[indiejade]

What I don't understand is why so many companies that have these kinds of problems hire people who don't understand anything technical to "screen" their applicants.

Technical competence and ability to speak on the telephone are not even remotely related. Written talent trumps speaking talent when it comes to the digital domain. Does ability to hear trump ability to read? That's probably debatable, but I imagine that the talent of most people who know how to read and listen surpasses the talent of people who are paid to talk.

Many people who consider themselves technically inclined (case in point, me) hate the telephone. Yet "telephone interviews" are a huge part of many companies' hiring regimes. And usually these telephone interviews are conducted by people with specialized training in sales, marketing or HR, people trained to do nothing more than speak aloud the words and acronyms off of a printed sheet of paper or screen, to inflect their voices with all the right intonations. Yet when faced with actual questions about specifics by a technical person, they stammer and don't know what to say.

It's usually at this point in the interview when I wonder why company X is paying this person to call me to be interviewed when I'm not getting paid anything for my time.

This problem is similar to what the OP argues for, I think. It's not that there's a specific holy grail of language or language-requirements that a company seeks, but simply somebody who knows what they're talking about. There can be a clash when a particularly "savvy" talker of BS encounters somebody who actually knows what she's talking about.

[mattmcknight]

I suppose another question would be- how many technical people want to spend all day screening applicants?

I've been to interviews which were more or less well designed quizzes that could be administered by non technical people, with the answers evaluated by technical people later. That seemed better than the alternative. I do know one interviewer who always uses "what do you think are the three best books on software development?" You get some interesting answers to that one.