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Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

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Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#71

Post by poulsbohemian »

mpeg wrote: post #50
emehex wrote: post #16

I found myself interviewing with a hedge fund last year because they liked some of my open source stuff (and approach to API design)... I had about six conversations with a bunch of the team and a conversation with the CEO to sell me on the position. The last step was a seventh “conversation” with the Chief Data Officer to figure out if this was something I really wanted. The CDO had different ideas… he joined the Zo…

I came into this thread to comment about a similar experience. Had a call set up with the company founder for a consulting role, for me generally this means an informal chat where they share the pains they're experiencing, I share my background and thoughts related to fixing those kind of pains and, if we both determine we can see it working, I put together a proposal. However, instead of the founder, an engineer amb…

I had a small consulting firm for a few years, and spent a few years as a solo consultant as well... what you describe is probably above all else what drove me away from that business model. Often I would walk in as "the sales guy" and they would want to turn it into a full blown technical interview. Disrespectful and a waste of everyone's time.

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#72

Post by mpeg »

emehex wrote: post #55
mpeg wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came into this thread to comment about a similar experience. Had a call set up with the company founder for a consulting role, for me generally this means an informal chat where they share the pains they're experiencing, I share my background and thoughts related to fixing those kind of pains and, if we both determine we can see it working, I put together a proposal. However, instead of the founder, an engineer amb…

I’m sorry that happened to you. Do you think that the engineer that ambushed you felt threatened by your candidacy? I’ve been around a bunch of engineers who hate hiring to “raise the bar”…

It's possible, I have also seen that, especially in small companies where everyone is very protective of their turf. I also had a terrible interview experience years after that where I was being interviewed for a CTO position by the company COO and the CTO that was leaving.

The CTO was really harsh in the interview, he gave me a bunch of brain teaser questions, followed by some algorithms questions where he was expecting one correct answer and would interrupt me if I was going a different way. We barely had any of what I would expect would be proper questions for a CTO interview (eg stakeholder management, people management, technical architecture)

It was so bad that the COO sent me a personal note apologising after the interview, but said that they had to go with the CTOs judgement on who was better qualified to succeed him. That was a pretty surreal experience and I think it was because the CTO already had someone in mind to replace him.

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#73

Post by stingraycharles »

emehex wrote: post #51
stingraycharles wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s not bombing the interview in my book, that’s just being thrown in front of a bus. Seems like they have terrible hiring practices.

The whole process was pretty informal as I never actually applied (they reached out because of my code!) I’ll never know exactly what happened, but it I had to guess I think the CDO felt undermined by the “rogue” employees who sourced me as a candidate and pushed me through the process without his consultation…

Still sounds like a terrible hiring practice. You can have an informal hiring but still do it proper; at least make sure all the stakeholders are aligned.

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#74

Post by mpeg »

poulsbohemian wrote: post #71
mpeg wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came into this thread to comment about a similar experience. Had a call set up with the company founder for a consulting role, for me generally this means an informal chat where they share the pains they're experiencing, I share my background and thoughts related to fixing those kind of pains and, if we both determine we can see it working, I put together a proposal. However, instead of the founder, an engineer amb…

I had a small consulting firm for a few years, and spent a few years as a solo consultant as well... what you describe is probably above all else what drove me away from that business model. Often I would walk in as "the sales guy" and they would want to turn it into a full blown technical interview. Disrespectful and a waste of everyone's time.

Isn't it just great? In my experience it's often the in-house technical team that ends up being overprotective about their turf.

And I kinda get it, I've been in-house tech leadership for companies where consultants have been pushed on me because they're someone's cousin or because they're a big company and therefore immediately trusted. But it can be frustrating...

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#76

Post by mpeg »

1attice wrote: post #56
mpeg wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are also frameworks like solidjs which have similar syntax to React but avoid the complexity of hooks with a simpler API and no hook rules. Classes are not the only solution

Lately I've been investigating Svelte. It looks really good, but I think I'm going to stick with React/Nextjs simply because of the ecosystem and switching cost. Again, this isn't 'American Idol for frameworks'; I'm not picking React because I think it's the best, or even better. I'm picking React because of the habitat, and because that habitat is now, in a sense, my hometown.

Yeah of course, you always have to do what is best for your company/clients and React is always a great choice (can't beat the ecosystem)

It's the same reason why I non-ironically recommend Wordpress to a lot of people that have super limited budgets and want the moon.

I do enjoy trying all the different new approaches to UI development though, especially as I'm not a frontend developer so most of the time I write frontend code I'm building either internal tools or personal projects, so I get to experiment a lot.

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#77

Post by 13of40 »

ikiris wrote: post #25

If you've bombed an interview in a skillset that you've done productive work in, the fault is with the design of the interview. This doesn't mean that you won't be expected to skill up in the different set to pass those interviews, but don't take it personally either way. As an example, almost no bit of coding work is done in an environment with no reference material, no autocompletion, no compiler feedback, and no d…

Whenever I interview vendors or contractors, I have a little bit of leeway from following company policy, so I sit them in front of a computer with Visual Studio and internet and tell them they can use whatever resources they want to solve the problem.

From the other side, I haven't had a technical interview for a few years, but back when I did, I eventually addressed the whiteboard thing by bringing a laptop and telling the interviewer that I suck at whiteboarding code, and I'd like to do it for real instead. I think I've tried that in three interview loops and gotten the job twice.

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#78

Post by 13of40 »

dzek69 wrote: post #59
poulsbohemian wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly why so many of us get so frustrated with the state of technical interviews / technical hiring / HR at tech firms in general. The interviews seem designed as some kind of frat-like hazing gauntlet rather than a legitimate discussion / demonstration of how this professional could contribute to and benefit the organization.

I like the just talking approach. The best jobs I had when the interview was just talk. But on the other hand so many people totally lie about their experience I can't believe it. People tend to have misleading cvs and overexaggerate their responsibilities very often. It makes me sad, because we can't just hire and continue the project, we need to spend few months getting people into the project, "giving a chance", t…

> misleading cvs

If you want a real chuckle, go look at the LinkedIn profiles of some of those "few-monthers" and take a look at how epic and groundbreaking their contribution was when they worked for you.

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#79

Post by kevin_vanilla »

nobody10 wrote: post #8

I have so many stories that I bombed the interviews, but this is probably the most interesting one. In 2008 I was searching for my first full time job. At the time a social network company flew me out to SF from Toronto for interview. I was promised a 5-hour block but only lasted 3 hours before they walked me out. I don't remember the questions, but I do remember that the VP of Engineering at the time was browsing hi…

Wow! It's amazing how much stuff can come back around in the tech world... A nice reminder to not burn bridges :) Thanks for sharing!

Re: Ask HN: Tell me about how you bombed a technical interview

#80

Post by kevin_vanilla »

joncfoo wrote: post #17

1. I froze during a whiteboard interview where I was asked to pretty print a tree in front of two people. Performance anxiety made me implode and stumble so much that I failed to implement basic recursion :') 2. I froze again during a live coding interview when I was asked to correct code under test for a coin change problem. I couldn't get over the fact that someone was judging me based on what they were seeing live…

To be fair, I've forgotten how to do basic recursion (and a lot of other basic stuff) while coding with no one watching me haha. Thanks for sharing!
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