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by mal808
3193 days ago
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Regarding the work history thing, I think the point is missing good programmers who have a patchy work history. I, for example am 42, but I've only been a programmer for 3 years. Someone looking purely at my work history probably wouldn't have bothered to interview me for the first couple of years.
Fortunately for me that wasn't the case. |
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I can see how it could cause an issue with some employers, but I would consider a 42 year old person with only three years experience not to be an issue whatsoever, in fact I've hired people with that profile.
One example was a guy with a degree in Biology who had ended up in technical sales for DNA related products. However, this was when mobile apps were getting hot, and the guy had shown an uncanny ability to learn iOS and build a few small but respectable apps using Objective-C during whatever nights and weekends he could scrape together. Considering many full time devs at the time struggled with Objective-C it was an impressive accomplishment. It was impossible to fake because we could scroll to a random piece of source code and ask him to start explaining it, which besides verifying he did the work, gave valuable insights into his development thought process.
These concrete results, combined with probing discussions of how they came about, proved he was smart, had the ability ramp up on new tech quickly, could make some immediate contributions, and as a bonus that he was full of motivation. He worked out great, and to this day we maintain occasional friendly contact.
Point being "work history" can be looked at in many ways. I'm advocating an emphasis on specific results, contributions, and weighing the value of those, not really generic work history patterns.