Living in the Shadow of a Non-Factor

From Managing Humans, by Rands:

The organization's view of your manager is their view of you.  I'm glad you're a C++ rock star, but the problem is, your manager is passive non-communicator who doesn't take the time to grok the political intruigue that's created by any large group of people.  I see him as a non-factor and you're living in the shadow of a non-factor.

I've seen that very thing happen. 

Movin' On ...

Well, the writing's on the wall for my current employment.  While I'm not moving on right away, it's time to start keeping an eye out for anything interesting.  In many ways, that's just more of the same, since I do that for Toronto Technology Jobs.

In the meantime, I decided this was a good opportunity to resurrect a personal site, so I've been getting the basics together up at geoffreywiseman.ca.

If you're looking, or know someone who is in the Toronto area, drop me a line, either because you're interested in having me take a look for TTJ or because you think I might be a fit.

No Google in Toronto

Someone is always taking the opportunity to talk about how nice it is to work at Google, so I'm always surprised that they don't have a Toronto office (actually, they do have one, but they don't seem to hire software developers). Although I don't have the stats to back it up, Toronto's probably got the most software developers of any Canadian city, but ... no Google. Why is that, exactly?

Hey, Google, open a Toronto office. :)

Referral: The Most Honest Feedback

When I recommend someone to work at my company, it's because I've worked with that person before and I actively want to do so again. That's probably the single-most clear, honest and positive feedback I can give to any previous colleague.

Because, let's face it, everyone has some good qualities and some bad ones. If I say something nice about you, I probably mean it, but it doesn't mean that you don't have bad qualities that counterbalance and overwhelm the positive. Whereas if I refer you to a company at which I work, I've weighed all those factors one against the other, and I've decided that, in the balance, I'd still like to work with you.

If a potential employer asks me about someone with whom I've worked, I'll try and give balanced feedback that includes the things I like about that person's work and things I disliked, or found to be challenges. Most of the time, I'll emphasize the positive, but I'll still try and give something from both sides. I don't want to bad-mouth that person, but I do want the employer to get a sense of what the tradeoff is. That said, if that potential employer isn't my employer, I'm not going to push too hard. Even if I don't want to work with that person again, it doesn't mean that I don't want them to find employment anywhere. In fact, I'd prefer them to find employment elsewhere, because that guarantees they won't seek employment with me.

Most people want to be nice, to be perceived as nice by others and by themselves. And as long as being nice doesn't have a direct cost, most people are willing to do so. So if I've worked with someone, and I don't want to work with that person again, doesn't mean I'm not willing to comment on your good sides (and bad) to a potential employer, and let them make up their own mind. If the employer is using different criteria than I am (or isn't listening very closely to what I say), they may end up wanting to hire that person. So much the better; if there's a fit, that's good for everyone.

But if my employer is asking, I have to ask myself, "Do I want to work with this person?" If the answer is no, then I'm going to do my best to make sure that my employer understands that, even if I use the nicest possible terms to get the job done, "Joe is a great guy; friendly, works hard. I'm not sure he's ever going to be a great programmer. He can get stuff done, but he doesn't seem to really have that design sense that you need to be really good, and I just didn't see any sign that he was getting any better as time went on. I'd probably pass." It's honest, it's direct, and most employers will make the right call if you're being that direct. (I've never worked with a developer named Joe; he's just an example).

If another company were asking about Joe, I might be a little less direct. "Joe is a great guy, friendly, works hard. He wasn't in a senior role when I worked with him; I'm not really sure I can picture him in that role, but I haven't worked with him for a few years, so he may have taken on new responsibilities and skills since I worked with him." This is much more non-committal; a really astute observer might ask some probing questions that I'd answer more or less honestly and get to the heart of the matter, but most people would stop there, and draw their own conclusions.

This is probably why, in part, referred employees tend to be better than the ones that come through regular employment channels. Because the referrers have pre-filtered their past colleagues through the "Do I want to work with that person again?" question, and anyone they refer has passed the test. And despite this fact (or, rather, because of it), it's probably a good idea not to make referral bonuses too high: you don't want to get to the point where the incentive to refer outstrips the incentive to avoid referring people with whom you don't want to work.

So, if I've ever referred you to a company at which I've worked, and they've hired you, take heart, that means I'm willing to work with you again, and said good things about you, and that puts you in the upper tier of people I've worked with. It's probably the most unambiguous feedback you could get from me. And if any of you choose to refer me in the future, I think I'll take that as a high compliment.

The Feedroom

For those of you who haven't had a chance to come visit me at the new office yet ...



Welcome to The Feedroom Toronto, courtesy of my cellphone.

The Feedroom

I guess now the news is out 'internally', I can let the cat out of the bag here: I'm moving on from Exchange Solutions to The Feedroom. Excited and nervous, both, but looking forward to a change.

It's always hard for me to move on; I try not to take jobs I can't get invested in, and having invested of myself in a project and a company, it's a hard thing to separate. So, I'm leaving behind a bit of an extended family for another one. Fingers crossed.

How to Recruit Developers: Attractive Job Postings

Most job postings for software development jobs are terrible. Completely unredeemable. In the last ten years, I can count the number of interesting job postings I've seen in Toronto on my hands (and, yes, I have the normal number of fingers).

Your job posting is your first point of contact with potential candidates: your first chance to market yourself, to make your case. This posting can increase the odds that really great software developers will apply to your company, or it can ruin them. If you fail at this (and I can tell you, most companies do), you've seriously damaged your chances at attracting a good-to-great developer.

Who's Watching?
You can group the pool of potential candidates into three broad areas:

• Desperate Job-Hunters
• Job-Hunters
• The Curious

Desperate job-hunters are developers who really, really need a job. They haven't worked in the industry, or they're already between jobs, of they have a job they really hate, writing RPG or MUMPS. You can't drive these people away with a stick. If they're completely unqualified, but think there's any chance in hell of even getting in the front door for an interview, they'll apply.

Job-hunters are looking for a job, but they aren't desperate. These are developers that probably already have a job they can live with, but they're out looking for a different one. They'll read your posting, and if it looks interesting, they'll apply.

The curious are developers who aren't looking for a job, or who tell themselves that they aren't. They've got a job that they're content with, but they're willing to consider an opportunity. They're keeping an eye on the market, or looking for exciting opportunities, or just have a friend who fits one of these three categories. These people are the hardest to attract, and are likely to respond to postings only if they're seriously intriguing.

Desperate job-hunters will track you down. You'll need to work a little to reach the job-hunters, and you'd need to work hard to reach the curious. Interestingly, I suspect that the groups that are harder to reach also contain a higher percentage of good and great developers, because these people generally find good jobs and are able to keep them.

So: here's what you have to gain by writing a great job posting. You'll increase the odds of reaching a wider audience, and more great developers. You can hook them, catch their interest, and maybe, just maybe, get them to apply. Once they apply, your chances of hiring the best candidates go way, way up.

How to Repel Software Developers
Having seen a lot of incredibly bad postings, it's very easy to point out some of the flaws inherent in many job postings:

• Don't Describe The Job
• Don't Describe Yourself
  
• Describe the Candidate as a Commodity
  

If you accept a position, you're going to spend at least a third of your day (almost half the waking hours) at your new job. Most people are going to want to know how they're going to spend that time. The people who don't are probably just looking for a job, any job. Many positions don't describe the job at all. If you want to keep some details private, that's understandable, but share as much as you can. Help your potential new employee be excited about the opportunity in front of him or her.

After the job, the next thing a candidate will want to know is something about the company. You can either try and tell them something about the company in the posting, or direct them to public information about yourself, like a website. Either way, it helps to give context, to give some idea of what you do, what the job's about, and with whom you'll be sharing your work-life.

Finally, it's great if you can tell the candidate what you're looking for without describing them as a commodity. A 'resource', or someone with five bullet-point skill classifications. What kind of person are you looking for? Do they need a passion for development? Does it help to have a background in medicine? Outside interests? These help the candidate to see themselves in the position, rather than see the job as generic.

I've noticed over the years that these flaws are extremely common in recruiter postings. I'm not sure if this is a desire to keep the candidate and the company from finding each other without the recruiter's help, but it's a great way to make a posting seem extremely generic. If you must work with a middleman, see if you can get them to avoid the above flaws. Some sites seem to encourage or accept these more than others. Workpolis.com shows a lot more of these generic postings than monster.ca.

Here are some examples of job postings that exhibit these characteristics: "J2EE Developer", "Java Developer". You don't want your postings to look like these.

What's the Alternative?
So what should you do instead? Describe the job. Describe the company. Explain what you're looking for in a candidate. Make it sound fun, exciting. If you're using neat technology, tell us about it. If you're trying to save the world, include that. Maybe include your answers to the Joel Test. This is your chance, so make it good.

What do good postings look like? This is better. It's not brilliant, but it's better. It talks about the company, the project, the approach. It uses a few selling points about the technology and team.

And what about Tim Fennell, who wants to know what they're doing wrong at the Broad Institute? I don't think the posting's bad. It's a little dense, and it doesn't describe the Broad Institute in detail. It could be presented in a more polished, more accessible manner but the basics are all there.

There are a lot of ways to attract good software developers, but if your posting doesn't get those points across, they may never get far enough to notice.