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Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

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Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#21

Post by LandR »

MarkCole wrote: post #11
git-pull wrote: post #6

I am at my wits end. I am getting exhausted and drained in these interviews. There are times where I just botch interviews. Here and there, I look back and realize I came off the wrong way, like wow, I did that. But I reflect, and strive to get better. Sometimes it's just not a fit. Or someone comes along that's a better option than me. But there is a growing pocket of places I interview at where they blatantly lie,…

Sometimes in an interview its better to just say "This is not the right job for me" and end it yourself. I've done that a few times now for various reasons. Sometimes simply just because I know I probably wouldn't like to have the interviewer as a Colleague or Boss. If I thought I was interviewing for a Django/Python job and they completely changed the job description on me I'd have probably cut it right there. You c…

I interviewed for one position where it was C# and SQL.

Come interview technical test, they start asking JS questions. I asked if their would be JS in the role, as it wasn't specified anywhere, I've never done JS, don't want to do JS.

They sorta dodged the question a bit and continued to ask me JS questions. Which was pointless as I had no clue.

The whole interview they both sat their looking incredibly smug adn the whole interview had a definite sense of hostility and them trying to prove they were smarter than me.

I let the recruiter know straight after that I had no intention of going back for a second interview.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#22

Post by gavriel »

>try to assert that your professional experience and knowledge is somehow inferior to theirs (or at least make you feel that way).

I had this exact situation happen a while ago. I applied for a front-end developer role and the interviewer insisted on asking questions about the deep internals of node. And whenever I gave a satisfactory answer he would immediately tell me an alternative answer, as if mine isn't somehow good enough. The entire interview just felt like he had to one up me at all times.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#24

Post by rocco337 »

margorczynski wrote: post #15

For me an instant turn-off is live coding (I get too stressed) and pointless academic questions that have nothing to do with the things I would be doing there. And to be honest after I experience that combo I usually give up cause that means most people there were chosen based on that.

Interviewer: Can you explain me linked list structure? Candidate: blah bla blah .... Interviewer: Great. Can you tell me where linked list structure is commonly used? Candidate: On job interviews

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#25

Post by vsc »

Some five years ago, I was having a phone interview for a company that were looking for people specializing in embedded programming with solid knowledge of OS internals and assembly. It seemed a great fit for me as that was what I have been doing since the start of my professional career.

As soon as the phone call started, the interviewer asked a puzzle question which had absolutely nothing to do with what I would eventually have to do if I got the offer. Bemused, I promptly solved the puzzle. He went on to ask three more puzzles after that. I solved each one of them. Now, it had already been 20 minutes into the interview and not one relevent question had been asked. I was getting a bit edgy.

He then went on to ask me textbook questions like difference between a process and a thread, types of memory management and so on.

It was one hour into the interview and he hadn't asked meaningful question that could justify the lofty requirements they had mentioned of their desirable candidate in the Job description.

When after around 1 hour, he asked me another puzzle, I politely asked him the relevence of that question with respect to the job. He told me that since he was the one interviewing me, he got to decide what was relevent and what was not.

I told him that I would like to end the interview right there. He protested. I hung up.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#26

Post by zelos »

expertentipp wrote: post #20
MarkCole wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometimes in an interview its better to just say "This is not the right job for me" and end it yourself. I've done that a few times now for various reasons. Sometimes simply just because I know I probably wouldn't like to have the interviewer as a Colleague or Boss. If I thought I was interviewing for a Django/Python job and they completely changed the job description on me I'd have probably cut it right there. You c…

> "This is not the right job for me" and end it yourself. I've done that a few times now for various reasons. I think this is the only weapon the interviewed person has. Not applying is not a solution as it will lead to even more disconnection. Apply, talk with people, disconnect when the bullshit level is too high. Looking for years of experience in your exact Angular/React stack? Cheerio.

> Looking for years of experience in your exact Angular/React stack? Cheerio.

Yes, I don't understand that kind of thing either. Getting up to speed on something like React takes, what, a week or two? Frameworks are the easy bit of development.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#27

Post by srean »

rocco337 wrote: post #24
margorczynski wrote: post #15

For me an instant turn-off is live coding (I get too stressed) and pointless academic questions that have nothing to do with the things I would be doing there. And to be honest after I experience that combo I usually give up cause that means most people there were chosen based on that.

Interviewer: Can you explain me linked list structure? Candidate: blah bla blah .... Interviewer: Great. Can you tell me where linked list structure is commonly used? Candidate: On job interviews

Linked list of buffers are pretty useful for ferrying data in and out fast when you cannot allocate a lot of contiguous memory.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#28

Post by LandR »

BigJono wrote: post #19
qualitytime wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll raise my hand. When I look back it seems I'm experienced at hearing other peoples software requirements and implementing them. From university to the workplace, I seem to be very good since those who receive the end result always benefit. Done it so many times, for others and for my own ideas. But check this out, occasionally in a dry period, when I feel I should find a job and get an interview. I get asked a pu…

Don't get me started on the framework buzzword bullshit. I'm so sick of developers that launch into 50 tool stacks just to tick the boxes. Whether it's resume driven development or just plain ignorance, it seems to be pervasive. I hate that every other interaction I have with the developer community is suggesting that a newbie back up a few steps and understand the problem they're trying to solve before introducing a…

We are also interviewing at the minute and I can't believe how low the bar is for people to claim they are software developers.

I'm sure these learn to be a web developer in 8 weeks courses don't help, but even people with years of experience seem to be absolutely hopeless.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#29

Post by lostboys67 »

vsc wrote: post #25

Some five years ago, I was having a phone interview for a company that were looking for people specializing in embedded programming with solid knowledge of OS internals and assembly. It seemed a great fit for me as that was what I have been doing since the start of my professional career. As soon as the phone call started, the interviewer asked a puzzle question which had absolutely nothing to do with what I would ev…

If I was really pissed of id have written to the CEO and HR director pointing out that there procedures needed "some improvement"

I almost did this after a disastrous interview at AKQA a while back.

Re: Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers?

#30

Post by lostboys67 »

LandR wrote: post #28
BigJono wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't get me started on the framework buzzword bullshit. I'm so sick of developers that launch into 50 tool stacks just to tick the boxes. Whether it's resume driven development or just plain ignorance, it seems to be pervasive. I hate that every other interaction I have with the developer community is suggesting that a newbie back up a few steps and understand the problem they're trying to solve before introducing a…

We are also interviewing at the minute and I can't believe how low the bar is for people to claim they are software developers. I'm sure these learn to be a web developer in 8 weeks courses don't help, but even people with years of experience seem to be absolutely hopeless.

Sounds like you are not offering enough or have a poor recruitment consultant
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