Re:Before brogramming, table flipping, and beyond
by jdietrich on Monday January 18, 2016 @07:06PM
(#10927991)
The two most toxic words in the history of tech - "culture fit".
Young, smart hackers came to believe that it is not just acceptable to exclusively hire people who look and act like them, but imperative for the survival of their company. Unconscious discrimination is inevitable when you hire based on nebulous factors of compatibility rather than concrete measures of ability.
When a founder hires in this way, they create an immense obstacle to diversity. The company grows on this ethos, creating barriers both direct ("she isn't a good fit") and indirect ("I don't want to work in this frathouse"). Improving diversity in these companies is like steering an oil tanker.
In my opinion, we need a new hiring norm that reflects the hacker ethos. We need to abandon the multi-day interview gauntlet and replace it with a fair, blinded work assessment. Classical music has seen a boom in diversity since the introduction of blind auditions and we should follow suit. Everything a developer does can be fairly and accurately assessed through IRC and Git commits.
Young, smart hackers came to believe that it is not just acceptable to exclusively hire people who look and act like them, but imperative for the survival of their company. Unconscious discrimination is inevitable when you hire based on nebulous factors of compatibility rather than concrete measures of ability.
When a founder hires in this way, they create an immense obstacle to diversity. The company grows on this ethos, creating barriers both direct ("she isn't a good fit") and indirect ("I don't want to work in this frathouse"). Improving diversity in these companies is like steering an oil tanker.
In my opinion, we need a new hiring norm that reflects the hacker ethos. We need to abandon the multi-day interview gauntlet and replace it with a fair, blinded work assessment. Classical music has seen a boom in diversity since the introduction of blind auditions and we should follow suit. Everything a developer does can be fairly and accurately assessed through IRC and Git commits.