Amanda Nock, a tech leader and devops expert who posts frequently to Twitter, offered this in response when I posted on Twitter about how to hire good people remotely, “When I hire remotely, I ask about their online friends.” Nock doesn’t need the details of anyone’s online friendships, but she needs to know that the person has developed a serious friendship online; otherwise that person probably doesn’t communicate easily and naturally online, so working with them remotely is going to be difficult.
Nock says, “I often hire remotely, and I make a point to ask about what people's online lives are like. No details. If someone, for instance, has good relationships on Twitter or they're active in a Discord server, that tells me they're good at asynchronous remote communication. I don't care if the Discord server they're active in is a furry community or whatever, the details don't matter — the skill for forming relationships and communicating in a personable way over asynchronous text is there.”
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But I think the opposite is also true: a lot of people do not easily form friendships online, and they lack online social skills, so they are not going work well remotely. These people are more productive in a traditional office.
From what I've seen, many people struggle to truly express themselves in written form. This includes well educated people. And those who are extroverted need to talk. Remote work tends to put an emphasis on written communication, and that is only partly offset by having a lot of Zoom meetings.
What nonsense, so are we expected to ask how many friends you have IRL to gauge someone’s ability at synchronous communication?
I can communicate remotely in a business setting (and have done) for many years. I don’t make friends online because it’s a personal preference.
It’s the same as “show me your GitHub profile” but maybe after 8 hours on a computer asynchronously communicating and coding. I don’t want to code or make friends on discord.
> What nonsense, so are we expected to ask how many friends you have IRL to gauge someone’s ability at synchronous communication?
Couldn't one draw parallels with the concept of networking here? As in, certain people might get a job because of being extroverted, seizing the opportunities that present themselves, as well as seeking those out on their own volition?
All qualities that might be preferred in certain roles, almost like a sort of self-selection.
Not saying that it's something that should always be selected for, but I suspect that it might be a bit like coding tests: vaguely useful despite the fact that they're not exactly the best method.
> It’s the same as “show me your GitHub profile” but maybe after 8 hours on a computer asynchronously communicating and coding. I don’t want to code or make friends on discord.
What if they want you to be the kind of person who does? I mean, you might want to avoid companies that expect you to live and breathe code (which might coincide with being available 24/7), but one can definitely imagine that such qualities would also be factors that companies would look for.
This an interesting approach to this that I wouldn't have thought of. You can clearly see who the people who are used to existing in a text space vs not.
In my team for example, one of my coworkers just hates written communication. He started after me and had to ask a lot of questions. To do so he'd send me a hangouts link and expect me to join so he could ask his question. Most of the time they were questions that then involved him sitting and staring as I had to go look up the answer and link him to it anyway. He was ignoring channels set up to ask for help and ones that would have gotten our entire area of the company to help him.
But I think the most insidious part of people who don't communicate well in written form is that it makes other people not want to do so. I was stuck as the only other engineer with this guy for 6 months. During this time I stopped updating, then stopped writing out ticket bodies. I stopped posting helpful things to our team channel and didn't update documentation. What was the point? Who was going to read it? I've been slowly getting back in the habit now that we have people on my team who actually... use things I spend the time to write.
And I get that he's twenty years older then me, has fifteen years of experience on me, and has not been living his life in a chat client since the age of 12, but he's a fully remote worker even without the pandemic and I feel like it's one of his opportunity areas.
My current supervisor said that posting questions and helps in public chat space is valuable since there's a chance that others will see and learn from the same question.
I guess he's right, after 3 months I can easily separate those who can follow conversation on slack and don't need other briefing, and those who need other session of briefing even though there's already many conversation and documentation.
> If someone, for instance, has good relationships on Twitter or they're active in a Discord server, that tells me they're good at asynchronous remote communication
What does a "good" relationship on Twitter even look like? Is the author looking at specific metrics like number of posts per day, no of replies per post?
While I overall agree that hiring remote requires a new perspective and new set of questions, but ...their social media engagement? Some of the best engineers I've ever worked with had ZERO social media presence.
I like to do a lot of communication with candidates over email and some kind of text format during the process. This is usually when communication problems present themselves.
It would never occur to me ask them personal questions about the number and nature of their online friends ... very strange and invasive.
As an aside, many recruiters like to control the conversation with the candidate and have all messages/emails go through them ... this is a great way for the recruiter to hide a candidates communication weaknesses.
and that quote is a brilliant example of cognitive bias.
"Only people who have online friends can communicate in the written form."
which can then be extrapolated to:
"I have online only friends, therefore this is the thing to look for"
Which is remote-ese for "we can't hire them because they don't look/sound/act like us and won't like the same things as us, therefore is a bad cultural fit."
If you want to test someone's asynchronous remote communication skills then communicate with them remotely and asynchronously. How much trolling they do on Reddit in their free time is completely irrelevant.
Life and friendship happen in the real world and taking away the physical side will result in something incomplete.
I suppose many don’t feel satisfied by such restricted relationships and will only bother with the real thing. I know I’m like that.
Zero connection between that and WFH ability. It’s all about communication and emotional intelligence. A great communicator will be able to apply their skills even in the stunted context of video and text chat.
As for asking about friends, if it’s not outright illegal to ask about friends, it’s certainly in poor taste. Another half-asses innovation from the SV-like mindset.
Lol if she supports using people's social media accounts in the hiring process... Does she support using arrest records with the FBI for domestic terrorism? Because Amanda Nock has one... Idk, perhaps we should all be careful who we take advice from.
That's a good take out of current issue. I'd say though having online friends is not necessary, but ability to follow forum conversation and initiating / joining one is a valuable experience in remote work.
I can expect that older managements are lacking in this aspect.
That being said, there's synchronous remote (similar timezone and same work hours) that can help to alleviate the remote work issue.
Amanda Nock, a tech leader and devops expert who posts frequently to Twitter, offered this in response when I posted on Twitter about how to hire good people remotely, “When I hire remotely, I ask about their online friends.” Nock doesn’t need the details of anyone’s online friendships, but she needs to know that the person has developed a serious friendship online; otherwise that person probably doesn’t communicate easily and naturally online, so working with them remotely is going to be difficult.
Nock says, “I often hire remotely, and I make a point to ask about what people's online lives are like. No details. If someone, for instance, has good relationships on Twitter or they're active in a Discord server, that tells me they're good at asynchronous remote communication. I don't care if the Discord server they're active in is a furry community or whatever, the details don't matter — the skill for forming relationships and communicating in a personable way over asynchronous text is there.”
(end quote)
But I think the opposite is also true: a lot of people do not easily form friendships online, and they lack online social skills, so they are not going work well remotely. These people are more productive in a traditional office.
From what I've seen, many people struggle to truly express themselves in written form. This includes well educated people. And those who are extroverted need to talk. Remote work tends to put an emphasis on written communication, and that is only partly offset by having a lot of Zoom meetings.