No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback • Hacker News Board

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#611

Post by perl4ever » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 5:10 AM UTC

AllegedAlec wrote: post #484

hvidgaard wrote: post #424

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I simply have to disagree. The amount of unqualified candidates that have a decent CV and are reasonable to talk to, but completely unable to correctly write a while loop is too damn high. That is what my whiteboard questions filter out. They're super easy stuff such as "I give you as input a list of integers, return the index of the first consecutive pair of numbers that when added is 42 - you can use any language o…

> The amount of unqualified candidates that have a decent CV and are reasonable to talk to, but completely unable to correctly write a while loop is too damn high. There was some research into this, and IIRC, only half the programmers, both experienced and junior, got a while loop right (IE: no off by ones etc) the first time.

A long, long time ago, somebody wrote about how most supposedly competent programmers can't write a correct binary search under test conditions.

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#612

Post by cheez » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 5:23 AM UTC

Dylan16807 wrote: post #601

cheez wrote: post #556

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Buddy I have has been homeless, in jail, never finished school, etc, etc, etc and this year he hopes to break the 7 figure income mark after more than a decade of mid-six figure income. No trust fund. No connections. No leg up. Yes you can do it. Excuses galore though.

I wasn't talking about whether people can do it. It's not easy , and most people can't just quit their job right now, or within a month or two .

Nothing worth doing is easy so not sure of your point.

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#613

Post by perl4ever » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 5:23 AM UTC

safety-third wrote: post #599

ProZsolt wrote: post #592

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doing interviews (as an interviewer) greatly reduced my impostor syndrome as a junior software engineer. When a guy interviewed with 10+ years of "experience" couldn't write a for loop was eye opening. I work really bad under pressure and don't like memorizing algorithms. I hate programming anything complex on a whiteboard or anyway on-site. Simple stuff, like your example is fine. It's a good way to weed out charlat…

I dislike pseudocode. I make candidates use an actual language because it smoke checks the ones who put X years of Y language. I don't demand perfection, just that the general shape be there.

Unlike some people, I'd be happy to spend a few hours over a few days writing some code for free in peace and tranquility. If I didn't have a job already, I'd be happy to prove myself for six months as a temp. I have never been in either situation and not excelled.

Why should this be inadequate to demonstrate technical skills?

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#614

Post by perl4ever » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 5:27 AM UTC

pingyong wrote: post #573

rendall wrote: post #430

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't do unpaid take home projects that are expected to take more than an hour. Even if I "pass", now I work for a company that has already demonstrated a willingness to occupy my time. Ditto if the take-home project does not have clear acceptance criteria: that's how it will be to work there. It's a real red flag.

I don't know. The problem is that there is almost no way to evaluate software engineers. Have a degree from a decent university? Cool, but how do we know how many actual larger programming assignments that included, and if those were group assignments, how much was your work? Have 10 years of experience? Cool, but how do we know what you actually worked on, and what the quality of your work was? It's just difficult -…

I think it's silly to complain about spending a few hours on a take-home assignment without pay. It's legitimate to reject that person as overly entitled.

But the problem is, some places provide a take-home assignment in the beginning, and then override their judgment with the programming test in the interview. Which makes it pointless, which probably leads to candidates rejecting the sort of place that does the take-home.

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#615

Post by perl4ever » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 5:30 AM UTC

mlthoughts2018 wrote: post #500

atomicnumber3 wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've just finished a job search, and the company I ended up going with (with the best offer, by far) was one of the only ones that didn't want a take-home project. With several of the companies, I managed to (via either vowing silence to recruiters, or having an inside guy) get feedback on my projects. Nobody volunteered feedback willingly. And honestly, based on what feedback I did get, I see why they didn't want to…

I think it speaks to the real point of hazing whiteboard trivia and time-waster takehomes: political gatekeeping. Engineers in many companies are already given far worse job experience than what is paradoxically required on their resume to get in. Interesting or valuable projects are rare and lots of people fight over them. Whiteboard hazing tests for fealty or naivety that will let existing engineers remain superior…

Can you expand on your description of TripleByte? I have heard of them (probably on HN) but am vague about their process.

I do think loyalty/fealty is a legitimate goal even if the things people do to try to get it are futile or counterproductive.

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#616

Post by perl4ever » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 5:34 AM UTC

ProZsolt wrote: post #570

5cott0 wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Interview homework is in many cases more of a disrespectful waste of candidates time than fresh grad whiteboard hazing rituals.

I prefer homework over whiteboard or any on-site coding challenges. I'm really bad under pressure. But I only do homework after the on-site interview, so I know I really want to work there and they have some "skin in the game" too not just shotgunning random candidates that they never actually planning to hire. Also, anything over 3 hours is a no go.

I'd rather do homework before the on-site interview - then I can be confident of my skills and their opinion going in. But then if they don't trust that the homework was done without cheating, it was all a waste of time.

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#617

Post by dang » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 7:39 AM UTC

epicgiga wrote: post #451

This is caused simply and merely by the absurd infringement of freedom of association that prevails nowadays. The fact is, you're never ever ever going to stop racists and sexists from not hiring people outside their race and sex because of your laws. All that will happen is precisely this: absurd levels of secrecy, which hurt those weakest in society: those just trying to get a job so they can afford to eat and not…

Please stop using HN for ideological flamewar. It's not what this site is for.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#618

Post by epicgiga » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 9:00 AM UTC

dang wrote: post #617

epicgiga wrote: post #451

This is caused simply and merely by the absurd infringement of freedom of association that prevails nowadays. The fact is, you're never ever ever going to stop racists and sexists from not hiring people outside their race and sex because of your laws. All that will happen is precisely this: absurd levels of secrecy, which hurt those weakest in society: those just trying to get a job so they can afford to eat and not…

Please stop using HN for ideological flamewar. It's not what this site is for. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Alright, but at the same time, HN is letting through fundamentally political articles, such as the "How ‘big law’ makes big money" one, which isn't even tangentially related to tech.

When HN does so, and concurrently says that's not OK material because it baits flames, how are we supposed to know the limits of our public participation as commenters, with those conflicting messages?

If an article is technical, people will tend to respond technically; if the article is political (in this case, at its root: industrial relations), people will tend to respond politically.

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#619

Post by brailsafe » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 9:33 AM UTC

Zarel wrote: post #514

Afton wrote: post #7

I got verbal feedback exactly one time (at Microsoft) during my attempt to land a post-1-year of university internship. I had solved the algorithm in a few minutes, but when trying to code it up, I struggled a fair amount before figuring it out. The feedback I got was "You seem like a smart person, who hasn't done very much coding. That makes you a bad risk. Go practice programming and come back next year". It was in…

Oddly, I had the exact opposite experience interviewing at Microsoft. I blazed through all the questions the manager asked, and the manager told me I was the most talented person he'd ever interviewed and would definitely get the job, and then I didn't get the job, and got no further feedback. It was the most confusing interview process I'd ever been in. I sent him to ask him if there was some sort of mistake, and he…

How'd you do on the interpersonal questions?

Re: No engineer has ever sued because of constructive post-interview feedback

#620

Post by brailsafe » Sat, Feb 08, 2020, 9:41 AM UTC

It really seems like there needs to be a widely adopted social protocol for engineers to basically say "Hey, if you're expecting this much from me, I expect a reciprocal amount from you at stages 1,2,3,4 etc.."

I interviewed last year at a company that had me do some homework first, then a first long interview where they went through that work—refreshing because almost no companies do—which went well, then a 2nd and 3rd interview. Felt pretty locked in, didn't get it. Ton of time wasted no doubt, but at least it felt balanced.