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posted by janrinok on Monday October 10 2016, @04:37PM   Printer-friendly
from the if-only... dept.

There is an interview with Joel Spolsky on GeekWire which reports that companies should Just shut up and let your devs concentrate:

If you want to attract and keep developers, don't emphasize ping-pong tables, lounges, fire pits and chocolate fountains. Give them private offices or let them work from home, because uninterrupted time to concentrate is the most important and scarcest commodity.

That's the view of Joel Spolsky, CEO of Stack Overflow, a popular Q&A site for programmers, who spoke this morning at the GeekWire Summit in Seattle.

"Facebook's campus in Silicon Valley is an 8-acre open room, and Facebook was very pleased with itself for building what it thought was this amazing place for developers," Spolsky said in an interview with GeekWire co-founder Todd Bishop. "But developers don't want to overhear conversations. That's ideal for a trading floor, but developers need to concentrate, to go to a chatroom and ask questions and get the answers later. Facebook is paying 40-50 percent more than other places, which is usually a sign developers don't want to work there."

[Continues...]

Spolsky, who in 2011 created project-management software Trello, said the "Joel Test" that he created 16 years ago is still a valid way for developers to evaluate prospective employers. It's a list of 12 yes-no questions, with one point given for every "yes" answer:

  1. Do you use source control?
  2. Can you make a build in one step?
  3. Do you make daily builds?
  4. Do you have a bug database?
  5. Do you fix bugs before writing new code?
  6. Do you have an up-to-date schedule?
  7. Do you have a spec?
  8. Do programmers have quiet working conditions?
  9. Do you use the best tools money can buy?
  10. Do you have testers?
  11. Do new candidates write code during their interview?
  12. Do you do hallway usability testing?

"The truth is that most software organizations are running with a score of 2 or 3, and they need serious help, because companies like Microsoft run at 12 full-time," Spolsky said when he created the test. He said that remains true today.

How well does your organization support its developers? If new or better equipment would improve your productivity, is it made available to you? How is your work environment? How well does your organization score on the 12-point "Joel Test"? What is the biggest thing blocking your company from improving?


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @07:48PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @07:48PM (#412604)

    Plenty of other job postings if you don't think it's worth your time or effort.

    Actually no, there aren't plenty of other job postings. It's a buyer's market out there and you know it. When there are hundreds of unemployed tech workers to every job opening, there's a shortage of job postings. Stop pretending jobs should be easy to find just because you have a job right now. Your applicants do not want to fucking hear about how lucky the interviewer is. The real waste of time here is when desperate applicants bother talking to a narcissistic asshole interviewer like you.

  • (Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Monday October 10 2016, @10:17PM

    by q.kontinuum (532) on Monday October 10 2016, @10:17PM (#412669) Journal

    Last time I looked for a job was 6 years ago. At that time I heard the same complaints from others about how hard it was to find a job. It took me a some months to find something suitable. (Luckily I wasn't unemployed, I can imagine it is harder to find a job if you are. First of all because it affects the self-confidence, second because the prospective employer might find an employed candidate more appealing; a candidate who does currently draw a salary must be good, otherwise he wouldn't get a salary, yes?)

    But after 2-3 months, I had 5 job offers on the table, contracts signed by my counter-part. Three of them quite nice, one was abysmal. Two of the nicer once required a relocation, but the employer was willing to pay for it. The third one was close enough I wouldn't have to relocate. Fourth one was close as well, interesting work (anti-virus software, including analysis of new malware, work on heuristics to detect new malware without known signature etc.) but salary didn't match my expectations. Fifth one was ok salary, but otherwise abysmal work-conditions (fixed salary for expected 40h per week, but component I would have worked on was a neuralgic part of the infrastructure, and in case of failure it was expected to do whatever it takes, without payment for overtime, and without consideration for vacation or weekend. Only one person working on the component, no substitutes, no backup.)

    In our current company our team does not currently hire, but I know several other teams do. I also know that several of them have severe problems to find qualified candidates.

    --
    Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
    • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @10:39PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @10:39PM (#412685)

      Let me update you for 2016, jobful winner. Out here in the world, there are jobless losers who have been unemployed for the past eight years, who were laid off right after you Obama voters voted in the Obama, who were purged from the workforce along with everyone who refused to vote for Obama. Racism is the only possible reason for refusing to vote for Obama, and there are millions of unemployed losers who must be racists otherwise why else would they be unemployed? Nobody wants a racist. Racists are unqualified to live in the Obamanation. Why can't the racists just fuck off and die already.

      • (Score: 2) by q.kontinuum on Monday October 10 2016, @10:42PM

        by q.kontinuum (532) on Monday October 10 2016, @10:42PM (#412687) Journal

        "Us Obama voters"? If at all, I'd be a Merkel-voter, which I'm not. I voted for the pirate party.

        --
        Registered IRC nick on chat.soylentnews.org: qkontinuum
  • (Score: 2, Disagree) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday October 10 2016, @10:24PM

    by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Monday October 10 2016, @10:24PM (#412676) Homepage Journal

    Oh please. Nobody who truly wants a job stays unemployed. If you've been out of work for more than a couple months, you either don't want a job or you are a whiny, picky, entitled little bastard that nobody in their right mind would want to hire anyway.

    --
    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @10:55PM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @10:55PM (#412691)

      And what is every whiny, picky, entitled little bastard who truly wants a job supposed to do? Oh right. Die in the gutter.

      Fuck you, asshole.

      • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:21AM

        by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:21AM (#412739) Homepage Journal

        Get hungry enough that they get less whiny, picky, and entitled and start acting like responsible human beings.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.
        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @04:14AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @04:14AM (#412805)

          I recall a comment where you referred to shitstain employees. You sir are an asshole, and everything and everyone you touch will become shitstained. So many people are struggling, with a recent story about precisely that thing, and here you have the bootstrapping gall to insult hard working g good people.

          Good job, maybe its time to leave this site or at least stop reading the comments and just enjoy the nerdy news filtering by the submitter. Seeing the inner thoughts of what probably represents a good portion of humanity just gets me depressed, and the not-so-funny part of that is people like you probably would say "good go kill yourself then sniveling rat." Sadly that mentality of treading over others seems to be all the rage, and unless something changes it will lead humanity into the next horrific chapter instead of the prosperous reality that is currently possible.

          • (Score: 1, Flamebait) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday October 11 2016, @10:08AM

            by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Tuesday October 11 2016, @10:08AM (#412871) Homepage Journal

            You sir are an asshole

            You, sir, are correct. But that's not what pisses you off. What pisses you off is I believe in personal responsibility and accountability and those scare the hell out of you. Tough titties, sweet cheeks. This is what we call being an adult.

            --
            My rights don't end where your fear begins.
            • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @12:03PM

              by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @12:03PM (#412907)

              No, what pisses people off is that you're an asshole about it.

        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @04:28AM

          by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @04:28AM (#412811)

          Responsible human beings? How does that enter into unemployment? Oh right, only people with successful careers are decent human beings. Pay no mind to reality, or to the fact that accepting a job below your skill level greatly hurts future prospects. They're all lazy good for nothings because you have been successfully brainwashed by the greatest pyramid scheme yet devised.

          • (Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday October 11 2016, @10:06AM

            by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Tuesday October 11 2016, @10:06AM (#412870) Homepage Journal

            Responsible human beings? How does that enter into unemployment?

            A responsible human being does not allow themselves to remain unemployed if they have responsibilities to meet like feeding themselves and their family.

            the fact that accepting a job below your skill level greatly hurts future prospects.

            You say fact, I say bullshit.

            They're all lazy good for nothings because you have been successfully brainwashed by the greatest pyramid scheme yet devised.

            Thanks for the salt, my eggs were kind of bland this morning. So you're calling doing what it takes to meet your responsibilities a pyramid scheme now? What an entitled prick you are. DIAF.

            --
            My rights don't end where your fear begins.
    • (Score: 4, Informative) by TheGratefulNet on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:36AM

      by TheGratefulNet (659) on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:36AM (#412743)

      fuck you.

      I was out of work for more than half a year and I was willing to do MOST things that ego-based coders would not.

      the lack of jobs is real and the hiring process is against you if you are not currently employed.

      again, go fuck yourself. the fact that you have had an easy time getting jobs does not mean that I didn't want one or wasn't willing to do nearly anything to get one!

      asshole. yes, these are fighting words and while I'm not a fighter, I'd sock you in the face for saying what you said, if you said it to me.

      many of us want jobs and the job market is against us. its a FACT.

      I actually hope you lose your job and are out for a year. it would serve you right, mate.

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
      • (Score: 1, Offtopic) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:46AM

        by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Tuesday October 11 2016, @01:46AM (#412747) Homepage Journal

        Who said it was easy for me? I fully expect to have to take a job that's beneath me when I get tired of burning through my savings and go back to work. You certainly won't hear me whining about it though.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @03:07AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @03:07AM (#412779)

        If you voted for Johnson then the invisible hand would grab you by the pussy and put you to work on the best jobs. The best.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @09:03AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday October 11 2016, @09:03AM (#412855)

      Oh sure, if you truly want a job, McD is always hiring.

      But the discussion was about tech jobs jobs.

      Claiming that there are no tech jobs in a discussion about tech jobs does not make one a whiny, picky, entitle little bastard. One can even take the job at McD and still say there is no tech jobs.

      • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday October 11 2016, @09:51AM

        by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Tuesday October 11 2016, @09:51AM (#412865) Homepage Journal

        WTF are you even talking about? Get a tech job that you're overqualified and underpaid for. It's what the rest of the world outside tech has been having to do for a long time rather than be unemployed.

        --
        My rights don't end where your fear begins.
  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @10:47PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 10 2016, @10:47PM (#412689)

    Perhaps where you are. Where I am there's a chronic shortage of tech workers and you can get a coding job fairly easily. I still went through two interviews to get my job. Admittedly not much on the technical side as the company's stance is that any competent coder should be capable of picking up C# quickly. Well, and I had someone in the company vouch for my abilities so there's that, too.

    Still, I'd appreciate a company doing its due diligence when hiring me. In a seller's market (or a balanced one) the pre-hiring process is as much about you getting a feel for how the company works as it is about the company getting a feel for you. A company that cares about how I work and how to make that fit in with the rest of the team is a company where I can expect to be relatively safe from things like clashing personalities, arguments about proper style or absurdly rigid conventions that must never be deviated from.

    Besides, a process as described by the GP keeps out bums who speak the language but have no idea on how to write maintainable code. I once worked as the successor to one such guy and inherited fun things like a 3000 line blob of nested if/then/else/goto that was the main() function of a crucial do-everything application. The first half year of that job was spent refactoring everything so I even knew what I was looking at and then ripping out the unsalvageable parts and rewriting them from scratch. Not fun. So I appreciate a hiring process that keeps people like that at bay or at least hires them into positions where they can't do much harm.

    Now, if you're in an extremely overrun job market all of that doesn't help as you have to take literally any job you can get. But still that doesn't make the interviewer an asshole just because they're making sure that they're hiring someone who fits in well with the team. It sucks that you have to spend a lot of time jumping through hoops but that shouldn't mean that companies should hire people based on a gut feeling.

  • (Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday October 11 2016, @10:25AM

    by TheRaven (270) on Tuesday October 11 2016, @10:25AM (#412884) Journal
    There's a shortage of jobs across the workforce as a whole, but for competent (or even mostly competent) programmers? No. I still get quite frequent pings asking if I've changed my mind about wanting a new job or if I know anyone I'd recommend from people I've previously worked with in several large and small companies. They're all offering more money than I'm getting now (though not as much fun) and finding it hard to fill the places.
    --
    sudo mod me up