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Comment by EricScottTaylor | Hacker News Reader

Full disclosure, I work for HackerRank, but I really wanted to comment for two reasons:

(1) Reading this article and seeing the comments, really helps me see how my daily work helps level the playing field and as Alibek says, change people's lives. Very fulfilling and thankful for that.

(2) Re: exabrial's comment above, where do you think culture fit should be evaluated in the process? Lots of interview processes today deal with culture fit at the end, but should it be item 1 and then coding skill item 2?

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My answer to #2:

Being from the midwest, doing interviews in silicon valley was like stepping into Charlie's Chocolate Factory at a few places in LA and SF. It made me smile to see people using their freedom to do whatever they wanted, but I really felt like -I- was being judged: you know for not wearing skinning jeans, feeling comfortable in my (literal) boots, being clean shaven, dressed in a long sleeve, and of course I have a soft spoken midwestern accent. You can't fake sincerity, and despite knocking the coding interviews out of the park, I felt like some (not all) of the interviewers were threatened by me somehow and mocked me gently with "well you did a really good job despite..." like they were talking to a three year old.

Really left a sour taste in my mouth how it seems the region preaches equality and acceptance, but that's only equality and acceptance of the non-traditional.

TL;DR: It's easy to say "We have a great culture" at your job if you hire hipsters homogeneously. The company I want to work for is color blind: we grow to appreciate each other. People of all walks, western, eastern, european, russian, christian, cat worshipper, whatever, just respect each other believe something different and learn how to communicate across these boundaries.

I thought the common stereotype is that most 'hipsters' are from the midwest? Go to any gentrifying neighborhood on the east or west coast and a common refrain is 'go back to Ohio!'.

That's so funny- I've been living on the west coast for around 6 years now, and I originally hail from Ohio (but mostly Colorado).

But, I'm decidedly not a hipster; no flannel, no beard, no skinny jeans, no boots, the sides of my head aren't shaved. I always had the impression that the hipsters were native to the west coast and it's always felt like I'm encroaching on their territory.

Do you think it could partially be in your head and that all of LA/SF don't actually have a problem with a person with your background? This is not to say it's your fault, but to say that you could have more influence over these situations.

Most of the time people will pick up on someone's anxiety, lack of comfort or confidence, and start feeling uncomfortable in response. It's not really a personal thing, but it's hard for anyone to feel at ease in such situations.

Take two different people who have anxiety due to superficial differences, that wouldn't matter if they knew each other better, and that anxiety will likely magnify unless one person can break out of that mindset.

It's better to avoid simple explanations that rely on some sort of fundamental attribution error, because you'll come up with better solutions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fundamental_attribution_error

Definitely not just him. I've seen this behavior play out at companies I've worked at from hiring employees. They code it like, "he didn't seem very passionate or enthusiastic." I take a look at the candidate and they're not dressed super trendily and their hair is kinda plain. But I read their code and it's just as good as any good candidate's. It's bullshit and I recommend anyone who's not seeing it check their "culture fit" criteria.

> Lots of interview processes today deal with culture fit at the end, but should it be item 1 and then coding skill item 2?

Culture fit should be focused on areas of professional interest, general preferred work modes, and possibly professional ethos (e.g. you're a big open source shop, are they an advocate?).

Many interviewers and companies think culture fit applies to non-professional aspects like do they like bicycles, wear the same clothes, like the same music. Unfortunately, this is easily filtered through unconscious and unintentional racial, gender, and age biases because what the interviewer is really doing is determining if the candidate is "like me".

It's the second interpretation that annoys and intimidates candidates and is probably a root cause to much of the diversity issues faced by the tech industry.

Given the trend I'm starting to see in my peer group of (non-asian) minority developers having difficulty finding work at their skill level or with appropriate compensation combined with the number of white developers I know who get turned down and told things "well, you just don't look like a developer" because they aren't frat-bro/hipster enough, I think that matching culture fit at the end instead of the beginning is (consciously or unconsciously) because people don't want to get sued.

You can always say that some other candidate was 'objectively better' if you bring everyone in and give them a bunch of arbitrary challenges to complete.

Except when the person you don't really want is objectively best at your arbitrary challenges. Then you just send that person home and pretend they didn't exist, apparently.

If I wanted to make suing companies my job, I would have been a lawyer. I'm not going to sue you, even if you deserve it. It takes too much effort. What you should really be afraid of is me posting such a negative interview report on Glassdoor that you start having trouble finding candidates who want to talk to you, and then going to interview with your competitors.

> (e.g. you're a big open source shop, are they an advocate?).

After reading this a few times I think you meant to say "you're a big open-source advocate; are they an open-source shop?" or something similar.

Huh?

On another inspection I was probably confused by the use of "they" and figured "you" was supposed to be the applicant and not the company.

I feel like "culture fit" is more often than not just an excuse to only hire people who are like you demographically. I mean, that doesn't mean you need to hire a screaming, unpleasant jerk, or anything, but still.

It's a weasel word. It means nothing at all.

As I mentioned to coworkers a while ago, at this point in my career I am extremely reluctant to reject a candidate for "culture" reasons. It's a nebulous and nearly completely meaningless term, which allows all sorts of terrible prejudice to sneak in under a guise of quasi-objectivity.

We have a job that needs doing, and we evaluate whether candidates can perform in that position. Period.

This comment doesn't appear at all troll-like -- not sure why it was flagged.

If you work for the site, do you think you could get the it fixed? The social media buttons obscure the text and zoom is disabled for some reason so it's impossible to read.

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