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by twic 4654 days ago
"Culture" is a bullshit nonspecific term and i apologise for using it. It's a word the article used, and i was trying to stick to its language.

For us, it just means "will we be productive and happy spending the working day with this person?". Somebody could be a great programmer, but might not be someone you're going to get on with. They could be too quiet, too loud, too aggressive, too passive, too arrogant, too sensitive, too confident, too insecure, strangely obsessed with tubs of jelly, etc. Great programming skill is a great resource, but if a programmer can't get on with their colleagues, that resource cannot be exploited.

We would not rule you or your wife out on grounds of gender, ethnicity, nationality, religion, university, taste in literature, or the state of your lawn. If you for some reason wanted a job with us, and passed our technical tests, then all we would want to know would be that you could sit down and be an effective pair in programming, and stand up and be an effective participant in a discussion. Ideally, we would also like you to be good company at lunch or in the pub, but that's not essential.

2 comments

> They could be too quiet, too loud, too aggressive, too passive, too arrogant, too sensitive, too confident, too insecure, strangely obsessed with tubs of jelly, etc.

How about too picky? Hint hint.

> We would not rule you or your wife out on grounds of gender, ethnicity, nationality, religion, university, taste in literature, or the state of your lawn. If you for some reason wanted a job with us...

How generous of you!

The language one chooses to use can reveal a lot about one's thinking and here, "rule you or your wife out" and "for some reason" is, I would argue, very telling.

Yeah, i don't think we've ever had a problem with anyone being too picky.
Sounds like the word you (and many other hiring people) are looking for is "Professional" which pretty much meets all your requirements without borrowing an unrelated word. There is a strange aversion to it industry wide. Unclear why. My guess is some peculiarity in .gov regulation WRT overtime pay or maybe contractor status.