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Comment by Ologn | Hacker News Reader

He only had a BSCS from Stanford and had been a VP of Engineering at Yahoo leading over 300 engineers. Facebook turned him away, and as someone else mentioned here, Twitter.

It kind of puts in perspective that blog post from yesterday that claimed companies in Silicon Valley can't find rock star ninja engineers ( https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7259845 ).

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This isn't all that unusual. Most people realize that hiring processes are really random. In some ways just hiring anyone who applies, firing them after 90 days if they don't work out, and keeping track of who has been through once is probably a better system overall.

The recent work on how SAT scores don't predict college success is similar. There is a huge amount of influence around 'fit' and environment. Some people just "click" and some people don't. Genius rock star programmers that don't click are poor employees, and some times former washouts that do click are your key hires. Hard to predict.

> This isn't all that unusual. Most people realize that hiring processes are really random. In some ways just hiring anyone who applies, firing them after 90 days if they don't work out, and keeping track of who has been through once is probably a better system overall.

"EMPLOYERS: avoid employing unlucky people by immediately tossing half the CVs in the bin" - Viz top tip.

I'll have to remember that one :-) But on a more serious note, its been interesting to see the different sort of talent location ideas that have emerged. So I person I met a long time a go as a production assistant for the TV series Robotica was trying to come up with a new series and I suggested "American Hacker" where folks would go on the show and compete for a spot at Facebook or something. His comment though was pretty funny which was "That won't work Chuck because too many people are like you and they don't care about being on TV, you really need people who will cut off their own leg if you promise to put them on during prime time." Which was a sad sad commentary.

Things like the Stripe CTF contests are good recruiting tools, hackathons kinda sorta, resume scanning and the 5 - 10 person interview panel? Hard to get repeatable results.

> I'll have to remember that one :-)

Also hilarialously wortwhile is the C. Northcotte Parkinson take "The Short List, or Principles of Selection" (e.g. https://www.google.com/search?q=c.+northcote+parkinson+candi... )

that's a great one. going to have to use that one.

"The recent work on how SAT scores don't predict college success is similar."

What do you mean? SAT predicts GPA pretty well and it predicts it better for harder than easier subjects.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3090148/

SAT predicts GPA better for high ability subjects: Implications for Spearman’s Law of Diminishing Returns Thomas Coyle,a, Anissa Snyder,a David Pillow,a and Peter Kochunovb

Abstract This research examined the predictive validity of the SAT (formerly, the Scholastic Aptitude Test) for high and low ability groups. SAT scores and college GPAs were obtained from the 1997 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth. Subjects were classified as high or low ability by g factor scores from the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery. SAT correlations with GPA were higher for high than low ability subjects. SAT g loadings (i.e., SAT correlations with g) were equivalent for both groups. This is the first study to show that the predictive validity of the SAT varies for ability groups that differ in g. The results contradict a presumption, based on Spearman’s Law of Diminishing Returns, that a test’s predictive validity should be lower for high ability subjects. Further research is needed to identify factors that contribute to the predictive validity of the SAT for groups that differ in g.

FWIW this is the news story that triggered the SAT comment: http://abclocal.go.com/kabc/story?section=news/national_worl... the folks at Pitzer have been running the 'ignore them' test for a while now.

I think this has more to do with detail orientedness and hard work. I thought I could take the SAT without any prep. Lol. If there is one important thing for a higher schooler to do, it is to master that test.

It almost makes him a folk hero for anyone else running up against the "cultural fit" barrier.

I think that would be an incorrect way of reading it. At his level, he would be negotiating executive responsibility and a huge salary. I'm sure any of these companies would love to have had him as a "senior engineer".

"Stanford right across the street... that must be pretty handy for recruiting efforts." - Me
"Hah! Yeah, we hire them to answer our phones." - Them

It does sound difficult to find someone who has an engineering degree, a stadium-touring band and practices ninpo.

I've known quite a few programmers that really should have access to the types of resources these big companies command; but just end up in situations simply paying the bills.

To be fair, we don't know what position he was interviewing for at Facebook.

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