Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Orbit — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 00:05:14 GMT

this is false, all of the interns on the link you posted come from IVY league schools while the majority don't goto ivy league schools, Yeah Microsoft hires college graduates but they come from Ivy league schools..

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

steven_sinofsky — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 04:36:56 GMT

I'm not sure which link, but out on our web site the full time and interns represented in the "meet them" sections are from: waterloo, stanford, michigan state, tuskeegee, rice, carnegie-mellon, harvard, and university of illinois.

So there was one ivy league represented.

I don't know if the site rotates people throughout the day though.

Having just printed up the t-shirts for Office this year, I can say that for Office the interns come from 54 different universities and colleges this summer. We print the schools represented for the summer on the t-shirt!

Our full time hires will come from an even broader array of schools, especially internationally.

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Orbit — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 08:22:07 GMT

All of those are distinguished schools..plus does MSFT have a network protocol team?, I'm a networking guy and would want to apply for a internship in the future, I would presume C,C++?

plus how hard is getting a Internship?

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Szymon Rozga — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 20:03:40 GMT

There's nothing wrong with hiring from distinguished schools. Although many great programmers do not have a 'distinguished school' caliber college education, the great majority do. And if a company hires at prestigious schools, it is because they know that there is a much higher chance of finding great talent in such schools. And truth is, if you are a company that wants to hire good talent, you're gonna go where the good talent is.

Also, I know of Physics, Information Science and History majors who program and are great at it and could easily compete with many CS majors in the Cornell CS department.

Microsoft internship interview: it's quite a challenge I hear.

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Dave — Fri, 12 Aug 2005 08:09:59 GMT

One discipline that is noticably absent from your list is design.
http://www.microsoft.com/resources/design/

It really should be a part of the "triad" of development you talk about. Leaving design to Dev, Test, and PM is a gamble. Sometimes you win (like with MSN Explorer), but more often than not, you lose.

Also, a better, more recent book on Program Management is The Art of Project Management, just published by ex-MSFT PM Scott Berkun.
http://tinyurl.com/7lyba

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

steven_sinofsky — Fri, 12 Aug 2005 08:18:37 GMT

Design is an integral part of the product development process for office. I could not agree more!

Not every aspect of the product requires product design skills (say the XML file format, SharePoint clustering) so when speaking in generalities about the process I do not generally include it. The designer referenced in the link you sent was hired into the Office team and spent a good part of his career working with us on Office :) I bet he would vouch for the critical role of design!

If you want to be fully inclusive, then you would list: program management, development, testing, product design, usability, product planning, product managmement, product support, localization, and maybe even a bit of general management and administrative support. All of these are critical members of the team that it takes to bring a product like Microsoft Office to market.

And incidently all of them are roles you can be hired for directly from college!

Thanks for the pointer on the book. Project management is one aspect of program management but by no means the focus (particularly with respect to the focus of this blog). The role is definitely well described in the Cusumano book. I will certainly check out this book.

--steven

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Dave — Sat, 13 Aug 2005 02:35:15 GMT

Thanks for the response. I'd argue that even your SML file format needs to be designed, especially if it's an API you're release to developers. If it's going to be useful and understandable by developers, you need someone who understands the needs of these developers and how they think about file formats and APIs. Maybe the PM or the Dev knows this, but maybe they don't. From my time at MS, I've seen far too many projects go awry by PM, Dev, and Test getting too caught up in what's cool, or what's possible, rather than what's needed and what's useful. I think IntelliMenus is a pretty good example of this.

I think Scott used the term "Project Management" for his book title since that's a more widely recognized and accepted concept. However, it's pretty much all about his 10 years of MS PM experience. Here's a review by a current MS PM:
http://tinyurl.com/aw6x2

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Chris_Pratley — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 12:23:08 GMT

Dave, in Office PMs are expected to be able to design such things as file formats and APIs (and UI and user experiences). If they couldn't, they'd just be project managers. If the PM gets distracted by what is cool but not useful then they are just not a good PM. A "designer" is usually concerned more with the user experience and visuals, so they do not typically get involved in things that have no UI and they are often not very "technical" compared to PMs.

Intellimenus was an attempt to do what we thought we were being asked by customers to do back in those days - control "bloat". Many of the problems with Intellimenus were known at the time but it was felt that the value of addessing the customer concern around bloat outweighed those issues. As an idea it has some merits, but in retrospect it wasn't really the right approach to address that problem.

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Jude — Thu, 18 Aug 2005 16:34:48 GMT

Thankfully I have a CS major. But I would like to add to this thread by referring to JobsBlog's Jobster site. In there is a description about the role and requirements for a PM. Most of the items mentioned concur with what Steven had described.

At the same time, they also mentioned that the qualification they seek include a BS in Computer Science/Computer Engineering or a related discipline (Math, Physics, EE, etc)/ equivalent work experience. This could imply that Joe with a BA, who may have the attributes describe in your entry, might not get pass the gatekeepers at JobsBlog since they are the recruiters for the PM role.

Maybe this is an opportunity to sync the differences in requirements between the hiring managers and the “gatekeepers”?

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Francesco Esposito — Tue, 13 Sep 2005 23:54:23 GMT

Just a quick note, those who were crticizing MS for only hiring from ivy league schools are just lieing. My buddy from Michigan State just got back from an internship, and last time I checked MSU isn't Ivy leugue. If anything is true, it is that microsoft doesn't really care where you go to school. If you know what your doing and have a passion for being the best in software development you've got a better chance then a chaunce from Harvard.

Either way, quick question, if MS doesn't scout at your school specificaly, can you travel to another school in your area and apply at their internship fair? I go to Wayne State University and could go to the internship fairs at University of Michigan or Michigan State, i just want to make sure its allowed.

If you don't post replies on your blog, you can back chan. me by emailing AP0549 AT Wayne.edu (at = @, trying to ward off the spam bots).

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

SDS — Tue, 25 Oct 2005 04:23:37 GMT

Hello Steve,

Read your blog, interested me a lot. I have cleared 3 phone interviews and I am not invited to Redmond for interview for a PM position.

While i consider myself a passionate person in terms of software....I have a slight phobia of coding. Yes I do have a software engineering degree...and I can simplify all the complex thoughts via algorithms, but if someone asks me to write code (may it be 10 lines) I freeze, and i think my this attitude can make me lose the career oppurtunity at MS.

I have been having this Coding Phobia since i started Software Engineering, I can eventually get over it but the first thought is always scary for reason that makes my hands n feet cold. Can you provide me some suggestions regaridng how to do good in the interview and get over this phobia?

I do not want to lose the career oppurtunity due to this phobia.

Sincerely
SDS.

PS - I am not sure if this is the right place to discuss.

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

SDS — Tue, 25 Oct 2005 04:37:20 GMT

Typo in the earlier post.

I am NOW invited to Redmond (disregard NOT)

-SDS

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

slashx — Tue, 14 Feb 2006 13:41:05 GMT

The censored elitist barometer of employment at MS is mensa level I.Q.
Look at some (in)famous MS almuni bloggers

www.joelonsoftware.com
www.wesnermoise.com
www.sellsbrothers.com
www.netcrucible.com\weblog

the list goes on...
these are the sort of people who boast in solving very complex abstract problems in minutes and when these sort of people interview you, they will like to hire one of their own.
You might be very passionate about software and wanting to bring changes into the world by software as a tool but dude superior intelligence is what gets you into MS !.

Let me qoute Joel on his article "The Guerilla guide to interviewing" --->"If you have some idiot savant who happens to be very good at SQL programming at the moment but incapable(!?) of learning any other topic ,its a no hire"
When i try to think about what sort of ppl does MS really want, i think the sort of ppl who will solve the prisoners puzzle (www.techinterview.org) in 5minutes in a tense room with 5 ppl drinking coffee looking at you

re: Do you have to be a computer science major to work on Microsoft products? NO you don't.

Debt Loan — Wed, 22 Mar 2006 12:22:31 GMT

very informative site with lots of useful info

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