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When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

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Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#581

Post by mbtamuli »

darkpicnic wrote: post #576
tptacek wrote: post #572

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I gave an example of one of our erstwhile technical interview questions below. Batting around interview questions is a hacker sport and I've met dozens of developers who delighted in relaying and evangelizing their preferred questions. I'll admit, candidly, that "what's your favorite tech stack and what don't you like about it" --- a question you can literally just look up blog posts on, and a question I feel I could…

"a question you can literally just look up blog posts on, and a question I feel I could answer credibly for several languages/frameworks I don't even know" Really? You mean you could memorize a blog post for random languages, go into an interview and answer a question and not completely fall apart from follow up question 1, 2, n?... You make it sound like I'm asking this question, getting a monologue response and jus…

> I think the best way to find talent is to do a trial run for 1 - 2 weeks and see how good they are at taking fuzzy problems and breaking them down into actionable steps

How do you get people to do a trial run for a week or two?

Most people start looking for the next job when they are already doing their current one. So how can we ask them to do a trial run for a week or two?

Also what about the remuneration(what kind should be given if at all for this period) and does this work for freshers and absolute newbies too?

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#582

Post by Consultant32452 »

mancerayder wrote: post #357
Consultant32452 wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IQ does correlate with work performance, and SAT tests are IQ tests. Brain teasers are an attempt at seeing how well/quickly your brain works to solve problems, is a rudimentary IQ test. The problem is that requiring IQ tests for employment introduces liability that employers do not want.

SATs are IQ tests? A large portion is math, and the other written language, both taught disciplines. You obviously haven't taken a real IQ test, which is more abstract and has a large portion of spatial geometry type questions.

https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/12/04/why-should-...

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#583

Post by LaserToy »

bradleyjg wrote: post #223
LaserToy wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are yo saying most of candidates commit fraud? Do you have any data on it or just following common sense nonsense?

> Are yo saying most of candidates commit fraud? Nope.

If majority doesn’t, why create a process that punishes everyone? People are lying on the resumes is a very common argument made by creators of insane interview processes. It feels weird to start a relationship with a company with assumption that I’m a cheater.

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#584

Post by snovv_crash »

jholman wrote: post #409
toast0 wrote: post #272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wouldn't expect a building architect to do a great job pouring a foundation, framing a wall, or running plumbing. But I would expect them to be able to do it, at least to a basic level. Architects that don't understand how to do the fundamentals of implementing the designs they make tend to make unrealistic designs, that are expensive to implement and may look pretty, but function poorly for the owners and occupant…

> I wouldn't expect a building architect to do a great job pouring a foundation, framing a wall, or running plumbing. But I would expect them to be able to do it, at least to a basic level. waaaaat? That is completely utterly 100% unreasonable. Unless you mean that you expect every adult member of society to do those things?

I agree with GP. If the civil architect doesn't know that you need to put up plywood to pour the concrete in, they will make impossible to build designs.

And I'm not saying that everyone needs to do everyone's jobs. But you shoupd be able yo do at least a bumbling job of the layers of abstraction you work on top of if you want to make a decision in how those things should work.

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#585

Post by Consultant32452 »

jonathankoren wrote: post #352
Consultant32452 wrote: post #318

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IQ does correlate with work performance, and SAT tests are IQ tests. Brain teasers are an attempt at seeing how well/quickly your brain works to solve problems, is a rudimentary IQ test. The problem is that requiring IQ tests for employment introduces liability that employers do not want.

No. None of this is true. Neither IQ nor SAT scores correlate with job performance. SAT scores were requested at Google for years. Explicit aptitude tests have been used in the past, and continue to be used. They are quite legal, as long as they are used for their intend use. https://www.forbes.com/sites/theemploymentbeat/2014/03/07/em... https://www.shrm.org/resourcesandtools/tools-and-samples/too...

IQ is the best predictor of worker performance:

https://www.businessinsider.com/why-your-iq-strongly-influen...

SAT is an IQ test:

https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2011/12/04/why-should-...

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#586

Post by dankoss »

I have talked to several interviewers with a buying mindset, and the thing that annoys me the most is that they always ask why I want to work for $COMPANY_NAME, especially if it's a well known SV company.

They don't understand: I don't need your job, your recruiter called me, so what is it $COMPANY_NAME has to offer me that's better than my current senior level gig?

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#587

Post by make3 »

fogetti wrote: post #425
make3 wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the ability to prepare for an interview is likely correlated to the ability to do the required work, so that point is moot.

It's not correlated at all. I can ask you questions about implementing a b-tree and then give you a job to fix CSS. Which is the case in most jobs and job interviews.

if you were able to prepare for the btree stuff, the css stuff will be a joke to learn. that is my point.

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#588

Post by burlesona »

scarface74 wrote: post #397
burlesona wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You may not be realizing that half or more of the compensation at the big SV tech companies is not salary. Total compensation of $300k or more is pretty standard for the public companies. Check levels.fyi to see examples. The benefits are also much better than I’ve seen elsewhere. I moved to SF from Raleigh because even after cost of living I earn significantly more (ie. put a lot more in savings every year) Housing…

And that’s only true at four or five companiess at the most.... Especially if you’re married, I know a lot of developers whose spouses income goes straight into savings, investments, etc. but it’s another example of HN Silicon valley thinking that software engineering starts and stops at four companies. Married dual income couples especially can make out like bandits in any of those cities. I live in one of those cit…

I get your point, but I think you’re overgeneralizing.

(1) the salary / equity combination I’m talking about is not just FAANG, it’s basically every large SF tech company. I don’t work for a FAANG but the deal is almost as good.

(2) I specifically moved with my wife and kids to SF to make it easier for my wife to stop working — she wanted to focus on the kids for a few years. One income here was worth more than double what I could earn in Raleigh and this is the first job I had in my career that offered comprehensive medical for the whole family, not just me.

We live in about the same amount of space as we had in Raleigh, it just costs more.

Lastly, while I would prefer to have a little more space for a less absurd mortgage, I’m not interested in living in any suburb. So when you compare housing in the central city of Raleigh (or Austin) versus SF, the comparison is less unfavorable.

So, sure, if I was willing to live in the suburbs I could have more house. But I’d rather deal with less space than is ideal than have to live in the burbs. No judgment intended, it’s just not the lifestyle I want, in the same way it sounds like city life isn’t the lifestyle you want.

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#589

Post by [deleted] »

dkersten wrote: post #485
BrissyCoder wrote: post #422

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally agree. I suck at interviewing and freeze up on the spot. Even on-site coding tests I'm not great at. Give me the time to sit back in my own comfortable environment and I'm confident I can solve 95% coding problems (and reasonably quickly). I've been involved in a lot of hiring and I always advocate a choice of a couple of fairly in-depth (maybe 4-6 hours) take-home coding problems. I think people should be pa…

I’ve got a friend who is a lot like you. I’ve worked with him, so genuinely know he’s good, but he sucks at interviews. He freezes up and can’t answer simple technical things, things he knows and has successfully done often. Some people simply suck at interviews.

[deleted]

Re: When hiring senior engineers, you’re not buying, you’re selling

#590

Post by notatcomputer68 »

dleslie wrote: post #47
nicoburns wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best interview I ever had was a 2-hour onsite work sample, followed by 1/2 an hour discussing what I'd come up with. I was offered the job the next day. Surely most people would prefer this to whiteboard tasks?

The best interview I had was a few hours of friendly conversation about the details of my resume. Then I was hired under probation, as everyone there was, and the understanding was that I could be easily dismissed if it was clear that I wasn't working out.

Sounds great for first job out of college not so great if you already have a good job.
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