The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework • Hacker News Board

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#11

Post by pleasecalllater » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:06 AM UTC

I'm waiting for recruiting doctors like that. Oh, you are a surgeon with 17 years of experience? Cool. How about you make a surgery at home, record it, and send us a video?

More pathetic are only companies which have only one question at the beginning (without any further contact) "how much do you want to earn" and after that there is no negotiation. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning in an endless sea of candidates. Oh, wait, no, the same companies publish the same job ads over and over for years. So maybe not.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#12

Post by vidarh » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:11 AM UTC

amorphid wrote: post #10

jpttsn wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Might make it more expensive to hire, favoring insiders who are employed at the expense of outsiders. Also makes it harder to switch jobs if you’re unhappy/deserve better.

I'd wager that insiders are given preferential treatment in most companies anyway.

Some places, yes. But surprisingly many places do a really bad job at encouraging internal recruitment, even when it would often let them identify talent they are unaware of and let them shift people into positions where they might be a better fit or be stay for longer. It's especially bad as it can often help shift more of their external hiring to lower risk entry level hires where a bad hiring choice has a lot less impact.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#13

Post by dagw » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:12 AM UTC

pleasecalllater wrote: post #11

I'm waiting for recruiting doctors like that. Oh, you are a surgeon with 17 years of experience? Cool. How about you make a surgery at home, record it, and send us a video? More pathetic are only companies which have only one question at the beginning (without any further contact) "how much do you want to earn" and after that there is no negotiation. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning in an endless sea of candidates.…

I'm waiting for recruiting doctors like that.

Would you want to work in a world where all programmers have to be trained, licensed and regulated with the same rigor as surgeons?

Surely the fact that programming is one of the few 'white collar' jobs where someone with no education and no relevant work experience can get hired based purely on the fact that they've taught themselves the necessary skills and can do the job is a net good thing.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#14

Post by RickS » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:12 AM UTC

NTDF9 wrote: post #3

Can someone explain why we need: 1. A phone coding interview (Potentially another phone coding interview) 2. A homework 3. An onsite with 5 rounds Seriously, what does that additional tree traversal round prove?

I don't necessarily buy fully into all of these (I am in favor of homeworks, but they should be paid and later staged [this usually means more phone screens. can't win em all]). But since you asked:

1) because meaningfully large swaths of applicants are too stupid to fizzbuzz

2) because passing fizzbuzz is not the same as writing software

3) because teams are comprised of many people in many roles and just because team/person X likes you, doesn't mean you'll be a good aggregate fit.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#15

Post by LandR » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:16 AM UTC

dagw wrote: post #13

pleasecalllater wrote: post #11

I'm waiting for recruiting doctors like that. Oh, you are a surgeon with 17 years of experience? Cool. How about you make a surgery at home, record it, and send us a video? More pathetic are only companies which have only one question at the beginning (without any further contact) "how much do you want to earn" and after that there is no negotiation. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning in an endless sea of candidates.…

I'm waiting for recruiting doctors like that. Would you want to work in a world where all programmers have to be trained, licensed and regulated with the same rigor as surgeons? Surely the fact that programming is one of the few 'white collar' jobs where someone with no education and no relevant work experience can get hired based purely on the fact that they've taught themselves the necessary skills and can do the j…

> Would you want to work in a world where all programmers have to be trained, licensed and regulated with the same rigor as surgeons?

Uh, yes...

There are too many terrible developers out there.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#16

Post by ldite » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:18 AM UTC

I've only been asked for this when I applied to a "digital design agency" (i.e. web development) during a moment of madness.

They asked me to write a GAE based web app for something or the other. I told them (politely!) that I'd do it, if they provided me with their diversity policy, specifically with an explanation of how this sort of exercise didn't discriminate against anyone (as noted in the article.) I got a "sure, we can do that" and then never heard from them again. I didn't consider that a loss.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#17

Post by danielh » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:23 AM UTC

I don't get it. The whole industry is complaining about not being able to hire developers, yet there seems to be some kind of competition who can come up with the most awkward hiring process.

Requiring homework is a great way to deter the kind of people companies should be most interested in hiring: those who are not actively looking for a new job.

I find this trend especially surprising considering that the U.S. has at-will employment where you can fire anyone anytime (at least that is my understanding, I'm from Germany). Why not get people at a desk quickly and evaluate them on the job?

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#18

Post by anon1094 » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:24 AM UTC

I actually gave a link to my Stripe account and told the company I was applying to to pay me hourly as a contractor for doing this work. In the end, they took it offensively and denied me.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#19

Post by hnzix » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:25 AM UTC

ldite wrote: post #16

I've only been asked for this when I applied to a "digital design agency" (i.e. web development) during a moment of madness. They asked me to write a GAE based web app for something or the other. I told them (politely!) that I'd do it, if they provided me with their diversity policy, specifically with an explanation of how this sort of exercise didn't discriminate against anyone (as noted in the article.) I got a "su…

>"digital design agency" ... during a moment of madness

Yeah you dodged a bullet there. Digital design agencies are almost always sweatshops.

Re: The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

#20

Post by anilgulecha » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 8:28 AM UTC

What you want from a hiring process is to be as objective as possible. For fresh engineers, the industry has settled on basic coding right from fizz-buzz to reverse a linked list and beyond.

For more senior roles, majority still rely on pedigree (previous employer, resume etc), and those who try to be more objective hand out a take-home which ends up frustrating both sides. Candidates have to spend a lot of time and effort and the hiring manager/devs have to setup/run/review.

This is where the industry needs to make the process easy, and operationally objective and efficient for the initial screen: An hour or 2 spent by candidate on a take home problem, which can be reviewed in under 5-10 minutes by the hiring manager. (This disparity in time is because the ratio of interviewed to screened is roughly that.)

(Disclosure: I work at hackerrank, and build the take-home equivalent of a coding test.)