Upgrade to Pro
— share decks privately, control downloads, hide ads and more …
Speaker Deck
Features
Speaker Deck
PRO
Sign in
Sign up for free
Search
Search
Hiring for Your Stack is All Wrong
Search
j3
May 19, 2015
Technology
2
520
Hiring for Your Stack is All Wrong
This presentation was delivered at the Ronin Labs CTO Summit in NYC and SF in May of 2015.
j3
May 19, 2015
Tweet
Share
More Decks by j3
See All by j3
Hiring the Best Talent
j3
0
230
Great Technical Interviews
j3
1
510
Opportunity@Work / TechHire
j3
0
94
Building an Innovation Community
j3
0
96
Just Be Fucking Awesome
j3
1
320
Pragmatic TDD
j3
1
240
Don't Use Spree
j3
0
160
Just Be Fucking Awesome
j3
3
440
Internationalization & Localization
j3
7
1k
Other Decks in Technology
See All in Technology
MySQL HeatWave:サービス概要のご紹介
oracle4engineer
PRO
4
1.7k
Preferred Networks (PFN) とLLM Post-Training チームの紹介 / 第4回 関東Kaggler会 スポンサーセッション
pfn
PRO
1
140
DeNA での思い出 / Memories at DeNA
orgachem
PRO
2
900
メルカリIBIS:AIが拓く次世代インシデント対応
0gm
2
520
[OCI Skill Mapping] AWSユーザーのためのOCI(2025年8月20日開催)
oracle4engineer
PRO
2
130
広島発!スタートアップ開発の裏側
tsankyo
0
220
Backboneとしてのtimm2025
yu4u
3
1.3k
生成AI利用プログラミング:誰でもプログラムが書けると 世の中どうなる?/opencampus202508
okana2ki
0
190
OpenAPIから画面生成に挑戦した話
koinunopochi
0
150
自治体職員がガバクラの AWS 閉域ネットワークを理解するのにやって良かった個人検証環境
takeda_h
2
380
現場が抱える様々な問題は “組織設計上” の問題によって生じていることがある / Team-oriented Organization Design 20250827
mtx2s
1
590
Autonomous Database Serverless 技術詳細 / adb-s_technical_detail_jp
oracle4engineer
PRO
18
52k
Featured
See All Featured
How to Think Like a Performance Engineer
csswizardry
25
1.8k
Unsuck your backbone
ammeep
671
58k
Helping Users Find Their Own Way: Creating Modern Search Experiences
danielanewman
29
2.8k
Building a Scalable Design System with Sketch
lauravandoore
462
33k
Side Projects
sachag
455
43k
Navigating Team Friction
lara
189
15k
Fight the Zombie Pattern Library - RWD Summit 2016
marcelosomers
234
17k
Making the Leap to Tech Lead
cromwellryan
134
9.5k
Six Lessons from altMBA
skipperchong
28
4k
GraphQLの誤解/rethinking-graphql
sonatard
71
11k
Practical Tips for Bootstrapping Information Extraction Pipelines
honnibal
PRO
23
1.4k
The Pragmatic Product Professional
lauravandoore
36
6.8k
Transcript
Hiring for your stack is all wrong Jeff Casimir /
@j3 / turing.io
Building Teams
What makes a developer the right fit?
Years of experience? Mastery of a stack?
What about you?
Let’s hire people for who they’ll become, not what
they’ve done.
The MVT
“I’ve never seen a technical project fail for
technical reasons.”
None
Product < People
Each team has a set of skill and cultural
needs
Confidence Humility Collaboration Growth Empathy Grit Sales Design / UI
UX / Product Backend Ops Service
Rob The Product Person Collaboration Empathy Sales Design / UI
UX / Product Service
Jamie Data Cruncher Humility Collaboration Growth Backend Ops
+ =
Confidence Humility Collaboration Growth Empathy Grit Sales Design / UI
UX / Product Backend Ops Service
None
Instead of “fit”, find a complement
Stability & MVT
Right people at the right time
Teams stabilize like the electrons of an atom
None
4 12 32 128
Confidence Humility Collaboration Growth Empathy Grit Sales Design / UI
UX / Product Backend Ops Service 4 12 32 128
Level A: 4
• Extreme risk tolerance • Mission definers • Hacker mindset
Level A (4): Overview
• Passion for the problem • Safety net • Culture
trendsetters • Wants responsibilities Level A (4): Profile
• Tech over mission • Seeks silos • Accustomed to
instruction Level A (4): Dangers
Level B: 12
• High risk tolerance • Mission challengers • Multiple strengths
and interests Level B (12): Overview
• Amplifier • People-people • Comfort with ambiguity • Building
not starting Level B (12): Profile
• The new shiny • Timid about ownership • Over-engineering
Level B (12): Dangers
Level C: 32
• Moderate risk tolerance • Mission believers • Specialist skills
Level C (32): Overview
• The deep diver • Replacing systems • Research, reproduction
• Other people’s code Level C (32): Profile
• Seeking excitement • Profit outcomes • Politicians Level C
(32): Dangers
Level D: 128
• Low risk tolerance • Mission followers • Redundancy and
growth Level D (128): Overview
• Lower pressure • Long-term engagement • Comfortable not-knowing •
Echoing culture Level D (128): Profile
• Entitlement • Things “just work” • Boredom Level D
(128): Dangers
Stability Levels Risk Mission Skills Level A (4) Extreme Definers
Hackers Level B (12) High Challengers Multiple Level C (32) Moderate Believers Specialists Level D (128) Low Followers Redundancy
Processes
None
Knowledge < Processes
Processes allow for iterative learning
Not following a script, writing the script
• Sketch out a plan • Relish uncertainty • Listen
to the work • Correct course • Iterate the process
Finding process people
• Writers • Chemists • Musicians • Social Workers •
Teachers • Bartenders
• Plan • Experiment • Listen • Correct
Potential beyond experience
Aptitudes
Can we try to isolate aptitudes?
Aptitudes: Empathy
The ability to understand the needs, feelings, frustrations, and passions
of others
• Profile five customers • What are their needs, desires,
skills, fears? • What will make them quit? Empathy: Measure It
• Compassion & sensitivity • Excitement for solutions • Understanding
scope Empathy: What to Look For
• Indifference • Biases and -isms • Contempt Empathy: Watch
Out For
None
Aptitudes: Iteration
The ability to integrate new information into a process
• Collaborate on a puzzle (LSAT, tangrams, sudoku) • Teach
along the way • Can they re-apply? Iterate? Improvement: Measure It
• Rational process • Patience & confidence • Changing course
• Listening & application Improvement: What to Look For
• Plowing ahead • Desperation & leaps • Inability to
explain Improvement: Watch Out For
In Action
None
None
“If you can do the job, then you should get
the job.”
TechHire
Hire for who they’ll become, not what they’ve done. Jeff
Casimir / @j3 / turing.io