Software Engineer Hiring Anti-Pattern #3: Overemphasizing ‘X Years of Experience’

Years of experience don’t necessarily align with skill levels.

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In this series:

• Anti-Pattern #1: Asking About Impractical Knowledge the Team Hasn’t Used in Years
• Anti-Pattern #2: Too Many Rounds of Interview
• Anti-Pattern #3: Overemphasizing ‘X Years of Experience’

It’s quite common to see job ads specifying the ‘minimum years of experience’ required. Here are two examples I quickly found on an Australian job-seeking site.

“Minimum 5 years’ experience in a test automation role.”

“7+ years’ relevant work experience in Java”

Honestly, I don’t agree with that. For example, before 2005, I worked as a Java developer for eight years, with the last five years in a senior developer contractor role. However, after learning E2E test automation (not at a master level yet) through pair programming with a world-class programmer, my coding productivity increased at least three times within three months, and then 10X+ the following year.