A question for management types.

I thought I was clear... If the exam isn't well regulated, as in standardized and well tested, it's too easy to claim discrimination. "He didn't get the same test I did, mommy." "My test was 'unfair."

I rather liked interviewing where I got to solve problems. I had a lot of freedom that others may not, though.

Again, it's easy for a candidate to claim discrimination. To be fair, it's easy to discriminate, as well. I *know* I was discriminated against (thought it was funny, though my wife didn't see the humor when I told her).

My point is that companies have to protect themselves or they *will* find loser who will sue and an ambulance chaser who will gladly be the enabler. That's why you see such crap from HR. In fact that's why it exists at all.

Something does not connect here. Since you hired him, this guy ought to be a good engineer and a decent person. Why did he run away? The part about 401K bonus and autocad doesn't make any sense at all. Perhaps there is a lesson in this story, but it doesn't seem to be about green cards and autocads.

VLV

Naw, I hit this working with the grad students, he came from a "entitled" background. Its a cultural difference. Those folks sometimes, but rarely, tend to expect it to carry over in their new positions.

I once had to move a piece of machinery across campus to claim some space before it was reassigned. Special services was way too busy moving the arts and math sciences people to their new building, so I elected to bring my personal trailer in, load the gear with grad student help, and transport it the half mile or so. The gear in question was say two hundred pounds, and well strapped down, so I asked the Thai student to set on the open trailer and hold some fragile cables, with no intention of exceeding about 2 miles a hour.

I know, I know, OSHA would be shocked, if this happened anywhere but a farm.

The next line I heard,After he chuckled, "Was wow, this is different". So I asked him why. Back home he said, " I would have a manager with me, and a crew to do this, and I would be setting in a pickup truck, with a driver, and be telling you what to do". He was the second son, as such, was packed off to college and grad school to be the spare heir in case something happened to number one son. He understood it to be his duty to do well, and be far enough away as to not interfere with number one. From then on out, he volunteered for a lot of physical labor, provided no one was allowed to see him doing "less dignified" work. He did remind me, "Steve, when my parents come to visit, you do work for me , OK?"

But I had one or two from various cultures that didn't understand that the professor expected me to facilitate their work, not DO it.

Steve

Then they should IMHO not apply for a technical job. "Here we have the schematic of an RF amp and we need some more bandwidth out of it. What would you do?" If he/she didn't know, no dice. Very simple.

"bench

Piece of cake. I've shredded lawyers and whole boards in mid air with far more difficult stuff than that. The culmination was when one board member showed up with a check, to make me go away.

Come on! Be real. We're talking about (protection from) frivolous law suits here.

of,

I have been to a few interviews where it was pretty clear that they didn't have an actual opening, just on the basic principle of keeping in practice, and a couple of times I have ended up doing a later interview for a real position based on how well I did at the fake interview.

I saw that at Mattel. The boss was Checkoslavokian, and he kept assinging the toys that he thought would be hits to the Checkoslavokian engineers. He had a problem, though; nobody has ever figured out how to predict which toys will be hits.

In general, the courts have found that the supposedly well-trained HR professional is held to a higher standard, while the supposedly untrained (in interviewing) technical person who does the later interview has a lot more freedom to ask unscripted questions as long as he/she avoids the obvious illegal questions. The best strategy is to avoid dumbing down your explanations during the HR interview, but instead to use plenty of acronyms and buzzwords. The HR department is just a gateway to sort through the job-seekers and throw out the obvious bad ones (I have seen helicopter pilots with no engineering experience apply for senior engineering jobs). Your task is to make them decide that they cannot understand what you are talking about and that an engineer needs to evaluate you.

I was interviewed in 2007 by a major semiconductor house, where the main object seemed to be to take me to lunch and _try_ to pick my brain ;-)

...Jim Thompson

I once worked for a Japanese company (*really* Japanese; they held all meetings in Japanese with translators, and considered Toyota and Sony to be way too americanized), and I noticed that the CEO would pick up and throw away any scrap of paper he saw on the factory floor, so I made it a point to do the same. It's important to understand and adapt to the culture, whether it's a US university or a Japanese workplace.

Because he didn't like me. And because what he really wanted was the green card.

The part about 401K bonus and autocad doesn't

Made sense to me. We had three people leave that year, and it didn't make sense to spend a lot of 401K money on them, so we gave the remaining employees big bonuses instead of the usual 401K contribution. That pissed him off, since he felt it was "his" money.

John

And learn how to bow properly, yet maintain your own status ;-)

...Jim Thompson

My dad tells me a story about when some Japanese came to visit his company. The meeting was in English , but the Japanese would talk among themselves in Japanese, which kind of ticked my dad off. So he and all the Americans started talking among themselves in pig-latin whn they wanted to discuss something privately.

A business associate and I were in Germany. The Germans would switch to German whenever they wanted to "go private". Unfortunately for them my associate was born and raised in Germany... and let them know several hours into the meeting ;-)

...Jim Thompson

I never let the chance of a frivolous suit get in the way between me and being able to do my job properly. How can one hire an engineer without such questions?

of,

Not once did we have a candidate who had to go through an HR filter when showing up for interview. On the contrary, often it was me who welcomed them at the door and later they did a 2nd interview at HR. Usually after we had signaled that we really want this person.

=A0 =A0 ...Jim Thompson

=A0 | =A0 =A0mens =A0 =A0 |

=A0 | =A0 =A0 et =A0 =A0 =A0|

=A0|

=A0 =A0 =A0 |

Gee, maybe this major semi should read usenet.

You don't have to. You don't have to give away the store, either. It's all *HOW* you ask the question, or what question you ask to get the information reqired.

of,

Are you saying that you allowed HR to pre-screen without allowing them to pre-interview, or are you saying that you had engineers screening out the helicopter pilots with no engineering experience applying for senior engineering jobs? The first choice seems to be stopping HR from doing a good job, while the second choice seems to be a waste of engtineering resources.