What is wrong with companies these days?

Company A publishes an ad for a position.

Prospect B replies to that ad.

Months later

Company A sends email to Prospect B, “Are you still interested? If so, Respond ‘Yes’”

Prospect B responds “Yes”

Company A sends email containing several pages of screening questions to be filled out in essay format.

I found the instructions telling.

Use acronyms only after you’ve explained them.
Use correct spelling and grammar.

Really? They had to specify the blindingly obvious?

Neither parties have actually spoken to each other, human to human.

Next will be a phone preinterview

Then a Zoom meeting and attendant group interview. 

Then there will be no word at all for another few weeks or months, because the candidates are hung up in committee. A Committee it should be noted that is  made up of people who will likely never set foot in the Engineering wing of the corporation, (if they even know where it is).

Just when Prospect B has forgotten about it, Company A will reach out with additional questions from the group interview.

This is what passes for “Efficiency”.

God I miss the old days! 

This shit was so simple and direct. By step three, Prospect B had been interviewed by the hiring manager, a decision had been made, offer letter was in the mail, (as were “Thanks but no thanks letters”,) and the hired candidate already had their company access badge.

Here we are in 2025, communications at the speed of light, more email pumps across the ‘net in a minute than “Snail Mail” in a week.

We have cheap, to the point of being free, global telephone & video conferencing on a scale that was only the fevered dream of futurists 20 years ago and we have “Leading Edge” companies (because all companies are “Leading Edge”), being hobbled by…

Human Resources? Lawyers? Fear of hurting someone’s feelings?

This process should be faster, not slower.

Additionally, because of so many bogus headhunting agencies play similar games I’m always wondering if I’ve got some kind of scammer phishing for information.

So I’m perhaps unduly cautious and suspicious.

In on-line dating, the scams are played out exactly like this too.

“Hey.”
Hello
“You’re really good looking.”
Thank you
“Do you work out?”
Yes
“At a Gym”
Yeah, one here in town.
“What’s it called?
Gold’s 
“Really? That’s my gym too.”
Nice, maybe I’ll see you there sometime
“What city you live in?”
Northeast LA

It’s after 30 more inane messages. You find, the person has no car, can’t afford their rent, and wants you to pay for a Gold’s membership but would prefer a premium Equinox gym package that includes monthly massages & pedicures. Then they send you a “Picture” of themselves which is clearly a well known porn star, and ask you to Venmo them “just a little” cash to keep their phone on.

When you say “Thanks but no Thanks” they get nasty and report you to the moderation council of the dating app and you’re under investigation for not being “inclusive” in your dating preferences. At this point you can infer this person is making their living scamming people on various dating apps.

I agree, job seeking at its basic level isn’t very different from dating.

One difference is that in technology, typically the best folks have zero patience for bullshit. Hmm, that might not be a good example. 

I can speak from personal experience when I say the best technology people I’ve ever worked with, had difficulty connecting with other people. They didn’t understand social niceties, and were very easily bored and confused by human behavior. They felt that the reason a company should hire them was self evident based on their resumes and the choice was clear.

A company hired them for their abilities, to fill a particular need and that was literally all that mattered. They preferred the ultimate meritocracy, in fact they thrived in environments where feelings had no place. It was simply a matter of getting the job done.

I very much lean toward that same philosophy of working environment. I had an advantage in that I had just enough comprehension of normal humans, that I could be an interface between people who didn’t do emotion or feelings, and those who were a bundle of contradictory impulses, desires, goals, manipulation, and feelings.

My function was to provide a window into how normal humans interact with machines and software, test software, and represent Engineering / Development / QA in meetings with people, my less socially adapted colleagues considered rabid chimpanzees.

After particularly difficult meetings with normal humans, it was bliss to return to emotionless labs where all that was required of me, was to analyze binary logic. Something worked or it didn’t.

Reporting that to a really good developer had zero emotional charge. It simply was a fact and the developer would accept it as such, perhaps ask clarifying questions, then put it on their “To-Do” list as a high priority to fix after they were done with the feature they were currently implementing.

Most of the developers I worked with, appreciated my ability to stand in with the “Normies” for them. Equally, they understood that dealing with the cacophony of “Normie” feelings and demands in meetings was exhausting and could intuit my status with a glance. They left me be until I’d recharged in the protected and rarified energy of the engineering labs.

Engineers and developers aren’t ignorant of emotional cues, they simply don’t live every waking moment in emotional discord. They’ll generally protect one of their own or someone like me. It’s not about friendship, or Machiavellian plans. Protection is extended because persons A or B serve a vital function. Clean, impersonal, simple, direct… Binary.

As HR departments have become more interested in psychology, employee engagement & happiness, they’ve alienated developers and people like myself who lean more toward a non-human mindset.

HR departments hate engineering departments. HR creates a party atmosphere for a company event, they have streamers, and BBQ food, give out little trinket awards, expect everyone to enjoy over amplified music in a corporate parking lot and they call this team building.

Engineers and Developers see it this way. Parking is not possible in our usual spot. Will be late to the morning status meeting. Free food > food in lunch bag. Cold packs in lunch bag will not last the entire day. Alternate cold storage will be required, lunch bag will serve as dinner tonight. 11:30 HR function, most of development pod will file out, grab free food & drink, then go back to desks where there is adequate seating and temperature is optimal. Suboptimal music playing in parking lot will be a distraction, headphones required. Metallica playlist available. Fourth order equations for project must be programmed in C or Assembly to be effective. Consult with Alan to determine which path is likely to produce best outcome.

When the “Team Building” event begins, HR expects, and I’ve seen in some cases, demands that all employees remain in the designated party area. Their “logic” is to promote interaction between all departments.

The reality, is that the engineers and developers congregate with each other, plates and drinks in hand conversing about the daily work, project issues, and do not interact with other departments.

Often the software QA group forms a protective picket line between the “Normies” and the Engineering / Development staff. It’s sort of a QA thing, we like our Engineering / Development colleagues and know them well enough to understand social interactions may not be comfortable or pleasant for many of them. We’re tribal and protect our own.

QA & Engineering / Development interact well with each other, but are “strange ducks” in comparison to the rest of the departments. Sales people often attempt to breech the QA picket line in an attempt to gain future product development knowledge that they can sell as “current product” to enhance their sales numbers for the month.

Most, if not all, are intercepted by QA and distracted with questions about the latest sports teams or how their children from various wives are doing in various sports.

Obligatory “Time Present” value expires, Engineering / Development / QA refills plates and drinks then retreats to Optimal seating and temperature inside their labs.

HR is disappointed that engineering was not engaged, but consoles themselves with handing out reward trinkets to Sales/Marketing and Executive staff.

HR then begins planning next company event with further goal to force Engineering / Development / QA to participate.

In this, HR utterly fails to understand that Engineers / Developers / QA are completely different creatures. We’re the kind of people that figure out how to build atomic weapons not because we want to blow shit up or for wars. We do it, because it’s interesting and we’re curious if we can actually make it work.

As a side note, we’re the people that are often guided by a principal loosely attributed to Robert Oppenheimer & Albert Einstein: “Yes, we can do this thing… But should we? Can we be sure that this won’t be misused or cause irreparable harm?

I’ve been at companies where HR mandated Engineering / Development / QA participation at 2 or 3 consecutive corporate functions. Typically by the fourth mandated function, the Engineering / Development / QA department leaves the corporate campus 1/2 hour before the scheduled event.

During the mandated corporate event, Engineering / Development / QA are all at  the local microbrewery enjoying beer, food, camaraderie, and discussing resume refreshes because the company has come to appear more interested in “cross department team building” than giving them raises greater than 1% or actual completion of new products or projects.

It does not go un-noticed by Engineering / Development / QA that they’re driving shitbox cars while Sales / Marketing / HR are driving new Porsche’s, Teslas, Corvettes, Mercedes, BMW, or Range Rovers and wearing 125K Patek Phillippe watches.

Which leads back to job searches

Company A publishes an ad for a position.

Prospect B replies to that ad.

Months later

Company A sends email to Prospect B, “Are you still interested? If so, Respond ‘Yes’”

Prospect B responds “Yes”

Company A sends email containing several pages of screening questions to be filled out in essay format.

And you wonder why, many Engineers / Developers / QA people are somewhat antisocial.

Well, I must now apply my time to answering essay questions. I wonder if I could get an AI to do it? Perhaps I could, but should I? Sure! I don’t see any irreparable harm…

More Systems Gone

So my Starling hub updated today. That means that it no longer supports my legacy Nest login. 

Because I’m adamantly opposed to being forced to link my house to Google, I’ve retired the Starling. 

The practical upshot is that my Nest devices are no longer linked to HomeKit.  Now I have to use the Nest Application to control the thermostat, and the remaining Nest Protect is no longer accessible to HomeKit.

This was going to happen anyway in October. It’s just a few months ahead of schedule. 

It’s weird, it feels like the house is dying around me. That’s not a good feeling and adds to a bit of depression.

I’ve decided no more smart devices until, and unless, I’ve either got a new home or a job where I’m staying here in this house.

If it’s the former, I’ll probably be in an apartment and smart thermostats or smoke alarms. If it’s the latter, then whatever may come, I’m avoiding Google products from here on out.

It’s a pity, the Starling was a cool idea. It linked Nest/Google devices to HomeKit functionality. It was one of those things that was neat and just worked. Until today.

It’s a pity, I’m fairly certain that I’m not the only person that doesn’t appreciate Google being so damn intrusive.

Oh goody! Google is at it again!

I knew it was coming. I just didn’t think they’d move this quickly.

According to an email today, and it was confirmed in the news Google is discontinuing support for Gen 1 and Gen 2 Nest Thermostats. 

At first thought, I was like no big deal, then I read further into the email and found that not only are they no longer updating the internal software, they’e also going to be killing remote access to the unit.

Basically, my smart machine is going to get just as dumb as a regular thermostat but will retain scheduling ability. 

This sucks!

No more ability to control the house temperature if I’m away. That doesn’t sound like a big deal, but it’s really nice in winter to have the house in the 50s when I’m away, then tell Siri to warm the house up to something comfortable before I actually get there.

If you’ve got a regular schedule that can be programmed. If you don’t have a regular schedule then you come home to a freezing house and crank the thermostat to warm it up quick.

With either the preprogrammed schedule, or the remote commands, the temp is increased in shorter bursts over a longer time. It’s a bit more balanced and efficient.

I knew Google was going to do this. To their credit they have discounted their newest version of the machine but I’m not interested. Yes It’s a nice machine, expensive, but given how Google is behaving and that they want me to have a full Google account instead of the old Nest account I’m not inclined to get deeper into Google.

What I want is an ecosystem that just talks to HomeKit and does so locally between devices inside the house. I don’t really like even low level stuff like house controls bouncing all over the internet. I was willing to put up with HomeKit, and Google so long as the Thermostat and the Protect smoke were providing what I believe to be a reasonable level of integrated protection.

The night of the fire, the A/C did kick on and distributed the smoke throughout the house. It also fanned the fire. 

But with Google’s recent moves,

I’ve been looking at alternatives.

Regardless of my remaining in this house or not, it’s a good point to disconnect from Google. My Thermostat will get dumb in October. I’ve got until then to make some kind of decision.

Trouble is, most of the smart thermostats want an account, and in some cases they want you to have a paid monthly or yearly subscription. 

That makes me rethink the whole smart thermostat idea. The Nest thermostat saved me money over the years, and while it was under Nest’s control didn’t cost anything beyond the cost of the unit and giving some of my information to Nest via their app.

This new situation may cancel the savings of any potential unit. It might also be a sign that for me, going forward simplicity is the best path.

Always in the middle of the night!!!!

The second, of three, Nest Protect smoke alarms reached end of life.

I swear, I think smoke detectors in general are more of a pain in the ass than they’re worth. (I say that as someone who had a house burn down!)

I also have come to believe that the damn things are somehow built to sense sundown, then wait 6 hours before starting their bitching about low battery or malfunctions.

That’s only when they’re not going off because someone took a hot shower, or a bit of toast got overdone.

There’s nothing quite like being naked on a stepladder in the middle of the night trying to get one of these nuisance devices off the damn ceiling to shut it the hell up!

The modern machines all seem to have CO detectors in them and it’s the damn CO detector that goes out first. But rather than being able to tell the stupid machine, “Yes I get it, the CO detector is malfunctioning. There is another unit that is still functioning so stop chirping every 60 seconds and let us get some sleep…”

Nope! It’s gotta be taken care of right then. Like you’re going to be able to run out to the local hardware store at 2am and buy a replacement.

The Protects were literally the best of these nuisance machines. I’ve had these for 10 years and they have legitimately reached end of life. I’m not too annoyed, other than now I have to replace them with whatever bullshit machines are on the market today.

That’s thanks to Google’s masterful decision to keep fucking over Nest, (who they purchased a while back and have systematically destroyed.) Trust me, however much you hate Google, (and there are numerous reasons beside what they did to Nest,) it’s not enough.

I’ve hated smoke alarms since at least 1982. I had one in an apartment that pissed me off so much, (again at 3 am), that I leapt off the floor, snatched the damn thing from the ceiling and disemboweled it on the spot.

The Protect units were purchased after, at random, any one, of the three units installed in my house by the builder, started going off at random intervals for absolutely no reason. Always sometime between 1 and 3 am. (Not good if you’ve actually been in a house fire and are perhaps a little twitchy about fire!)

Those stupid machines were so bad we couldn’t use the stove in the kitchen without having the sliding doors and all the windows in the house open. Even then, it was 50/50 that they’d start that horrific screeching, reporting a fire that didn’t exist. This was only slightly more annoying than the smoke detectors in the previous house that burned, never raising a peep, even as they were consumed by fire.

But take too hot a shower… Then once again there you were, naked, throwing doors and windows open to make the damn things shut the hell up!

The Protects, solved most of those problems. I’m not looking forward to going back to the shitty overly sensitive machines.

Last night, at least, I knew what was going on. Even half asleep, I got the malfunctioning Protect off the ceiling. Unplugged it from the AC connection, pulled the backup batteries, and left the mess on the kitchen counter.

I don’t remember pulling the batteries, I was on auto pilot. I don’t even remember going back to bed.

From this you might infer that I’m very grumpy when my sleep is disturbed. That is true to a point.

If the source of the disturbance is the dog wanting out at some ungodly hour because he’s not feeling well. I’m totally fine with it. If it’s a child or even an adult that’s waking me for a legitimate reason, I’m not grumpy at all.

But a machine? (Including alarm clocks,) oh hell no! I loose my damn mind. This is especially true of a machine that’s decided to tell me about a low battery every 60 seconds at 4am.

Now my challenge is to strike a balance between price and minimal false alarms in my replacement smoke detectors. Truthfully, if the originally installed units weren’t wired into the house power, (and therefore there weren’t open holes in the ceiling where they were installed,) I’d be removing the mounting rings, spackling the screw holes over, and calling it a day.

What ever POS devices I choose, I take comfort in the high probability that I will not be living with the decision for long.

The Hum

Living where I do is generally quiet. Unless they’re doing work in the wash. Then it’s a constant beeping and grinding as heavy equipment rumbles up and down the wash moving dirt around.

We’ll not talk about the dust and debris that blows in on the wind.

But when I first moved into this house after I’d been here for about a month, suddenly there was “The Hum”. At first it was only something I could hear in the Master Bedroom. What was strange is that due to an acoustic oddity, I could only hear it in one relatively confined area in the bedroom. (Of course it happened to be on my side of the bed.) It drove me wild and disrupted my sleep. My loving partner switched sides of the bed with me, so that I could actually sleep because he couldn’t hear it.

Over time, “The Hum” grew such that I could hear it everywhere in the house and outside too.

Slowly, it stopped being a constant thing. It became intermittent and finally after years, it was gone.

I don’t actually hear “The Hum”…

That’s not entirely true, but I hear it more like the sounds you hear when you’re underwater. That soft area just behind your jaw near your earlobes. That’s where it feels like I’m hearing the sound.

For many years, I haven’t heard “The Hum”.

This morning, well before dawn, I woke with my jaw clenched, grinding my teeth. I laid there for a few moments trying to figure out what woke me up. Then I heard it. “The Hum” was back.

Only now, instead of being constant, it’s cycling up & down, then being entirely silent, then starts again. It’s like an annoying gnat buzzing around your ears that you can’t quite seem to kill. Just when you think it’s gone, buzzes into your ear canal to remind you it’s there and piss you off.

“The Hum,” is like that but worse for me. It’s right on the threshold of my hearing, just loud enough that it bothers me, but most other people can’t hear it at all. So I’m the crazy person!

I suspect that it’s originating from a water pump that’s at some distance from the house. I can hear “The Hum” very clearly inside the house, but outside it’s not as prominent.

I think it’s resonance in the ground, and somehow the house it picking it up an amplifying the sound.

The water company claims that it’s not them, I couldn’t possibly hear the pump, and drops all subsequent inquiries in the “Crazy Person” bin.

In an effort to determine if “The Hum” is originating in the house, I shut the power off. My thinking was that any and all electro-mechanical devices would power down so if “The Hum” remained, it was external, not something I was doing to myself.

“The Hum” never missed a beat.

The dog hears it too. He’s a lot better at ignoring it than I am. I suppose since it doesn’t represent an immediate threat, or treat he just figures it’s the price of living in the human world.

I know he hears it because if “The Hum” stops for a minute or so, then starts again he wakes up from his nap looks around, then goes back to sleep.

I’ll try wearing my AirPods with noise cancellation on. I don’t think they’ll help because where I feel the sound isn’t the ear canal. Maybe a full ear set of headphones would help.

I’d ignore “The Hum” if I could. Something about the sound disrupts my thought processes and keeps me right on the edge of being angry. The way it comes and goes makes my brain start looking for a pattern.

Sometimes, “The Hum” sounds like Morse code. With that kind of dot-dash-dot pattern, my brain thinks there’s something to decode and being on the threshold of hearing, drags my full attention to the sound even though I know it’s nothing.

I have the same problem with fluorescent lights. They all hum, and most of the time I hear them. If one is starting to go out I hear that too. One of the many reasons that school was so very difficult for me. I tried very hard to listen to the teacher, but the humming from the lights and their patterns always captured my attention more.

Incandescent light bulbs will start “ringing” about a day before they burn out. The first few years living my the other half, it drove him crazy that I’d walk in from work with light bulbs the very moment he’d turn on a light and it would flash and burn out. I think he thought I was doing something to the bulbs on purpose to freak him out.

Even LED bulbs “ring”, as do plug in transformers used to recharge devices. Braun trimmers and shavers are the loudest in this regard.

So now you know why I like to sit at the bottom of lakes, or pools, and why I like SCUBA even though that’s actually a bit noisy.