Living in the Tech Avalanche Generation

What do you look for when interviewing developers. It’s a question that every manager needs to consider when hiring new staff and there are always a number of questions to ask, on both the technical and cultural aspects. I am not going to talk about the ‘culture fit’ (gratuitous HR terminology) here at all and the only technical aspect under consideration in this post is to do with how much effort I can see the candidate putting into self improvement and what level of interest they have in their profession.

How it works.

The idea behind ’semi invested’, revolves around only being interested enough to do the absolute (or close enough to) minimum in self development, or in harbouring a belief system that requires personal growth be the responsibility of the anyone else but yourself. I am not making excuses here for employers who do not invest in the their staff’s growth through training, but I don’t believe that it’s entirely the purview of the employer to be responsible for individual learning and growth.

So what is self development and how does it manifest? I usually start the quest in understanding how career invested developers are by asking, what was the last programming book you read? And quickly followed by when did you read the book? Here is a more complete list of questions that I ask (under interview and from time to time with staff) to get a feel for how much thought is going into self improvement.

How to find out.

• What Technology or Development newsletters do you subscribe to?
• Whose blogs do you follow?
• What magazines do you buy?
• Which Podcasts do you listen to?
• Which Webcasts do you watch?
• What user groups do attend?

When I get a positive answer to one of these questions, it can quite often lead to a good discussion as to where the perceived and or real value is in utilizing the content found on or in the method chosen and how each individual turns the exercise into a positive learning experience. If I get a negative response on all fronts and that is to say that the individual in question apparently has no interest and invests no time in the professional world around them (given that they proffer no alternatives), then it’s generally a pretty short interview.

Life wasn’t meant to be easy (who said that?)

Now if I sound as though I am being a little harsh on your average Joe or Joanne developer, well then so be it, I make no apologies. Its my goal to ensure that I have encouraged my teams to be as interested as possible in what they and their colleagues do for a living and my experience tells me that groups of ‘invested’ individuals flourish together and grow into great teams and this leads to great software.