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How not to hire a software engineer

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Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#11

Post by seanmcdirmid »

reallydontask wrote: post #4

I'm currently working on revamping the way we do the first interview, which is nothing more than a filter. We currently ask mainly, let's face it, poor theoretical questions. I want to ask more experience based questions. so instead of: Explain what a database index is Ask: Can you give us an example of a time you used a database index? What were you trying to achieve? Could there have been a different solution to re…

I’ve been asked these kind of questions before....for a compiler job. I mean, you can clearly see on my CV that I don’t do backend, cloud, or database, the hiring manager is not interested in me for those things, yet their interview process is so inflexible that these are the only questions that can be asked during the interview (....and not one compiler question either).

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#12

Post by Nursie »

Honestly these days I'm thinking that the best interview is going to be about people's attitudes and opinions. e.g. I usually ask things like what's your favourite source control system, branch technique etc? Why?

There's no right answer here, other than to show thought and understanding of the engineering problems this is seeking to address.

Obviously there should be some domain/framework/language specific things in here too. But the object is to gauge competence and experience level, and thoughtfulness vs doctrine.

The 'practical' should take place on the job, give them a week and if they aren't up to the task(s) at hand, say goodbye and move on.

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#13

Post by zensavona »

Interestingly in the last 6 months I’ve been on both sides of this: being hired and hiring others. It was really cool because it allowed me to understand what is actually good and useful in the hiring process from both ends.

While hiring (only 2 people, one junior and one senior, both fully remote) I just had a ~45-60min chat about technical and non-technical things (e.g. what do you think about functional programming/rails/deployment/ops/whatever, what does mean to you, how do you feel about ) and then gave them a small paid project to work on our actual codebase - something like implementing a small, self contained feature or writing some tests for a particular piece of code. I found this to be a really good way to find out if I’ll like working with someone and if they are a good fit on a technical level.

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#14

Post by reallydontask »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #11
reallydontask wrote: post #4

I'm currently working on revamping the way we do the first interview, which is nothing more than a filter. We currently ask mainly, let's face it, poor theoretical questions. I want to ask more experience based questions. so instead of: Explain what a database index is Ask: Can you give us an example of a time you used a database index? What were you trying to achieve? Could there have been a different solution to re…

I’ve been asked these kind of questions before....for a compiler job. I mean, you can clearly see on my CV that I don’t do backend, cloud, or database, the hiring manager is not interested in me for those things, yet their interview process is so inflexible that these are the only questions that can be asked during the interview (....and not one compiler question either).

The key is flexibility. As you say, there is little point in asking somebody who is going to be working with compilers the best way of doing something with React or Angular.

A guy I used to work with would walk through the technical skills section on candidate's CV asking for knowledge level out of 10 and then ask questions accordingly but that is trickier to do on an online platform (at least as far as I'm aware)

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#15

Post by gota »

yitchelle wrote: post #5
morkfromork wrote: post #3

Lately I have done a few at home code challenges for companies. They usually take several hours. They are perfectly functional and use minimal code but, the only feedback I receive is: "we're not moving forward". They won't discuss anything with me. The only impression I get is that your company is terrible and I will never respond to your recruiters again.

For me, honest and accurate feedback is the one thing that is missing. When I get rejected, the response is usually "You are not a good match to our company culture". What I would appreciate would be "Your lack of experience in managing remote teams is a gap for us." I feel that quality to the pool of candidates will increase once this feedback loop problem is fixed.

I'm not sure this is true but I've heard people who work in 'hiring' say so: from the company's point of view there is almost no upside to providing insightful and useful feedback, and there's always a chance that feedback will be used to sue for discrimination, or ridicule the company online, etc. Best to be generic and forgotten about by the candidate as soon as possible

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#16

Post by jahrule »

morkfromork wrote: post #3

Lately I have done a few at home code challenges for companies. They usually take several hours. They are perfectly functional and use minimal code but, the only feedback I receive is: "we're not moving forward". They won't discuss anything with me. The only impression I get is that your company is terrible and I will never respond to your recruiters again.

a) dont take these rejections personally. dont hold a grudge. it might be someone incompetent is reviewing your code. it might be the company does not have urgent need to hire but is only on tge lookout if they spot someone matching their (awkard) criteria.

b) if its a repeating thing consider asking someone (a friend, a forum, a senior dev) for review of one of these "exercises". this could show you what youre not seeing. or could show you your code is just fine or perfect and it's about the company not knowing what they want. so either you will learn something or you will boost your self confidence.

a series of "rejections" can put one's self-confidence to a test, remember good times will come again.

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#17

Post by mgreenleaf »

zensavona wrote: post #13

Interestingly in the last 6 months I’ve been on both sides of this: being hired and hiring others. It was really cool because it allowed me to understand what is actually good and useful in the hiring process from both ends. While hiring (only 2 people, one junior and one senior, both fully remote) I just had a ~45-60min chat about technical and non-technical things (e.g. what do you think about functional programmin…

I agree; when I interview I tend to talk to them for a bit to get a feel for how they view the world and how they code. I ask about personal projects, how they learn new things, sources of information for keeping current, what they've worked with, personal interests. I ask what they've worked with and why and why they would choose a particular solution. You can get some really interesting answers (programmers tend to be polymath-y types). I think the best hires we've made were people who had personal side projects, naturally curious with learning hobbies (not just programming), and were open and honest about questions, willing to have a good discussion, and weren't just trying to give the expected answers. There are two sides to that coin, since the interviewer also has to value that, and maybe it just depends on who you are and what you are looking for, but it has worked well for us.

I love the idea about doing the paid project on the real project; I'd love to implement that too.

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#18

Post by kryptiskt »

techterrier wrote: post #9
morkfromork wrote: post #3

Lately I have done a few at home code challenges for companies. They usually take several hours. They are perfectly functional and use minimal code but, the only feedback I receive is: "we're not moving forward". They won't discuss anything with me. The only impression I get is that your company is terrible and I will never respond to your recruiters again.

Try not to judge the individuals too harshly in this circumstance - their lawyers have probably forbid them from saying much if anything at all.

That's not a reason to let them off the hook, because they control the rest of the experience. If they can't give feedback, then they shouldn't have a hiring process that asks for such effort from the candidate.

Re: How not to hire a software engineer

#20

Post by bryanrasmussen »

#1 thing for me - don't ask me to be a salesperson. In relation to this post - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19534772 I was recently at an interview and the interviewer was a technical guy who had recently been promoted and he had a checklist of 10-15 things he wanted to achieve in the next half year, all really good reasonable things and then he said 'Now I just want you to tell me why you are the best person to do this'.

I finally had to give up and say hey lots of people can do what you want, I can do it and I can give you a list of people who can do it, I don't understand this "best" thing you want from me?

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