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Who Else Would Tell You About the ‘Fringe Benefits’?

Well, shit on a Chiclet, people — I didn’t expect that.

Seriously. I thought I was just writing a whimsical little ditty about phone screening. But a handful of people were nice enough to take the time to comment, and all of them (or ‘one of you’, if you’re on the list) wanted to know about the job.

(Yeah, sure, I know — I did call on people to reach out and get their resumes in. But how the hell could I know people would take me vaguely seriously? I mean, it’s never happened before. Hell, I had to propose to my wife six times before she decided I meant it. Who knew?)

Anyway, just to satisfy your curiousity (not to mention my word quota for tonight’s post), here’s the actual job listing that I’m hiring for… with my own comments in parentheses. You just knew I couldn’t resist a few sets of parentheses, didn’t you?

Position Description:

The candidate will produce designs and code to satisfy user needs within the (<name removed to cover my sorry ass>) group. Initial assignments will concentrate on our SNP discovery work, specifically handling complex strategic reporting and sequencing pipeline assignments. (Sadly — and much to my own initial chagrin — ‘SNP’ does not, in fact, stand for ‘Sorority Nipple Parties’. So yeah, I was pretty disappointed, too.)

The candidate must be comfortable with the molecular biology domain, including sequencing pipelines and genotyping pipelines. (And don’t forget the ‘kissing my ass’ pipeline. Once we build it, of course.)

S/he must have a proven track record of successful delivery of accurate product and application deliverables in an intense work environment. (I’m not exactly sure what an ‘intense work environment’ entails. But I assure you that in our office, we hardly ever work with guns pointed at our heads, or fat guys sitting on us, or rabid Bengali tigers chasing us down the hall. Sometimes the fat guy in the corner office chases us down the hall, but he’s relatively harmless. And he never has a gun. Almost never, anyway.)

In the (<again, name removed, in the interest of my own self-preservation>) group, employees are responsible for proactively gathering requirements, writing specifications, creating designs, and delivering production quality code. In other words, this is not a position where the developer will be handed a detailed spec to code — the developer must proactively seek out and collaborate with users in order to rapidly produce the desired deliverables. (In other words… here’s your desk. Good luck, there, cupcake.)

Position Duties

• Work closely with users to gather requirements and frequent feedback through demos, mockups, and scenario-based prototypes. (Funny, I don’t see ‘wash my car’ in there; who wrote this fricking description, anyway?)
• In consultation with architects and project lead, build task lists and schedules with frequent, concrete milestones (And no, dammit, ‘showing up to work sober’ does not count as a milestone, no matter how frequently it happens. Or doesn’t.)
• Deliver on time, on target functionality to end users. (And deliver on-time, on-target yummery pizza to my office for lunch every day. Me likey extra pepperoni, new minion. On the double, now.)
• Ensure that own priorities and goals align with the high priority team goals. (So, of course, the challenge here is this — how on earth can you make ‘find a way to get the girls in the shared office to kiss each other’ a ‘high priority team goal’? For the life of me, I haven’t figured that one out. Yet.)

QUALIFICATIONS

• Computer Science or equivalent undergraduate degree. 4 years software development experience. Knowledge of genomics a necessity. (It would also help a lot if you can juggle. Oh, and if you have a keggerator. And maybe a cool car, too. You like the Red Sox? Yeah. That’s good, too.)
• Experience with commercial reporting products a plus.(I’m pretty sure that TiVo does not count as a ‘commercial reporting product’, by the way.)
• Must have excellent written and verbal communications skills, excellent problem-solving skills and people skills, collaborative skills. (Hmmm… yeah, that would be nice, wouldn’t it? Hell, somebody in this place oughta do all those things. Might as well be the newbie.)
• Must be able to deal with a rapidly-changing and high-demand environment. (Yep, it’s rapidly changing, all right — every couple of weeks, I go through the offices at night and exchange all the chairs. And all the books and papers. And the signs on the mens and womens bathrooms. You probably don’t want to ask what I do with the phone receivers. It’s neither pretty nor entirely mess-free. And it smarts a little, if I don’t do it just right. Yeah, just… just don’t ask.)

So, there you have it, all you interested parties. I can almost hear the flood of resumes surging my way right now. Get ’em in quick to avoid the rush, folks. And remember — a couple of twenties paper-clipped to the cover letter goes a long way further than actually meeting any of those pesky requirement thingies. Man, maybe this hiring business isn’t so bad, after all.

I Also Accept Large, Extravagant Bribes

So, my office is hiring right now.

(Yes, that’s right, folks — get those resumes in here. Applicants should be enthusiastic, bright, well organized, and ready to kiss my ass like it was covered in strawberry frosting. Which it sometimes is, but that’s probably not relevant right now.)

Anyway, we’ve got an open position around the old workplace, and I’ve been saddled with the responsibility of making the first cuts in the field of hopefuls. This time around, that involves phone screening a half dozen people or more.

Yes, phone screening. The bastard child of the interview process. Phone screens are to actually hiring an employee as copping a feel on a crowded bus is to a big church wedding. It’s a crock.

And the worst part is, you can’t really gauge a person from a phone interview. I mean, how am I supposed to tell whether the person will fit in if I can’t see their reactions? The look of horror when I describe the working conditions… the nauseated snarl when I go over the salary and benefits… the cackling grin when I slip a joke in among the interview questions… these are important details, dammit!

(Oh. No, wait. I think I mixed up the reactions and the stimuli there — I think the cackles are for the salary, and the working conditions usually get the snarl. That would leave the nausea for my jokes. Yeah, that’s about right. Bitches.)

So, I’ve got to figure out some way to separate the wheat from the chaff without actually being able to see these people. It’s tough — they’ve all got roughly the same skills, and experience, and they all tell me pretty much what I want to hear… I feel like I’m not ‘screening’, per se; I’m really just spending half-hour chunks of my life talking about work while trying not to cry. I suppose it’s good practice for when I see my family over Christmas break, but I’m not sure I’m accomplishing anything useful.

Oh, well. I guess I’ll just bring all these people in, and talk to them in person. Then I’ll be able to figure out whether any of them can make it in our office. And more importantly, whether any of them can whip out a convincing fake laugh when I tell a joke. Oh, yeah. That‘ll get you an offer. Pucker up, baby.