nominal years of experience != actual XP gained

many established co's fail to grasp this

thread:

XP does not accumulate linearly. How much XP you gain depends on your capacity for introspection, your feedback loops, the mentorship & coaching you receive.

Qualifying experience by number of years is a failed measure.

Sure, including nominal years of experience as a requirement for a job role can be a good filtering mechanism, allowing a co to streamline their recruiting by not having to go through *actually* inexperienced candidates, saving $$ and time

problems arise when the years of XP requirement starts to be Goodhart-ed

"When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure".

remembering one application I had done for a senior role at a mid-sized co; had ~2 years of XP at the time, with the co asking for 4+.

Feedback was that, despite having XP in the tasks required, I can't be considered for a senior role due to not fulfilling the years of XP req.

this hard insistence on nominal years was exacerbated by the fact that the recruiter was new to the company, so she was strongly incentivized to follow the co's guidelines

friends have told me about similar situations they've been involved in; being filtered out due to nominal years of XP — this oftentimes being thinly-veiled ageism

(cc @anthilemoon)

the consequences of this practice for co's are plenty:
- overlooking strong, ambitious, talent
- hiring more war-weary, conforming professionals
- culture becomes more uniform, deferential, "law-abiding"
- culture disintegrates, becomes more corpie, unappealing to top talent

become unappealing to top talent, have a culture that operates conformingly and you slowly become ripe for disruption.

Stop measuring XP purely based on years