Just imagine what would happen if you had to select three interns, worked with them, liked a few of them - a lot - and then discovered that you can't choose them....
That was what happened to me last week. I went to the University to select three interns for our development, and I found a group of very good candidates.... that didn't speach English.
I was not asking too much, a good candidate for me what either a very good student, or a student that has been working throughout the university, whatever job, whenever place. There is a lot to learn in McDonalds about how to work in a team that can be very good in the working place. Little knowledge of Ruby / Python, passion for Open Source, willingness to learn, maturity to take decisions were part of the deal, but I could cope with it, and then English, just enough to work in a community where you have to interact.
I am still wondering how that is possible. XXI century, people that are finishing their studies in a technical field, that are used to read books in English, as there is no much literature on computer science that is properly translated... but not enough.
The direction was telling me they try to convince students to study English, and they try, but they don't listen. What kind of jobs are they trying to get? Any high level profile one will start with an English exam, even for jobs where English is seldom used... My 6 years old has a better accent than most of them.. (yes, I am angry because I could see the potential)
So at the end I have a great candidate that will work with us, and two pending positions for what I will need to start searching again good candidates... This time in the selected group of people that can speak more than one language.
This is being fun, and quite tiresome.
