Ask HN: How to deal with inexperienced interviewers? • Hacker News Board

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

#41

Post by BillinghamJ » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 12:56 PM UTC

gavriel wrote: post #22

>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…

Your comment was dead. Looks like you were shadowbanned due to your previous comments. I have vouched for this one, as it seems reasonable.

Downvoting this seems strange... it’s pretty standard practice to explain why you’ve vouched for a dead comment.

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

#42

Post by TeeWEE » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 12:59 PM UTC

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…

I think this interviewer was not that bad actually. He checked your problem solving skills, and he ensured you knows some textbook basics. That's fine. Thats what we do too: In the first interview ensure the candidate satifies the minimum requirements, and is a problem solver.

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

#43

Post by Beltiras » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:00 PM UTC

akerro wrote: post #18

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…

>they completely changed the job description >the stress of interviewing and having to refresh my knowledge of CS trivia I was recently visiting a friend from uni, he wanted to start working in a bigger company, so he took his chances on Amazon (they had office 10min walk from where he lived). He applied for Java/C++ backend role with some indication that's related to robotics. First week interviewer told him to refr…

For the interested, this is the page referred to: https://sites.google.com/site/thefaceofamazon/

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

#44

Post by endymi0n » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:02 PM UTC

Here's the secret: Don't apply for those jobs and cut your losses short by finishing the interview yourself and walking out.

TL;DR: Bad interviews are a strong, pretty reliable symptom of a lack of good company culture.

What few people understand is that interviews aren't just for the employer, they are also your chance to choose who you're working for, what you get to know and how to progress your career. Your colleagues are the people who you will regularly spend more time awake with than your spouse.

They say "you don't leave a company, you leave a boss" — and it's true. Interviews are exactly the other side of this coin: You will usually sit across the table of your future boss. So choose well, as your choice will have a profound impact on your wellbeing for next few years, impacting work-life balance, chances and hirability afterwards.

Don't screw it up and just politely leave as soon as possible.

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

#45

Post by TeeWEE » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:02 PM UTC

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.

Live coding and knowing why we have BigO and what it means is a hard requirement for us for senior candidates. We even dive deep into UDP vs TCP and the differences. You don't need to know this always, but if things go bad, i rather have a collegue on my side that understands this stuff.

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

#46

Post by TeeWEE » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:04 PM UTC

I think the best way to handle it is: Sit trough the interview. At good companies you get to talk to more than 1 person, and a group of persons decide whether you get hired. If you really want to join the company you are interviewing with, then just try to get trough this interview, and try to make the best of out it. The company you are interviewing with also has limited developers time, and developers need to get an idea of your skill in a short amount of time. Try to be the nice person. Or try a different company if it gives you the bad buzz.

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

#47

Post by skmvasu » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:27 PM UTC

I had the exact same problem with an interviewer recently. He came in with a preconceived notion to reject and kept moving the conversation towards that.

He was interviewing me for a Sr. Engg role , and his first question was what is the difference between Server side and Client side scripting. I took it in good humor and answered him. He stunned me by saying "That's not what I was looking for. You should have just said server side scripting runs on the server and client side runs on the client" :P

I know I should have hung up there, but I was referred by a friend so had to sit through the entire hour.

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

#48

Post by david-gpu » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:32 PM UTC

TeeWEE wrote: post #42

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…

I think this interviewer was not that bad actually. He checked your problem solving skills, and he ensured you knows some textbook basics. That's fine. Thats what we do too: In the first interview ensure the candidate satifies the minimum requirements, and is a problem solver.

You are getting downvoted, but I agree. A first phone _screening_ is meant to discard candidates that are clearly not a good fit for the role. Lots of small technical questions are a good way to go about it.

Once you bring the candidate onsite you can ask deeper and more open questions. A phone is simply not a good medium for this.

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

#49

Post by lostboys67 » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:36 PM UTC

dcminter wrote: post #33

lostboys67 wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Unless you were offered the position and declined it that would always be ascribed to sour grapes. Regardless of merit.

No Gross incompetence and interviewer wearing such a soiled and scruffy t-shirt I would not use to do the gardening.

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

#50

Post by Piskvorrr » Mon, Nov 20, 2017, 1:52 PM UTC

TeeWEE wrote: post #42

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…

I think this interviewer was not that bad actually. He checked your problem solving skills, and he ensured you knows some textbook basics. That's fine. Thats what we do too: In the first interview ensure the candidate satifies the minimum requirements, and is a problem solver.

I think that the scope of the interview should have been more explicit in such a case - up front, ideally: "this is a first-level interview, I expect it to take an hour and a half; if you're successful, we will get to the specifics in the next one." Without an introduction, an hour of general quizzes would seem excessive to me.

OTOH, if the recruiter reacted to this expectations mismatch with an equivalent of "no explanations are given", I would have bailed, too: the interview is a two-way street, and both sides are interviewing - "do I want to work in such a company culture as evidenced by the recruiter"?