRIDGE
CANNOT TRAVERSE DRAWBRIDGE
$ ABANDON DRAWBRIDGE
YOU REALIZE THAT YOUR EFFORTS ARE WASTED TRYING TO EXPLAIN YOUR QUEST TO A LOW LEVEL GUARD.
YOUR PRINCESS IS IN ANOTHER CASTLE.
GO NORTH, WEST, SOUTH OR EAST (?)
Your application for an internship was spot on - ignore any and all feedback you've received from the HR rep, as it's all gumph. You obviously know what you're doing, and Internships (while beneficial in the market at the moment) are useful, you will be more than capable finding real paid work in any other area with your skillset - and best of luck to you as well. Aiming high doesn't necessary mean applying to the Facebooks and Googles of the world.
--- Wonder if the HR filters take regex?
'It'"'"'s a $"[nN].[Xx]" system! I know this!'*
*Edit: This also qualifies you on Xanax, which may not be what you want.
The recruiter is not knowledgeable. If he/she is hiring for production engineering, he/she needs to understand the basic of the keywords they search for. No reason for you to apologize.
I always envy my friends in medicine. They have a strong union and stand together, pushing salaries for all of them and don't accept anyone above them who is not also from their profession (even if that's often hell of arrogant...).
Nah. Relax. It was gauche, but not that bad. The responses you get are largely driven by the fact you got egg on the face of a tech Golden Boy. Also, social norms say you shouldn't air private conversations that expose the failings of a (potential, current, or former) employer.
Almost everyone will admit that tech hiring practices are an ongoing dumpster fire and comedy of errors, they just prefer a less dicey context and framing for that conversation.
You're new to the world of applying for jobs and how hiring works in professional contexts. I don't hold this against you. But this does lower my opinion of Facebook. Don't buy into the meme that programmers are dorks and therefore always carry 100% of fault for any social interaction that doesn't go magnificently.
See if your school has a career services office, they can give you a crash course in all the ceremony and fuss around building a resume and getting interviewed.
I dislike big companies for this reason. Expect worse when you work at one. The most successful learn the game (you've taken your first step) and rise the ranks.
Personally I would have (different character AND way too many years dealing with this kind of people) sent him this:
https://i.imgflip.com/spwve.jpg
(and be blacklisted forever).
Another point of view is that recruitment people are going to be less technically savvy than the actual engineers. That's a good thing - do you want to work as an engineer somewhere where they make the engineers do all the HR grunt work?
'Thanks for the tutorial' I don't think any chat bot would read the entire thing and maybe sarcastically summarize it as Tutorial
When participants in conversation are different enough, true communication becomes impossible, and it's useful to recognize this as early as possible to either choose another tact or abort entirely. (I think this applies to any distributed system not just recruiter-candidate pair.)
You have taken the time at university to learn about the origins of "UNIX" and about portability, but it seems clear to me you do not need to know about these things for this Facebook internship.
If you want this knowledge to be acknowledged and valued, if you want to put it into practice, then perhaps Facebook is not the proper place for this to happen.
There are open source UNIX-like projects that would be better suited and more appreciative.
If the position they were recruiting for was not "UNIX and Linux" then I would have a different opinion.
You did nothing wrong. Sure, you could have gotten past this recruiter by being more cooperative but if you are really passionate about UNIX then I think the internship would be a disappointment.
You come across as far more impressive than the Facebook organization and I hope that you will stick with UNIX-like OS going forward, whether as part of your day job or as an open source contributor.
"ya was pretty much all true, but writing this to show i'm not an asshole to hopefully not fuck up any future job prospects with other recruiters who might read this"
The audience is not-too-technical requiter. You introduced term he did not knew (posix) and sent him wall of text explaining history of unix/linux. First, even tech people use terms Linux and Unix as a synonyms for Unix-like daily, so there is not need to go full nerd on someone who is not into it. Local experienced senior could easily have said "we need Unix and Linux experience" and requiter then simply attempts to fulfill that requirement. Local experienced seniors would rather change job then manage communication with dozens of potential interns, you cant expect first contact to be like them.
Second, history of tech wall of text will not work even if you are the most polite and humble person in the world. People don't read long detailed explanation even when they actually need them. They want to move to next mail as soon as possible. If the long text where you are lecturing someone contains just a hint of condescension, even if unintentional, people wont read it and will react negatively (which happened by the end of conversation). It is his bad not yours, but such reaction is still fairly predictable.
Just say that yes, you worked with Linux and Unix systems and leave out historical details. When you are looking for doctor, you don't expect lecture on correct latin names of body parts and their history. You expect them to translate from human speech to doctor speech. It is same thing.
I suspect you could still get the internship if you send an apology like "Sorry for my previous emails they were out of line. You're essentially correct and here's an updated resume to reflect that."
I'm imagining a recruiter saying "We're looking for someone with graphics programming experience. Your resume says 'OpenGL and DirectX experience.' If you do not have graphics programming experience, I can try to find another role for you." As a candidate, I would think I was interacting with an idiot.
Plus, recruiters are incredibly busy this time of year. I don't blame him for choosing not to engage with candidates who reply with a wall of text when given a simple request.
If so, that's really really sad. Even more so if you thought "Unix-like" genuinely disqualifies you because it's not strictly "Unix" !
You need to be more confident about your skills. Most interns don't know how POSIX relates to UNIX and Linux like you do, if they are even familiar with the word !
Look, I'm a former Facebook production engineer. I won't exactly reveal a secret by saying that FB is wholly Linux based. It's not a bank with legacy commercial Unix systems, and you were of course right about the 1970s engineers comment.
Positions requiring expertise with a specific brand of Unix are less and less common, and these would always mention the flavor they're after anyway (mostly Solaris, possibly some AIX/HP-UX).
One more general piece of advice : let others decide that you're not qualified for, don't self-censor before you even get a chance to fight.
You: Yes, I'm a qualified plumber and can do the job.
Recruiter: Sure, but can you fix our pipes?
You: Off course, that is is what I was trained to do.
Recruiter: You keep saying you're a plumber but we need someone to fix our pipes
You: I can do it.
Recruiter: we need someone who have worked with pipes.
You: I have worked with those.
Recruiter: Sure, but we need someone to fix our pipes.
etc
But this position is primarily for pipes in park bathrooms. Do you have any experience with that type of pipe?
Two parallel lines though....
Replies: "Yes, I have experience with pipe in that setting."
Recruiter: We're looking for someone to fix the pipes.
(re-word their statement/question in your answer so there can be NO ambiguity)
You: I have lots of experience fixing many kinds of pipes, (including the EXACT SPECIFIC kind you asked for - WORD FOR WORD.)
(Notes on your replies, they didn't ask if you are a qualified plumber, they didn't ask what you were trained to do)
I interviewed at Google 3 times and I'm currently going through the interviews for the 4th time (a combination of bad interviewers and me being a total idiot), and this time I've stumbled across the nicest technical recruiter I've ever seen in 7yrs in the industry. She actively fought for me after a poor performance, and went above and beyond to accommodate me. And all my previous 3 recruiters at Google were extremely "professional-nice" and rather intelligent. In contrast, every single interaction I had with Facebook left a bad taste in my mouth (mostly getting rejected 2 times with a 5 line email, after being referred by Fb employees).
TL;DR stop enabling companies to be shitty
Companies have billions in the bank, make tens of billions profit each year, and have "staff" working who they don't pay a cent to.
The fact there are no laws against that is evil.
Of course, depending on your objective: if your objective is to have at least the option of interviewing further for this company, it helps to remember the concept of Pyrrhic victories: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrrhic_victory, i.e.: don't win the battle and lose the war.
Recuiter: we need someone who can work with copper and pex pipes. Your resume says that you work with PEX
You: I can do plumbing. I have connected PEX to copper before.
Recruiter: Do you have experience installing copper?
You: Building codes allow you to substitute PEX for copper pipe. I have used PEX with copper.
Recruiter: we need someone to work with copper. Thank you.
I would add that in this case they wanted someone with 'clay' pipes experience. He only had 'regular' pipes knowledge.
There aren't that many differences in software and they are easier to learn (eg. be aware of `killall` linux vs bsd).
In this case though I doubt they were looking for a specialist; it would have been marked as, for example, AS/400 experience if this was the case.
This guy has a better analogy (and funnier) then mine:
http://www.jasonbock.net/jb/News/Item/7c334037d1a9437d9fa650...
I get the arguments that the HR recruiter was a bit off a buffoon, but at the abstract level, you lacked the pragmatism and interpersonal skills to brush through something that clearly isn't important seeing as you have the relevant skills.
I see a few people like this in every company and they most definitely hold up progress. Most of them get fired, technical understanding isn't the only facet of being a software developer. Working in a team is a mix of being assertive when its important and placating others when it doesn't matter, much like life. A failure to distinguish between the two types of situations is a pretty big flaw for anyone who will be working as part of a team.
I used to interview at Google and I've dealt with entitled candidates, but this reads about as polite as I could expect without being a complete pushover.
I don't think I'd have thought of one ignorant recruiter out of a company of many thousands as a red flag. We have a great recruiter at my company, but I have no idea if he knows the difference between Unix, POSIX, and Linux, or if he knows OSX is a Unix (tm).
[0]: https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/1489/is-mac-os-x-un...
Por examplo: I get the arguments that Stanley was a bit of a buffoon, but at the abstract level, the HR person lacked the pragmatism and interpersonal skills to identify a possible problem with a job description, and at the very least run it by the hiring manager if they were not allowed and/or comfortable adjusting the must-fit qualifications themselves.
I see a few people like this in every company and they most definitely hold up progress. Most of them get fired, rigidly filtering resumes by well-defined criteria isn't the only facet of being a recruiter. Working to help build teams is a mix of being assertive when its important and bridging the gap between what was said and what is desired, much like life. A failure to distinguish between the two types of situations is a pretty big flaw for anyone who will be working as part of a team.
True, but consider that some commenters might be commenting as end users of open source UNIX-like OS, not as salaried software developers.
In that case, there is nothing in this email exchange to suggest he could not be a valuable contributor to a UNIX-like project, paid or unpaid.
As an end user, I could care less whether developers are adept at dealing with recruiters (though I might sympathize them for the BS they must endure).
What I care about as an end user is whether they can write portable code.
Given that these companies are dedicated to selling web ads, it really makes me wonder how "progress" would be defined in your chosen context.
I am not sure that UNIX or Linux would even exist were it not for the type of person you are describing.
There is nothing wrong with having technical understanding or working elsewhere besides companies selling web ads. That is where true "progress" has come from in the past and I think it is likely to come from in future.
Just my opinion.
This may seem obvious to you, but it's not to me. Why are you assuming malice on the part of the recruiter?
Maybe that was the test all along :)
There are many new grads who are capable of appropriately dealing with social challenges. Those who can't have only themselves to blame.
Thanks for the quick response and clarifications. Experience with Linux and other UNIX-like operating systems is largely transferrable thanks to the standardization that resulted from the POSIX specification. As a result, the terms "POSIX" and "UNIX-like" by-and-large refer to the same thing.
My experiences are in particular with developing software for Linux platforms, which are the most popular of the UNIX-like operating systems. I also have experience using POSIX-specified APIs to ensure consistency and portability. Beyond software developers who have programmed in the 1970s, most people do not have experience with a true UNIX OS, and I would find it hard to believe that such outdated technologies are underpinning Facebook's advanced innovations.
I've updated my resume to indicate my familiarity with Linux, POSIX, and UNIX-like systems. Please let me know if there is anything else you need.
Thanks for your time and consideration, Stanley Zhang.
Response:
Hi Stanley,
Thank you for the tutorial. We're looking for experience working on Linux and Unix.
If you do not meet the above, please let me know if there are other roles you'd like to rank.
Best, ________
I'd love to see you defend why the guy who wrote the first half is bad at technical communication and needs to develop a professional attitude, and the recruiter -- who copies and pastes the same incorrect response over and over, showing no indication that they read a single word -- is a professional communicator with a good attitude.
Yes, but if a recruiter is attempting to convince the smartest people at top universities to come be an intern at their company, they should know the difference (or practical lack thereof) between linux and unix. Or at least they should be smart enough to not triple-down on that difference when they clearly don't know wtf they're talking about.
Bottom line is OP is a candidate that should have gotten through to the next stage and should not have been disqualified because the front-line recruiter was being an idiot. It's a missed opportunity and there are probably many more like it.
Presumably they were worried that the resumé wouldn't just be seen by a recruiter, and a more knowledgeable person might flag it.
Wrong: "Yep, I have UNIX experience!"
Right: "These days, the phrases 'UNIX' and 'UNIX-like systems' are used interchangeably. Please double check this with your hiring manager to confirm that we're on the same page."
I don't think the onus is on developers here to explain why Unix and Posix are interchangable.
It's like the carpenter telling the recruiter that yes, his skills in building a chair transfer to building a table.
IMO the recruiter should have basic understanding of the technologies they are recruiting for. But it's the norm for them to have no idea.
"Is the tumor beniggun?" "Yes, that's correct, the tumor is benign".
As a tutorial for those of us like me who sometimes stumble in situations like this, could someone who found the OP's responses to the recruiter unprofessional please post example phrasing of what the OP should have said? Let's assume the constraint that the OP will refuse to lie (so they won't just change their resume to 'Unix' instead of 'Unix-like').
This is a genuine question; I often can't think of how to phrase things and I think an example would be educational.
Stanley: "As per my previous email, I have experience working on Linux and Unix ..."
Recruiter: "Your email and resume say Unix-like systems, which is not exactly Unix."
What is the point of the recruiter's last email, claiming that the email doesn't say Unix, when it clearly does? It looks to me as though Stanley was crystal clear at this point, and the recruiter still wouldn't have any of it.
Is just communicating a fact politely, "not nice"?
The recruiter handled himself professionally and should be commended for not being bullied. Mr. Zhang sounds like a punk, and would probably be better served by pulling the image.
Facebook markets itself as hiring the best people. Therefore, when applying to Facebook, you want to market yourself as being among the best. When a recruiter first tells you that Linux isn't Unix, you assume that the elite recruiter looking for elite people is looking for an elite response which explains the difference.
OP's point is that image of Facebook elitism is just smoke and mirrors.
This is a genuine question; I often can't think of how to phrase things and I think an example would be educational.
This constraint is invalid. People need to use contextual awareness. The recruiter is most likely not a technical person, so splitting hairs won't help. And based on a bit of knowledge about Facebook, it's highly unlikely that a company that prides itself on building its own data centers from scratch will actually use a creaky AIX 7.1 for their backend, so you just "lie". Heck, it's not even a lie, it's a white lie which you'll tell the engineer interviewer down the line, while explaining that you have POSIX/whatever experience.
In my opinion this whole exchange shows a need for improvement regarding people skills for OP, at least in writing. Considering it's an internship, this was probably a good moment for a wake-up call.
email 1: I want to apply
email 2: I fixed my resume
email 3: my fix didn't work? you must be wrong
email 4: you are still wrong
but at email 3 you clearly aren't getting it and should ASK them what they want
--
Interviewer: First of all, we're working in a subdivision building a lot of brown houses. Have you built a lot of brown houses before?
Carpenter: Well, I'm a carpenter, so I build houses, and people pretty much paint them the way they want.
Interviewer: Yes, I understand that, but can you give me an idea of how much experience you have with brown? Roughly.
Carpenter: Gosh, I really don't know. Once they're built I don't care what color they get painted. Maybe six months?
The student is representing only himself. The recruiter is representing the company.
When a recruiter mishandles a situation so massively as was the case here, it puts Facebook in a poor light. Obviously, Facebook's engineering teams are well aware of what all of this technology is, but it is distasteful to see this complete lack of understanding and know that I might have to deal with it if I were to work with one of their recruiters.
I'm not saying the industry in general is better than this, but it would have taken the recruiter all of 30 seconds to draft an email to the hiring manager and ask for clarification - "This guy is really insistent on how he has POSIX and Linux experience and that this will be okay. What do?"
Also, putting Unix on the required skills for an intern position? What did they think was going to happen?
- Keep messages simple. Less information to process is better.
- If the response seems strange, start by assuming miscommunication and misunderstanding. Do not respond with more complicated information.
- When in doubt, say what they are expecting to hear and sort it out later when you talk voice or in person.
A more fruitful exchange would be:
Recruiter: We require having UNIX experience. If you have it could you update your resume and resend?
Candidate: Resending with UNIX experience written in.
Recruiter: Thanks! We'll be contacting you shortly.
If you are lucky, maybe you have some friends at Facebook that can intervene on your behalf. If not, there's other companies.
I had friends at Google to help me get an answer. But I decided I never wanted to work for Google based on how callously they treated me during the interview process. It became clear to me that I was not a high priority person to them ... just a fungible commodity. This is true, but nobody likes to be shown the truth of their value like that.
I knew other people with other talents that were treated really well by Google. My skillset was not in that high demand ... or there were plenty of other candidates. But I felt like Google did not need to treat me like garbage.
After that I went and joined a startup. Quite happy now. We stole a few engineers from Google even :)
I always make sure we get back to our interview candidates as quickly as possible. I won't let us turn into a callous Google.
edit: Looks like it's been posted already internally judging from one of the other posts
Any chance someone on here that was deeply technical transitioned into recruiting? Will you spill the beans like compensation ranges, per head bonus/commission, and satisfaction?
As an engineering manager I've done all my own recruiting and have been recognized by my management chain for doing a stand up job at it.
I know several socialites from High School that are not or barely technical that outwardly seem to be earning a lot of money doing recruiting or contract agency talent management. It seems like way less hours and stress than I've put in to become a systems expert. Maybe that wont last forever with economic waves, but then again neither do a lot of tech jobs.
Typically you get a cut of the action (10-20% of first year salary or annual rate) or spiffs. If you have a good network of contacts, you may be able to specialize in some niche that pays more.
In an engineering org, I typically see low salary multiples for the lowest and highest performers. The lowest may be barely responsive while the highest is trading away health and life to make something happen. There is a real ceiling for pay vs effort and talent in technical roles. Tech management roles can allow for less effort and incentive programs are easier to come by, but it is still very seldom performance based where again the difference between the worst and the best is marginal. Cynically, it seems the most effective game theory to maximize ROI in a technical org is to be a shitbag and perform minimally. I can't bring myself to slump like that.
I am really thinking I need to transition into something like this or sales to build wealth in a few years. I would trade 10 years of grueling effort for financial freedom. I traded 15 years of basically unpaid grueling learning to become a systems expert. Very silly from an ROI perspective. I can always get intellectual stimulation from open source I guess, but I'd caution anyone from taking the path I did.
I might be wrong, but as far as I know PE's are recruited to have SysAdmin expertise as well. It's clear that the resume didn't reflect that as well as it should if this was even being asked.
No idea if it was a typo for C# or the recruiter thought, we have C and C++, why not add C+ in there to increase our hits.
I found it amusing, but didn't start an argument..
They also asked me about if I had experience with the EMACS editor, but spelled out the letter E-M-A-C-S. Why that was an important skill I have no idea. Especially since this was for a contact that several companies were competing for and I was hired by the winning company to work on it. No special knowledge of EMACS was required. Any text editor would work.
For instance, when I'm hiring a vSphere admin, and I ask my recruiters to put anybody that wasn't immediately familiar with RVTools (among other things) at the bottom of the resume pile. It's a dead simple and ubiquitous utility for vSphere admins, and is a pretty good shortcut for eliminating people with too little experience or too hands-off experience from contention. Sure, it might end up accidentally selecting against what would otherwise be good candidates, but in general I've found it helps accelerate forced ranking of candidates.
That's probably a bit more directly applicable to the role than your Emacs question, but they might be trying to feel out what 'kind' of a developer you could be. Those that favor Emacs, Vim etc tend to be rather different than those that use Visual Studio, etc.
I like to use vim whenever possible, but my job requires Visual Studio for many day to day tasks and would not hire someone unfamiliar with Visual Studio.
Knowing the person you're talking to helps greatly.
The average recruiter has a high school certificate and that's it. They're hired to do largely manual work comparing skills on resumes to skills on job positions.
Now that you know how they work you should ask yourself what's your goal? Is it to get that internship at Facebook? If so then how can I write my resume and cover letter to help me get the recruiters attention? Put the skills from the job listing on your damn resume.
Personally I'd dislike working with this guy. I can tell he's a smart guy but he's misdirecting his intelligence.
He did. Everyone seems to be scrolling by that screenshot. He's trying to be honest -- the poor bastard.
A few more interactions like this though and he's bound to start telling white lies on his resume. Eventually he'll start to think "sure, I've got like '4 years'ish of experience in that... fuck it..." And so it goes.
Pretty soon he's just like everyone else who doesn't bat an eye at "10 years of Swift experience" and all that garbage.
Frankly, if Facebook is hiring recruiters fresh out of HS with no tech background and treating fresh, naive, honest soon-to-be devs like this, then they've failed their own interview. This is nothing short of ridiculous.
Sure, it is Facebook, they know how to build systems that are tolerant to faulty components. If they cared about preventing this, they could send resumes to multiple recruiters and proceed based on some sort of consensus. But that's the kicker, turns out their recruitment organization is already a fault tolerant system. The particular fault tolerance mode here is that they don't care about a certain rate of false negatives, no matter how egregious in hindsight, as long as they have few false positives. Sucks at a human level, but in some ways it probably is the optimal system based on what the objective function is for a large company.
The proper response here is: "I have experience in Linux and Unix. Updated resume is attached." Done.
You need to treat them like he's your old uncle. Use minimal technical words, repeat what they ask/say and most importantly respect them.
I don't think the profession has any room to be embarrassed:it seems like a check your dignity at the door type deal. I've dealt with plenty of recruiters as an applicant, an employee being hounded for referrals, and even in just social situations, and I can't think of a single positive thing to say about them.
I'm usually not comfortable with such blanket statements, but it's literally 100% of the ones I've interacted with. I've yet to meet one that knows anything about the jobs they're hiring for, or one that doesn't give you the dirty feeling of being used after a conversation in any capacity with them. The worst was meeting them in social situations when they'd hear I worked for Google: 90% of the time they'd immediately get a predatory gleam in their eye and the tenor of their interactions with me would immediately shift. It was sickeningly transparent.
Every OS X from 10.5 on except 10.7 has been certified under Version 3 of the Single UNIX Specification, and thus is officially considered to be UNIX.
If you cannot understand that the HR person responsible for hiring you maybe is not a top-tier engineer and you cannot accommodate that person's gap in technical knowledge you probably cannot function in a healthy way with other members of the team such as junior developers, business people, or end users.
However, keep in mind this guy is recruiting for internships, so I assume he’s not the most experienced recruiter on the team.
P.S. - I personally believe in reading the audience, which in this case meant not digging deeper into technical terms but just adding “experience with Linux and Unix systems” to the resume as the recruiter suggested. But... only if you really _can_ answer questions about either/both during an interview.
As for a singular product it was always kind of muddy. There was early UNIX, Research UNIX, BSD and then System III and System V as products from AT&T. The last product that was "pure" UNIX was System V Release 4. You could buy it into the 90s for 3B2s and PCs. It had lots of derivatives that used it as the port base like Solaris, Interactive UNIX, UnixWare etc and the code was also widely incorporated into other port bases (AIX, IRIX, etc) that predate or incorporated lots of different code like OSF/1. IIRC Novell came to own this "pure" UNIX and then sold it to SCO.
I would say any of the BSDs are UNIX today, but that caused a pretty big legal gaffe between AT&T and BSDi in the early '90s and limited adoption at a critical point. OpenBSD to me seems like the spiritual Research UNIX continuation.
I was a sysadmin in the internal managed services division of a healthcare company and we had AIX, Solaris, HP-UX, Linux (CentOS, Debian, RHEL), BSD, Open-VMS, and FreeBSD.
We had about 150 Sysadmins to manage it all, a lot of the guys had been doing their respective OS's exclusively for 20+ years.
From what I've experienced with Facebook recruitment, they dragnet linkedin pretty hard and have at-least a 5-step process for interviewing that is designed to be implemented at high speed by internal people, but at-least lets you talk with internal people.
I stopped responding to their requests on Linkedin because you start over each time. Although the inquiries are interesting, it's not really fun to have a bunch of "first dates" constantly.
They should probably stop doing that.
If a business hires cutrate idiots to source candidates for the largest investment expense it has[1], I guarantee you that it will cut costs elsewhere as well.
[1] Yes, people are an investment. At a quarter of a million dollars a pop for proper coding talent, multiplied by however many coders the company has, people are the largest expense Facebook has.
This is a large part of why they contract it out and they shouldn't get a free pass on it. If $company contract out customer support (very common) we don't say "sure I was on hold for 7 hours, but the support was contracted out, so it doesn't reflect on $company".
Anyway, I guess he figured it out since he did well enough to get a return offer.
Apparently things have changed a bit.
Edit: apparently the student did follow up here about the same time I posted this; props for doing so. This entire discussion serves as a reminder that getting a resume past HR (and most recruiters) is 100% about ticking exactly the right boxes, and only serves as the most rudimentary of filters.
Facebook has a vast array of technologies in use, from the top to the bottom of the stack and across a wide breadth of problem domains. A lot of the time there are competing technologies.
No one engineer at Facebook is familiar with the sum of technologies worked on by engineers at Facebook.
It stands to reason that recruiters are in the same boat.
So if someone comes to you and says "I've used Oberon, which is like Modula", do you know if they're correct? You don't, really. They very well may be. But the recruiter may also be dealing with one of the three dozen hopefuls every day who are desperate to pitch that X is similar enough to Y that they should be given a chance.
The recruiter was in the wrong. But at that size, there will always be recruiters who are in the wrong. It's luck of the draw. I've dealt with two Facebook recruiters in the past 4 years: one who misunderstood my résumé, another who understands it quite well. These days I don't take it personally.
If I didnt bother accepting anything beyond an exact keyword match of something I didnt understand then I was probably a lousy recruiter and likely not worth my paycheck.
We (developers) want the recruiting, interviewing and hiring processes to be improved and optimized to not let this sort of things happen again, yet when it comes to actual actions to take, we just decide to post it as a "look, another funny incompetent recruiter!" post. As time shows, this post will not change anything and these people will continue harassing and denying interviews for good developers. Today it was a fresh graduate; tomorrow it can be me or you.
So please, do share the name of this recruiter.
It did in my eyes.
The lesson that should be learned: HR should have some technical background to do technical hiring.
Seriously though, this conversation is not completely untypical of some I've had in the past. The technical knowledge of _some_ recruiters is, well, non-existent. As has been pointed out they tend to keyword search, and well, if you don't have exactly the right keyword you're toast.
Perhaps it's in our best interest to keep these people ignorant; we do get paid a lot of money. Perhaps society has decided it's not important for most people to know, and that it's alright to be ignorant (though this leads to common problems we complain about every day). But whatever the reason, this person was doing the right thing by trying to educate the person in a pretty polite way. Sure he could play the game and get the job. But it's still frustrating.
Empathy is a critical skill in engineering. In this exchange you have shown to be unable to understand what the recruiter's point of view.
You will encounter many similar situations in your career, especially when working with people in areas of expertise different than yours.
Luckily, it is a skill, not a gift. So it is just up to you to get better at it.
I'm hoping this is a yes. That was... incredibly difficult to read.
Beyond software developers who have programmed in the 1970s, most people do not have experience with a true UNIX OS, and I would find it hard to believe that such outdated technologies are underpinning Facebook's advanced innovations.
These two sentences could easily be read as
"Hey idiot, no one since 70's era programmers have that experience, also I think you're wrong about this requirement because I know better.
Dripping with condescension, but you're young and smart so understandable that ego can swell. You've down tremendous self-awareness in your post here though, clearly have a bright future!
https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/1489/is-mac-os-x-un...
"Oh, you're exactly right. I've updated my resume accordingly.
...//Unix //Linux"
and have that be the end of it. What is the point of arguing here but to prove some kind of imagined superiority?
Of course, the recruiter is just a recruiter but with this "I know it all & better"-attitude, when the intention was absolutely clear, having no deal was the right choice for fb.
The recruiter was basically trying to help you, most would have just filtered you out and not even replied.
Recruiters don't have technical experience, so don't expect them to understand the nuances of OSes etc.
Yes, you should. If they don't understand what they should be looking for in a CV, they should not be recruiting for the position.
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/linux-vs-unix-crucial-differenc...
"Mac OS X is also a certified Unix operating system".
At the point that it became clear that there was a technical misunderstand, would you find it condescending to say something like, "I think there's a misunderstanding over this qualification for `foo` position. Could we clear it up with a `foo` engineer who is working on this stack?
I know HR/headhunters who think Hadoop/AWS are programming languages.
...
> We're looking for students with experience working on Linux and Unix.
What the recruiter said - twice - was pretty clear and matter-of-fact. Why does everyone assume it's not true? They could indeed be filtering out candidates whose "Unix" experience is limited to Linux.
* The name "UNIX" or "Unix" is trademarked.
* AIX, Solaris and HP-UX are certified Unix systems. These are bonafide Unix systems and there indeed are software developers today who work with these Unix systems.[2]
* The set of Unix-like systems is a superset of the set of Unix systems. The set of Unix-like systems include systems like Linux, FreeBSD, etc. which the set of certified Unix systems do not.
[1]: https://archive.org/details/bstj57-6-1905
[2]: http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/linux-vs-unix-crucial-differenc...
> By decree of The Open Group, the term "UNIX" refers more to a class of operating systems than to a specific implementation of an operating system; those operating systems which meet The Open Group's Single UNIX Specification should be able to bear the UNIX 98 or UNIX 03 trademarks today, after the operating system's vendor pays a substantial certification fee and annual trademark royalties to The Open Group.
But if I were exchanging information with a candidate, what Stanley provides is more than I would expect from a candidate (even from industry; he seems to be a student); that he isn't exactly on the mark should have been fine. If we really wanted exacts, the recruiter had ample opportunity to explain his/her position, but instead, we get nothing. Stanley took the time to both give his view on things, and give a simple layman's answer that conforms to that view when the tech jargon didn't seem to go over well. That he might be technically wrong is incredibly nitpicky, and I am not persuaded that that was the issue the recruiter had.
It still seems like an extremely weird qualification to require, doubly so again for an intern level position: you would still be likely to pass over extremely qualified candidates who just never touched a "UNIX".
Interestingly, MacOS is included in the certified UNIX list. Most of its userspace and a lot of its kernel interfaces come from FreeBSD. So in a way, some of FreeBSD is a certified Unix.
Curiously enough, Oracle just killed Solaris. AIX is old. Is it dead? Last release was in 2015. HP-UX was last released a year ago. My guess is that both of these systems are on their last legs.
I believe that specific distributions of Linux and versions of FreeBSD could both trivially be Unix certified, if someone wanted to waste the money paying SCO for the designation.
Either way, it's a stupid pedantic thing for a recruitor to gate on.
Besides, there are other upsides: you get to work at a company that values developers, you'll have lots of competent colleagues and you'll learn a lot, and you'll work at a product that hundreds of millions of people love.
EDIT: Is it possible that they actually want people with actual UNIX experience? They are recruiting students. Maybe they want someone who has used an actual UNIX system on some kind of emulator for some sort of secret retro initiative.
Facebook asked for actual Linux and Unix experience which indeed many people who have worked on GNU/Linux systems like CentOS, Debian, Ubuntu, etc. and Unix systems like AIX, HP-UX, Solaris, etc. have.