Thank
you for your interest in me, but let's get a few things straight.
You
came to me.
I
already have a job at an interesting company with a vision in which I
believe. You are trying to lure me away to some other company. I
have no reason to care about your company, nor to spend my precious
time accommodating you or them. It is your job, and by extension,
the task of anyone with whom you have me interviewing to court me, to
convince me that the job, the company, and the people are compelling,
that they offer an experience not to be missed. You will have to
sell it, and you will have to do so honestly, as anything less than honesty simply won't ring
true anyway. Don't take my consent to interview as an indication
that I'm sold, but rather as an indication that I'm willing to hear
you out, as long as you don't piss me off, offend me, bore me, or
otherwise give me reason to stop listening; this goes especially for
the interviewers.
To
your clients, employers, or whatever relationship you bear to the
people for whom you are recruiting:
I'm
a generalist. I do not claim to be an expert at anything. I'm not
interested in being a specialist. I'm not interested in
titles, status symbols, or vanity-feeding crap like being referred to as a rock star.
I
will not brush up on anything before interviewing with you. What is
relevant to my life and/or job, I learn (or recollect) and memorize
quite naturally and effortlessly; the rest I can look up, if I need
it. You haven't paid me anything, nor have we established any relationship of mutual respect and reciprocity, so don't expect me to put in
effort on your behalf for things that are of little person interest to me. You're still supposed to be trying to convince me
that I want
to work for you, remember? You can ask me questions about
technologies and so forth, but you should be prepared for and
satisfied with 'I don't know' or 'I don't remember'. If I feel
negativity from you about these answers, I will walk out, and will
give your organization no further consideration. If you decide to
hire me, and I decide to accept, only then will I begin learning or
brushing up on specific topics for your purposes.
I
will not whiteboard solutions with you. This is not a natural form
of coding. If you want to find out how I solve problems, give me
code challenges to work on during my own time (and count yourself lucky that
I'll spend my own time bothering with them). If that's not good
enough for you, don't waste my time and yours bringing me in for an
interview (or, for that matter, in any preliminary activities like phone screening).
I
am not interested in working anywhere for under-market compensation.
I can live with less, but if I do, I'm dragging down other people's
earning potential. Offering appropriate compensation is a sign of
respect. Don't ask me what I make now, or what I made at previous
jobs. It's none of your business, and has no bearing on what you
should be offering for the job. You
tell me
what you're offering, and I'll tell you whether or not I'm
interested.
If
you don't like any of this, go your own way and stop wasting my time.
