[sown]

>* Bachelor's degree in Computer Science from a top-tier institution.

I always hated this requirement. I'm sorry if I don't have the right pedigree to satisfy people like this. I'm sorry I didn't go to the "right" school, wasn't born into the right family or just a failure in their eyes.

[jpeterson]

Agreed. This requirement is just plain dumb, and bitterly disappointing given how much I've praised Dropbox and their product in the past. I won't be doing that anymore.

I didn't go to a "top-tier" institution, for reasons I'd rather not discuss here. I have worked with a few graduates of these kind of schools, and I can say that their coding and problem-solving abilities were not any greater than my own and others who didn't have such prestigious names on their diplomas. In my experience it makes no indication whatsoever. In fact, I generally ignore the specific undergraduate school when I look at a resume.

This is simply a statement of extreme and irrational elitism, and it stinks.

[idoh]

Often these requirements aren't literal. If you've got a background that is otherwise a good fit they might give you a look anyway.

[j_b_f]

Yeah, anyone who takes the formal requirements literally for a startup the size of Dropbox is probably not the type of person they're looking for. If you do a cover letter where you're like "I LOVE Dropbox and have used it for X years, have developed 10 Android apps (here are the links) and wrote a well-linked blog post on low-level networking over flaky 3G, oh and here's a ton of StackOverflow questions on mobile programming I answered" - you think they'll turn you away because you don't meet some arbitrary job posting requirement?

These postings are just written by other poor saps, on deadline, who generally just pull them out of their ass. They're not set in stone. (None of this applies to huge companies with rigorous HR screening of course.)

[gcheong]

I don't know if it's useful but I noticed that in two out of their four job postings (Senior Systems Engineer and Web Engineer) the "top-tier" degree requirement is not listed.

[sown]

Well, it is a good product and I will probably keep using them.

[markerdmann]

This discussion reminds of the time we interviewed a senior in the EECS undergraduate program at Cal (who had a 3.9 GPA). To quote directly from the interview:

Interviewer: So, what was your favorite course? Interviewee: Oh.. probably Data Structures. Interviewer: Ok, great. Let's start with a question about that. What's the running time of a hash table lookup? Interviewee: Oh.. uh... <stares blankly>

The rest of the interview continued along those lines. By contrast, another guy we interviewed who had earned his CS degree at Oregon State was a brilliant programmer.

[huangm]

Your problem is that you're taking job postings personally. Dropbox isn't posting a job posting to make an objective statement about what makes someone good. They're posting it to fill a position in their company.

Your bachelors degree institution also isn't just a pedigree. You can't perpetually argue that 'everyone is equal'. People aren't equal, and where you went to school is a useful signal.

Beyond all this, the Dropbox guys are predominantly MIT, and expecting applicants to be from a similar environment should be seen not as insulting, but natural.

[sown]

I'm not arguing that everyone is equal.

What I am saying is that it is almost but not quite discrimination. I can't control with total fidelity what school I get in no matter how good a student I might be -- ie, if I'm good enough to go to MIT I can go to MIT. They can't let in anyone who is good enough to go to MIT because there is only so much space. And besides, I don't have the money to go there nor did I have the money for the right college prep school[1]. I got handed some cards by life that meant I had to slowly work through a state university at my own cost.

I'm not mad at you or people who went to Ivy league schools, it's just that I get a little tired of people immediately shutting me out (parties, interviews, life in general) as soon as I mention that I went to some Unknown State university. Maybe it's just a SV thing but it gets old. Really old. So when I see it in a job posting I can't help but to take it personally. It's something you'll never have to worry about since you yourself are an MIT student.

I realize that they don't have to make me happy and they're free to hire from whatever school but they don't have to say it out-loud.

1 - Whether that prep school was an actual school or it was a parent who could stay at home screeching into the ears of their kids to motivate them or both, it means that they had the money for that school or one parent could stay home.

[kirubakaran]

This is why the best bet for people like us is to found our own startup. It is easier to please the customers than the gatekeepers. It has always been that way and always will be. Remove the proxies and profit. IMHO it is not productive to rant about people looking for credentials. They are just trying to reduce their search space.

[sown]

Yeah, I know.

[gcheong]

"but they don't have to say it out-loud."

Actually it's better if they do, that way it wastes less of your time if you know up front that you don't have a chance because of your lack of pedigree as you say. I don't like it either, but I would rather know up front.

[hyperbovine]

  They can't let in anyone who is good enough to go to MIT because there is only so much space.

Exactly. You hit the nail on the head--consequently, "good enough" doesn't cut it to get into MIT. You have to be the best of the best. Which means, if you're looking to hire the best of the best, you look for people who went to MIT. As you also rightly point out, this is not discrimination because clearly they'd be willing to hire a badass who didn't go to a top school. The job market is one giant signaling game, and having a rocking degree is a strong signal.

[tsally]

You have to be the best of the best.

Not quite. You have to be the diverse of the best (if I may mutilate English to make my point). Horror stories come out every year of the kid with perfect test scores and GPA who gets rejected from [insert prestigious school here]. It's not enough (and rightly so) to be the best of the best. You've got to have something different. Some distinguishing factors that come to mind are:

* Socio-economic background

* Athletic and musical ability

* Ethnicity and gender

* Unusual, proven talent in some rare area

[sown]

No I think you mis understood me. Being best-of-best isn't good enough, either. They've got to throw in some other random elements to make it look...I dunno, fair, different, genuine?

I just fail to see how being an expert viola player or a state ping pong ball champ or a <gender,race combo> is going to help someone write superior software or conduct excellent science.

And I mean in a real, verifiable way, not some unconvincing, weak collection of anecdotes.

Of course, I'm not saying I can write super-superior software.

[charlesmarshall]

mit - best of the best .. that can afford it and fit in a niche they haven't filled you mean?

I think the trouble in this case would be the recruiting company that are reading them and only passing on the ones that tick all the right buzz word boxes ..

[shaddi]

Fair enough, but I have to agree with the GP. Sure, your average MIT grad may be pretty good, but some of the most talented and impressive people I know come from (decently ranked but not super prestigious) state schools. Hiring from one population is going to lead to homogeneity, and if I were doing the hiring my first cut would be based on proven accomplishments, not school.

In short: no, not everyone is equally skilled, but you're going to miss a lot of gems if you only hire from MIT's peer institutions. I'm sure Dropbox will have no problem finding someone good to fill their position, however, so I guess that isn't such a big concern for them.

[nixme]

In short: no, not everyone is equally skilled, but you're going to miss a lot of gems if you only hire from MIT's peer institutions.

You are correct, but that doesn't matter. Hiring filters are intentionally excessively restrictive because a bad hire is much worse than losing out on a few good individuals.

Remember that in our industry (and probably others), even a full-day interview tells you very little about a candidate and their ability.

[amichail]

Is this a form of discrimination? Is it legal?

[nixme]

Is this a form of discrimination?

It is a form of exclusion based on past education and experience. Are you implying that it is unethical to do so? I say no. Past performance is the best predictor of future performance. Getting accepted into and performing well at a top-tier university is past performance. This will undoubtedly exclude many great candidates. But the reality of hiring is that there's always a time constraint and bad hires are incredibly disastrous to an organization.

Is it legal?

In the United States, it is certainly legal to judge candidates on their education and experience. I'd also wager it's legal just about everywhere. Otherwise, as tsally said, employers would be forced to interview just about anyone that applies for a position.

[gcheong]

It is a legal form of discrimination.

[tsally]

As opposed to being forced to interview every candidate who applies?

[mattrepl]

There is probably a correlation between top-tier CS pedigree and performance, but using it as a filter for joining a startup is detrimental. The chance you're missing a "diamond in the rough" is high, and those are exactly the folks you want.

If you're Google and have tons of résumés to sort, then fine; but in this case it seems a good way to miss a great hire.

[aristus]

It is elitist, but also their choice, and while the false negative rate may be high the false positives are what they are worried about.

I personally filter on "has made major contributions to interesting projects" and "speaks two or more human languages". That discriminates against a lot of people too. My tertiary filter is "ignores my filters but is impressive enough anyway".

[amichail]

But maybe this requirement will attract more applicants from 1st tier universities.

[gcheong]

I suppose then that I would be a good candidate for the next CEO of Apple given that I dropped out of the same school as Steve Jobs.

[tsally]

The phrasing is a bit unfortunate, but I think a person talented enough to work there could probably make it happen anyway. They hired Zed, and although I'm not sure where he went to college, it was probably his demonstrated programming talent that did all the talking.

[gcheong]

Maybe it's because they're looking for an employee and not another co-founder?

http://steveblank.com/2009/04/07/the-good-student/

[sebg]

Disagree. The point is that it is a filter. A high percentage of people will not respond based on this criteria. But the people who believe that they are as good or better will respond anyway. These are the type of people you want to get - the ones that are willing to go around the system to get things done.

[joubert]

So it isn't really a requirement?

[sebg]

I have no relation to dropbox other than using it. My guess would be that it is a requirement if the person applying chooses to make it a requirement.

To me it's a question of reality. Within any interaction each person has a different version of reality. In order to interact, the participants have to agree on a common version of reality.

In this case - The applicant's reality should be that it is not a requirement. The company's reality is that it is a requirement. If the applicant can convince the company that the applicant's reality is the right one to use for the common ground, then the requirement is not a requirement.

[mailanay]

Many companies put such requirements as filters to reduce number of applications they receive. Going through a huge list of resumes is time-consuming and not exactly what a start-up is looking forward to.