Helpful advice packaged with insults . . .

Mixed Guidance on Recruiting Professionals

Johanna Rothman: Hiring the Best Knowledge Workers, Techies & Nerds
2004, Dorset House, ISBN 0-932633-59-5, 330 pages
reviewed by Conrad Weisert, October, 2004, ©Information Disciplines, Inc.

Shocking title and condescending view

techie

A computer programmer or software technician who has a strong command of the details of hardware and system software. In many organizations this term now has a pejorative connotation, designating a technician who lacks communication skills and a sense of proportion and who, therefore, can't be trusted to exercise mature judgment.

Although techie has appeared occasionally in the trade press as a term of praise, many computer professionals consider it demeaning, and it is best avoided. Earlier synonyms "bit twiddler", "computer jock", and "computer nerd" were similarly considered offensive when applied to a programmer.

Que's Computer Programmer's Dictionary, 1993, ISBN 1-56529-125-5

I was astonished when I saw the gratuitous insults on the cover of this book. How on earth could someone who claims to specialize in recruiting computing professionals, publicly refer to us by such demeaning terms? Should we feel relieved that she refrained from calling us geeks?

Fortunately the actual text doesn't repeat those offensive epithets from the cover. Presumably someone other than the author suggested the title after she had finished writing the book, perhaps figuring that it would appeal to theory-X managers.

Ms. Rothman nevertheless continually exhibits less than sincere respect for people in our profession. Her extensive advice on interviewing assumes that an interview is a one-sided process in which a potential employee ("the candidate") is obliged to respond to interrogation by the potential employer, like a witness in court. For example on page 184:

"Is the candidate hijacking the interview?"
"Leave the last two to five minutes of the interview open for the candidate to ask you questions."

Pluses

Ms. Rothman does offer readers some helpful advice on screening and interviewing.

I firmly support her warning (p. 110f) against overreliance on specific tool and language skills. Far too many recruiting ads, automated résumé screeners, and naïve Human Resources staff exclude some of the best qualified people, either because the applicant chose the wrong term (spreadsheet instead of Excel) or didn't include a specific version number (Java 1.2). Computing professionals, especially at the senior level, learn new tools as a routine part of their work.
Regretably, some of the author's examples violate that advice. For example (p. 43): " . . . if the product is written in Visual C++, you may require someone with some number of years of Visual C++ experience." (Competent programmers with C++ experience on any platform would have little difficulty becoming effective with Microsoft's proprietary Visual C++.)
I also applaud her deemphasis of certification (p. 48), but I wish she had clarified the important distinction between professional certification and vendor certification.
Ms. Rothman gives the prospective interviewer a lot of sound advice on common courtesy. It would be nice if such advice were not needed, but the deterioration of business etiquette is a sad fact.
A bibliography of several dozen references will be of value to the serious recruiter.

and minuses

On the other hand some of her advice undermines her 20-year reputation:

I strongly disagree with Ms. Rothman's assertion that " . . . not everyone can bring in work samples." (p. 137) As I noted in some recent Thoughts on Interviewing a Programmers Candidate everyone you'd consider hiring has something he or she is proud of and is willing if not eager to show you.
I'm quite puzzled and a bit alarmed by this:
"If you don't intend to keep someone around for a long time, you'll need that person to be conscientious about thoroughly documenting what he or she does." (p.12)
On the other hand, if you do intend to keep him or her I suppose . . .
This one (p. 38) makes me wonder how many computing professionals Ms. Rothman actually knows:
"Some candidates like offices with doors . . . Some candidates prefer cubicles or a bullpen office . . . "

Recommended with reservations
(but keep it away from inexperienced managers).

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