This is what non-technical recruitment idiots will do when they need a “Web Developer” to handle enhancements and maintenance to corporate ASP.Net based systems:

1. Place advertisements packed with buzzwords that they don’t even understand. If you are in the market for a technical role and you find these ads packed with fluff such as “we need to elevate our technical synergies in a corporate sense” etc - beware! Most likely a senior person that has bubbled their way up to that role after a very large number of years working in the same place, rather than because they actually know anything real.
2. Some existing technical employee told them that the systems they have are in ASP.Net, so that’s the only word the recruitment idiot needs to know. They run a selection process and the person who includes the term “ASP.Net” in their CV, selection criteria (If a government position) and in the interview will most certainly score the position. This is because the recruitment idiot doesn’t know what “ASP.Net” even is, so it comforts them if they get someone who can handle that territory for them.

Oh no - what a disaster.

I recently ran a couple of selection panels for web developers, who would primarily be developing in ASP.Net and this is what I did:

1. Took “ASP.Net” as simply one possible language that an all-rounder would be able to quickly understand and use to develop web applications, just like any other platform.
2. Was very pedantic probing applicants in areas of leadership and teamwork. These are critical. Existing staff are always going to leave, you want future leaders in absolutely any role. You need people who will get on with everyone in the team. You can teach an intelligent monkey how to cut out the same old code in ASP.Net.
3. Looked for a technical all-rounder. It was far more important to me to find someone who knew fluent XHTML, CSS, a bit of PHP, a bit of SQL, competent in Java, some Cold Fusion for instance, rather than someone who has memorised ASP.Net since the beta release date. Honestly, you just don’t want one of these narrow 1 language people. I’m sure they are gurus in their area, but in any role, people are going to come across integration challenges and need to have all kinds of open views to be able to be the most flexible developer they can be.
4. Took the written side of applications very seriously. If you can’t string a sentence together without proper grammar, how can you be expected to be organised in any role or especially push out structured, logical code as a developer? A lot of public servants have an attitude of “Oh well, I’m sure they were busy, its just a mistake - let’s still interview them”. Rubbish - Not if I’m part of the interview panel, and definately not when I’m chairing the panel. You just can’t throw money at people who don’t deserve it. Its survival of the fittest and Canberra suffers too much from providing extra handouts to the non-deserving. The sad reality is that a lot of internal handouts are dished out between those who have soft spots for the lazy. But again, not when I’m involved on the panel.

The result: Well I got a real open-minded, highly capable developer. A strong all rounder who would look people in the face, work reliably, politely, and had a very open approach to development and things in general. Someone who I knew was much better than existing staff who had memorised “ASP.Net” simply because they’d been doing it for a while.

This particular developer knew a handful of approx 5 different langauges, but needed to gain experience specifically with ASP.Net. But you have to look at that as no big deal at all. I mean that is nothing. The guy has obviously proven he can program in most other languages, so why couldn’t he spend a few weeks making links from the ones he knows over to yet another language named “ASP.Net”. Much more important than that is having a personality, being driven, reliable, a team worker and a potential future leader etc. Right - makes sense to me too.

Anyway, I apply for money to send this guy on an ASP.Net course, and actually 2 separate courses get approved - great. Not cheap by any means, but dangle the total cost along side the guy’s salary and you’re not increasing the whole picture by much at all. Its a deadset investment. You’re forking out some money from the government slush funds to actually put it to a really smart use. A future investment of getting someone already smart, to be specifically tweaked for the environment he will be working in. Kind of a kick start making the jump across languages quicker, and time allows for productivity.

In this particular example, I left the particular organisation, and in a way, this particular employee was under my wing - really fitting in with how I saw the area expanding and evolving. A short while later there was pressure from above about spending this couple of thousand dollars on the above mentioned course. That bottled up into an attitude of “Why do we have employees that don’t know exactly “languageX version 1.298457458459″ (i.e. ASP.Net). Which then bottled up into pressure towards the particular developer, specifically dragging him into a room and probing him about why he doesn’t know ASP.Net fluently backwards in the first month or two, which I would have normally absorbed and responded to as his manager, eliminating any unnecessary panic. Not long after, the developer feels like he doesn’t need to fight an uphill battle coming to work every single day and voluntarily resigns.

What an utter waste of Government money, but mostly, what a wasted opportunity of having a really decent all rounder generalist type technical person who would have been key in helping an area grow. Instead, the recruitment idiots want someone who can walk in today and has memorised “ASP.Net”. Oh well, there are plenty of one-language monkeys around - go get ‘em.

I end this post with a plea begging all you intelligent and common-sensed readers to come down and help Canberra out. There is no shortage of money down here, Canberra is the roots of where every federal budget is spent - to keep the Country’s administration ticking over. Come and do a good job in your chosen role and take pride in it. You will earn decent money and push the idiots out of these roles that they inhabit, usually because they have trickled up into those positions after 25 years of achieving nothing.

Tags: Consulting

This entry was posted on Saturday, May 27th, 2006 at 5:56 pm by aaron. You can leave a response