The latest trend for tech interviews: Days of unpaid homework

Post by monocasa » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 6:38 PM UTC

poulsbohemian wrote: post #393

monocasa wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I used to hate it, but have now performed enough interviews of supposedly senior devs with decades of experience. I've literally seen someone who did firmware for the space shuttle grind for 45 minutes on fizz buzz without making progress. Like, I'd they struggle for ten minutes or so, I take a step back and say "Ok, screw syntax, let's just vaguely talk about what needs to happen and mock up some pseudo code.". Even…

I’m going to show some vulnerability… this happened to me this week. I’m probably like a lot of you here: professional software developer for 20 years, have shipped countless products in multiple languages / technologies. Work has appeared on tv and print media multiple times. Have generated millions and millions in cost savings and revenue for employers and clients. But I totally failed a technical screen. It’s been…

Post by TheGRS » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 6:38 PM UTC

Clubber wrote: post #410

TheGRS wrote: post #364

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hence the take home interview. At least at the last company I worked at we began doing these because we could tell that the stress was filtering out some otherwise decent candidates. At least that was one of the reasons, it also gave us a chance to talk about technical solutions the candidate produced in a more stress-free way.

So you decided to filter out good candidates in a new way; the take home test.

Post by lowbloodsugar » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 6:39 PM UTC

waylandsmithers wrote: post #246

speby wrote: post #218

Our industry's hiring practices are absolutely obnoxious. In an ideal world, you could trust someone's resume. e.g. "I've written large production programs in C." Ok, great, so then clearly this person knows C so there should be no need to dissect code or run them thru some linked list algorithm and see if they know how to use pointers correctly. Yet, we do. Ok, then what about open source contributions (if they have…

As someone who does a lot of interviewing, I tone down the technical stuff as the experience and responsibility level increases. I think a lot of the annoyances you mention still make sense for an entry level position, because there are a lot of folks who actually can't write code who apply for those jobs. For candidates with many years of experience, obviously they can and have been writing software effectively, so…

Post by mywittyname » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 6:42 PM UTC

newobj wrote: post #395

mywittyname wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not refuting my point though. I agree they should do what they can to ensure they get a good hire, but I also thing they should do the minimum amount necessary to do such. I've worked on many great teams whose interview process was little more than asking intelligent, pointed questions about previous work experience. Of course, this puts the onus on the interviewer to know what they are doing. I personally kee…

I wasn't trying to refute your point... in fact I think I was mostly agreeing with you?

Post by newobj » Thu, Apr 19, 2018, 6:43 PM UTC

haskellandchill wrote: post #458

newobj wrote: post #301

It's unreal that will people will bitch and moan about having to invest a couple days, maybe even a whole week in cramming/prepping/interviewing, to perform on-demand, one time, for a job that realistically will earn them $100k, $200k, $300k, $400k+ a year. Meanwhile people that work harder than us 5 days a week for the entire duration of their career will make 1/2, 1/4, 1/6th, or less of income, with none of the per…

> $300k, $400k+ a year Amazon, Facebook, Google? Those are hard salaries to get in my experience. I'm reasonably well respected in my field; attending conferences, speaking, leading meetups, and tirelessly researching computer science in my free time. Can't get a job at those 3, but going to try and take the hedge fund route I guess (I'm in NYC).