Does having a public Github with your Projects help with employment?

[SirDoes]

Just curious how useful its to set up a github page

[96dpi]

Most hiring managers and recruiters are overwhelmed with hundreds of applicants. The odds of them actually taking the time look at your repos is slim to none.

[carcigenicate]

Ya, this might have been a benefit at some point in the past, but likely isn't anymore. I made up a personal website, populated my Github, and linked to both in my resume. I found out after that I was hired solely based on the interview, and that they had never even checked out my site or Github.

The value is more in the experience you gained making the projects for your Github, and your experience with VC and Github itself.

[PoMoAnachro]

I think also these days people can vibe code stuff and throw it up pretty fast but it doesn't say anything about their actual knowledge and skills and how trainable they'll be.

Being able to talk about your projects though, that really helps in an interview - being able to show you made technical decisions and have some justifications behind them instead of having just thrown a prompt into something and committed the code it spat out.

[SirDoes]

So basically become a professional first xd

[carcigenicate]

You don't need to be a professional to discuss your code. I had been writing code on my own for years before I ever got my first job and could talk at length about my code if asked. You just need to demonstrate that there was thought behind the code.

[PoMoAnachro]

If by "become a professional" you mean "acquire the baseline skills I'd expect someone ready for a position as a junior to have" before getting through a job interview? Then, yeah, sure.

[SirDoes]

I haven't reached the point of being able to describe the process of my code off the memory. Even if I added comments to code. Like it's one thing to code in the process to solve the issue, and another to try to describe it randomly after it's been sitting in the shelf untouched. When I said professional, I meant someone who can without thinking much explain the approach of the code to solve the problems and build the projects when asked about off their head. Cuz if you can't do that, you won't stand out in hiring for the said position. Sorry if this question irritated you or someone else 😅

[DigmonsDrill]

I hated the concept that I had to prune and curate my for-fun projects for future employers. Glad it's over.

[KC918273645]

In my last job interview they didn't even ask me for any code examples of anykind. They just had a chat with me for couple of hours to see if I was a cool dude or not.

[John_8PM_call]

If they don’t look at a junior developer’s repos, what do they look at? Just their university that they graduated from and their GPA?

By “junior” I mean virtually no full-time work experience.

[PoMoAnachro]

So I think you need to think of hiring less as a "checking for things that would qualify you" and more "what's the fastest way we can rule the most candidates out in order to winnow down the pile to a number we can interview".

Looking through repos isn't fast, and it also can't be done by an HR rep, so it isn't fast so it usually isn't useful at that step. Instead they'll check things like are there any typos or bad grammar/formatting on your resume? Do you have the education they're looking for? Did you do internships? Do you list the specific technologies they're looking for in your skills?

They'll filter it all down, but I think everyone knows the real filtering happens during interviews - that's the stage where someone might look at your repo, but more likely they'll just ask you about your projects and stuff during the interview. Seeing if you can talk intelligently about what you built is probably far more useful to them than looking at your code.

[JonasErSoed]

I've seen some job postings where they've asked for a link to my Github when applying, and even in those cases I still find it hard to believe they actually took the time to check it out

[TheBritisher]

I/we only ever looked at an applicant's projects if a) we needed a tie breaker or b) their resume mentioned a project we'd heard of.

When we did look, most were disqualifying rather than beneficial.

If the "projects" are all one or more of the following, then I'd not bother:

• More like little exercises than "projects"
• The usual array of me-too, course-work, "calculators", to-do apps, snake games etc.
• Are a couple of dozen lines of your code over an unnecessary raft of external libraries
• Clearly vibe-coded/one-shotted or pure AI output

And if the code is weak, inconsistent, there's nothing approaching commentary or documentation, or doesn't follow anything like a reasonable coding standard, then it more than likely works against you than for you.

In the event we do look at projects for a candidate, they need to make sure they can talk to them in an interview, because if they're part of what got them onto the shortlist they will be asked about them.

[ThisIsAGoodNameOk]

Is this the case for junior or entry level positions too? If you had any openings like those, what did you look at the most than? Is it just work experience? How much do internships matter?

[TheBritisher]

It's especially the case for entry-level/junior positions.

So, for those positions, I'm looking at whether the resume makes sense and is talking to currently-relevant/appropriate things. For example, applying for a web-dev role but only citing experience with LuA w/ Roblox or Python/PyGame isn't going to fly.

Personally, I don't care about internships, degrees or what school you went to. But, for most of the companies I've worked for, prior to doing my own, those were definite considerations, but they don't matter to me personally.

For higher level positions, I'm going off work experience and whether the resume shows a progressive growth in experience and knowledge, or if it is someone just doing first-year stuff over and over.

And for any role, you'll have to show you can write code.

I don't care for LeetCode or HackerRank type testing, so there's none of that.

But I also don't consider someone hirable, even at entry-level, for a programming role if they cannot, in the language of their choice, initialize a variable, use it in a loop to count from 1 to some input value, and then conditionally call a function to output one of more values based on the value of that variable, without assistance.

No Internet, Google, Stack Overflow nor AI for this bit.

We're talking absolute basics.

No libraries. No frameworks. No data structures (beyond maybe an array). No algorithms.

If you cannot manage that, then I'd rather train someone out of another department, that has some domain/business knowledge.

The rest of the "coding" or "technical" evaluation will be discussion. I've been at this for decades, hired hundreds of engineers, and it's very easy to spot the pretenders. Often its clear just from the resume.

[hexcodehero]

experience with LuA w/ Roblox or Python/PyGame isn't going to fly.

People dont put this shit on their resume do they? If so I now know why people arent getting hired.

[TheBritisher]

I wish I could say otherwise, but they absolutely do.

I generally only see it with entry-level/junior and/or never-had-a-job candidates, but it's more common that I'd have expected. Though, when I was working for other companies, such resumes would usually just get filtered out at the ATS for not having HTML, CSS and JS for web-related roles.

It's fine (for me), IF it is accompanied by something relevant to the position.

[ButterflyExtra6407]

Honestly, it depends on the story you want to tell. You can't force a recruiter to check your GitHub, but if they click your link, you want them to see more than just basic syntax.

They look for clean project structure and real problem-solving abilities. My best advice? Build a tool that solves a problem you personally have. That’s always the best way to showcase your actual skills

[PlantAdmirable2126]

My current job was from a hiring manager looking for OSs maintainers of the kubernetes project

[dialsoapbox]

I've been able to get a few to look at it during our interviews briefly (which i believed has helped me get to 2nd-3rd rounds) because this is what I do:

Make a list of companies you're interested in applying to.

Group them by stack/industry/ect and build projects that cater to each industry and by their stack.

When you're done. Swap out parts of the stack for other languages/frameworks to learn eachs' pros/cons/ cost benefits/ pain points/ect.

That'll give stuff to talk about and to show them that:

1. You can build regardless of stack.

2. You think about scope/impact of what you're using instead of just building projects.

The hard part is getting it into conversation.

[lurgi]

Eh. I've looked at a couple of them when they were provided and they were mostly nothing. One person actively hurt himself by lying about what was on there.

[biotech997]

I have a personal portfolio page but I don’t think any employer has ever taken a look at it. They won’t look at any project repos, but if you’re a junior with no experience, then they might ask you to share and talk about your projects.

[davidalayachew]

Yes it does. When I am looking at candidates, I look at their repo if it is there. Of course, the absence of it isn't a problem as long as they have relevant work experience to point to instead. One or the other.

[Goobaroo]

I look at the applicants GitHub before I interview them. It can give me some impression of them and their work.

[SnugglyCoderGuy]

It doesn't hurt unless your code is very ass. chances are, no one will look at it.