Subject: What kind of language in job ads and "Jobs" section in corporate Web sites would attract us?

From: Omer Zak <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2004 17:47:11 +0200 (EET)

Suppose you are an Entrepreneur with a Bright Idea.
To implement the Bright Idea, you need either 3 Hackers or 20 Mediocre
Programmers.

Most Entrepreneurs make a Business Plan calling for investment to cover
the expenses of employing 20 Mediocre Programmers.

You prefer to try a different approach.  You want to try to attract three
Hackers.  Then you pay each triple the salary of a Mediocre Programmer,
and still enjoy 55% reduction in the size of the required investment.

How would you go about this?

The questions are:
1. What to write in a job ad to encourage Hackers to reply and discourage
   Mediocre Programmers?
   Of course, a list of the current buzzwords is not the right approach,
   because Hackers would learn and master any buzzword needed for the
   current project (within reasonable limits).
2. What to write in your corporate Web site's "Jobs" page?
3. What profile to give to headhunters to match against suitable
   candidates?

It is assumed that your interviewing process has already been fine-tuned
and serves you well in separating out Hackers from the horde of Mediocre
Programmers.  So your only concern is to pre-filter Mediocre Programmers
before having to interview them.

An example answer to question 3:
In headhunters' profile, you might require the candidates to have some
experience in either Perl or Python (two obscure programming languages,
not taught in university, and therefore people, who, learn them on their
own and use them in their work - would probably qualify).  You might also
require candidates to have proof they enjoy programming (for example, in
the form of contributing to a Free Software project).

                                             --- Omer
My opinions, as expressed in this E-mail message, are mine alone.
They do not represent the official policy of any organization with which
I may be affiliated in any way.
WARNING TO SPAMMERS:  at http://www.zak.co.il/spamwarning.html

---

From: Eugene Teo <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 27 Jan 2004 01:08:02 +0800

<quote sender="Omer Zak">
> 2. What to write in your corporate Web site's "Jobs" page?

Do not write. Post a challenge that is related to the job scope.
Example (my friend's company): http://www.metaparadigm.com/jobs/001/
I heard that he even timed the duration you took to view the page,
and submit the answer based on your ip, but of course, that may not
be accurate.

Eugene
-- 
Eugene TEO  <eugeneteo at eugeneteo.net>  <http://www.anomalistic.org/>
1024D/14A0DDE5 print D851 4574 E357 469C D308  A01E 7321 A38A 14A0 DDE5
main(i) { putchar(182623909 >> (i-1) * 5&31|!!(i<7)<<6) && main(++i); }

---

From: Shlomi Fish <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 26 Jan 2004 18:52:36 +0200

> the expenses of employing 20 Mediocre Programmers.

Heh heh. Perhaps.

> 3. What profile to give to headhunters to match against suitable

I suppose I will put there knowledge of Linux, because a large number of 
potential hackers have already discovered Linux or heard about it. I recall a 
job ad for Siftology Ltd back in the days it was still existed that went 
something like that:

<<<
Looking for bright programmers with knowledge in the following areas:
Perl, Python, PHP, Tcl, Lex, Yacc, C, C++, and other stuff.

That quite intrigued me on why they were looking for knowledge in all of these 
things. What I would put would be:

1. Knowledge of Linux or UNIX.

2. Some experience in Perl or Python or a similar language.

3. Knowledge of HTML. (HTML is very easy to learn, so even starting hackers 
should have invested time to learn it.)

4. Some proven experience in an open source project.

> before having to interview them.

Well, you can look at their C.V's and see what they say about themselves. Do 
they mention that they worked on an open source project? Do they have 
experience in Linux? Do they know HTML? Do they mention other accomplishments 
besides computers?

After all - you only need three such hackers, so you can simply filter out a 
lot of hackers with misleading resumes. However, you probably will end up 
interviewing some mediocre programmers, you just wish to make sure there will 
not be too many of them.

Regards,

	Shlomi Fish

-- 

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Shlomi Fish      [email-masked]
Homepage: http://t2.technion.ac.il/~shlomif/

I don't believe in fairies. Oops! A fairy died.
I don't believe in fairies. Oops! Another fairy died.