Finding great people for hire is difficult. More than once an employer would be looking for people which are interested in what they do, and not just good at it. Such people would usually be more passionate at work, and work harder and better that others.
One technique not many employers are utilizing, is asking what's on the RSS reading list of the potential employee. Come to think about it, it's a great way to see what the person is passionate about.
It doesn't mean that if one goes to an interview at some company that does media streaming, should read media-streaming blogs. But if the person is going to be a programmer, and happens to be reading Coding Horror, that's a great plus.
A thing I like very much in my current workplace (M86 Security) is that we have a must-read reading list. That means that every team member receives an OPML file on the first day on the job that contains stuff that he must read on a daily basis.
This helps turning the team members into pro's, and will certainly help the company and our future careers.
I would ask a candidate what mailing lists he is subscribed to. Most of the real work is done on mailing lists.
ReplyDeleteEhud,
ReplyDeleteYou are obviously correct. While RSS feeds are mostly 1-way communication, mailing lists are n-way.
We also have must-subscribe mailing lists.