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Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

jarednelsen.dev

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Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#101

Post by tastroder »

deanCommie wrote: post #35

I got to the last thread too late for a comment to make a difference, but I'm exactly the person most of you want to talk to or hate. I'm an interviewer at a FAANG company with >500 interviews in the last 5 years, I teach multiple internal courses on interviewing, and I think the system makes a lot of sense for companies at our scale. Ask Me Anything :) I currently have a toddler on my lap, but I'll edit this post la…

> Ask Me Anything :)

Appreciate it. For some background it would be nice if you clarify the perspective of your role as one of HR/coordination or a more technical view on participants of these interviews.

Do you feel like current FAANG hiring practices for lower level roles incubate a generation of programmers that trains specifically for the interview process moreso than they do for the actual role you want to fill (and if so, do you feel like that is benefitial to your employer / simply a necessity at their scale / worth changing)?

edit: That makes sense, thanks!

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#102

Post by peter_d_sherman »

Spooky23 wrote: post #85
peter_d_sherman wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But there is a way to filter the amount of FAANG applicants! It is as follows: Offer ridiculously low pay, such that only basic expenses could be paid for, like basic housing... Then, see who shows up. Whoever shows up... really wants a job. You don't hire them yet. You implement your own corporate bootcamp, where you give then coding assignments. These start easy, but progress, over a number of weeks, to those that…

That sounds like a lot of work to oppress a few programmers. If you want to be a dick and systematically screw people, just hire an army of agency contractors in some out of the way place.

That's not the intended goal...

...The intended goal is to figure out who is intrinsically motivated (i.e., curiousity, innate interest, desire to learn, etc.), from those that are extrinsically motivated (i.e., salary, money, title, career, corporate position, etc.)

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#103

Post by p_l »

dehrmann wrote: post #21
skizm wrote: post #7

Honestly, I think until FAANG start doing something else, the vast majority of tech/semi-tech companies will just copy them. A few smaller companies might branch out and try some other stuff, but most people hiring at mid and large size companies are just trying to minimize risk more than go grab that great diamond in the rough. If the big guys are doing X, the medium guys are gonna keep doing X also.

Google stopped asking logic riddles, so things can definitely improve. Maybe FAANG-style interviews are the least worst option we have right now.

Google made logic riddles disallowed on interviews by over a decade ago (I think 2005? plus-minus few years), yet they are still thought to ask them.

Despite it being a turn of the decade 1980/1990 Microsoft thing.

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#104

Post by edoceo »

a1369209993 wrote: post #63
scarface74 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But while they are getting guidance and mentorship, they are not being a productive member of the team, taking time away from experienced developers and as soon as they level up they will change companies and the next company didn’t have to invest training time. I know everyone has to start somewhere but from the company’s perspective, hiring a junior developer doesn’t make sense.

If you're hiring new people because you need more people working on your current project, Fred Brooks would like to have a word with you.

Fred is talking about adding folk to a late project

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#105

Post by kbrisso »

This is a great article this is exactly where I am at in my life. I have almost 20 years spent at a company doing all kinds of different projects, working on many different systems, and continuing to teach myself new skills all the time on my own time. I'm currently converting a huge legacy Weblogic Java J2EE project to TomEE. I want to leave so I am now studying algorithms. I had an interview at a job I really wanted and blew one part of the technical part because I was a little unprepared. It sucks because I know I could have added value to the company because I'm a grinder and love what I do. They have a killer product that would have been awesome to work on and the people seemed great. I know algorithms are important so I will study on but it sucks in an interview one stupid question you haven't worked on will cost the job.

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#106

Post by Apocryphon »

scarface74 wrote: post #30
rekabis wrote: post #23

The “hopeless list”, no. 3: “If you run into an asshole in the morning, you ran into an asshole. If you run into assholes all day, you’re the asshole.” This pretty much sums up my impression of these hiring managers that crank the bar sky-high: they are assholes through-and-through, and are full of shit to boot. If you crank the bar sky-high, all you will get are two kinds of people: those that interview/test well, b…

But while they are getting guidance and mentorship, they are not being a productive member of the team, taking time away from experienced developers and as soon as they level up they will change companies and the next company didn’t have to invest training time. I know everyone has to start somewhere but from the company’s perspective, hiring a junior developer doesn’t make sense.

If you build a culture where you expect no loyalty, it will be a self-fulfilling prophecy. Sadly this culture now no longer applies to specific companies, but the industry- and perhaps the economy- as a whole.

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#107

Post by scarface74 »

no_wizard wrote: post #83
scarface74 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But while they are getting guidance and mentorship, they are not being a productive member of the team, taking time away from experienced developers and as soon as they level up they will change companies and the next company didn’t have to invest training time. I know everyone has to start somewhere but from the company’s perspective, hiring a junior developer doesn’t make sense.

In my experience a great way to hire and train juniors is to have them do tasks that need to be done but you can’t over allocate or reallocate an existing engineer for it. Like refactoring existing code. Why? The only guidance then a more senior engineer would need to give is during code review and where they may have questions. It’s a great way to get them familiar with the code base and train them up. I haven’t see…

How would a junior no what to refactor and not make it worse? In my experience it’s harder to refactor existing code than to start with green field development.

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#108

Post by watwut »

hinkley wrote: post #92
watwut wrote: post #16

I think that "apparently very few people actually know how to program a computer" part is more about how many people have "fake it till you make it" attitude or how large ego they have. Or how much they dont bother how they look like during interview and keep trying until they get lucky scoring position. And that actually is how many get to start programming. As in, one of common advice is to be self-learner and abse…

The thing is we want to be surrounded by people who see development as a calling, and not just a safe career. That cycle has been going on for years. Now, there are so many companies that are essentially writing variants on the same software over and over again that demand is dictating the shape of the field. The shape of the industry. “We” are all industrial designers in a world that just isn’t that enthused. If we…

I think that the idea that people who see development as safe career are the most incapable is just wrong. Someone stable that does what needs to be done even when it is not fun sounds good to me. Large parts of projects are not fun nor challenging - they are work that needs to be done with good quality.

People who see their jobs as safe careers are routinely good at those jobs.

And conversely, I have met people who talked about passion and seemed passionate and had all the right opinions. And they were not good simply because they would loose interest when it stopped to be fun or somehow never finished anything that was medium sized, were disorganized or demotivated easily.

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#109

Post by omar_a1 »

scarface74 wrote: post #77
irq11 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

” I know everyone has to start somewhere but from the company’s perspective, hiring a junior developer doesn’t make sense.” When did “not able to solve leetcode-nuclear puzzles while singing and tapdancing backwards” , become “junior developer” ? The OP is talking about “sky-high” levels of (interview) competency, and you immediately jumped to the conclusion that anything less must be juniors who need training to wip…

Seeing that in over 20 years and very successful track record of getting jobs quickly that I’ve never done leetCode or had an algorithm interview - how did you get that out of anything that I said? I’ve met “junior developers” who couldn’t translate simple business requirements into code. The stereotypical “developer” who couldn’t do FizzBuzz.

The technical interviews I've had are decidedly not fizzbuzz level problems. They're "implement new features in an unfamiliar codebase in 10 minutes while we watch closely and tell you that every line of code you start to write is the wrong approach."-problems.

Re: Follow-up to “The dystopian world of software engineering interviews”

#110

Post by andrewflnr »

klenwell wrote: post #4

Glad to hear he hasn't given up. I agree with his basic thesis that much of software engineering hring is a cargo-cult shitshow. But I haven't given up hope and have worked on developing a hiring process that is human, efficient, and effective. I've outlined it here before. Been using it and tweaking it for the last 3 or 4 years. I keep bring it up because it's a tested alternative to the usual death marches and dump…

How do you design your coding challenges? Can you give examples?
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