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Interview advice that got me offers

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Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#91

Post by moksly »

mercutio2 wrote: post #77
totaldude87 wrote: post #67

I recently got interviewed by a FAANG company, and it was not a nice experience, it had like 4 hours of back to back interviews with 4 different people and couple of them didn't even bother.. on the technical side, I was asked questions that didn't even fit my profile :( . although am waiting for their response, regardless of whether i have cleared their "tech" rounds, at this point I dont even care about that interv…

If you're not up for four to eight hours of interviews (with a break or two, depending on how long the day is), asking the standard bank of questions, it doesn't sound like you're a good fit for a big tech company. But why did you bother applying? None of what you describe seems like it should have been a surprise.

I’ve been on the other side, and hired people, which means you sit through 8 hours of interviews. Sometimes days in a row. I also work as an external examiner for CS students, which again, mean that I sit through long days of tedious technical tests.

I can’t imagine why you would ever want to subject candidates to that. It’s tiring enough when you’re not on the spot. I’ll typically spend the weekend or days leading up to such an ordeal in preparation, and when a day is over I’ll go home or to the hotel, do a few hours of prepping for the next round and then go straight to bed. Because you’re that spent. It would be ridiculous to expect a candidate to perform well, or show you anything about themselves, when the interviewer gets that busted. Because a candidate would have it much harder, especially if they are early in their careers.

I can’t imagine why anyone would want to subject themselves to those sort of ordeals either. I realise that I’m Scandinavian, and that our interviews and hiring processes are very different from Silicon Valley, but all my interviews have been as much about the company/organisation selling itself to me as me selling myself to it. Well not for my first two jobs, but since then.

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#92

Post by vonmoltke »

gizmo686 wrote: post #37
deeeeplearning wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imagine if a Brain Surgeon was quizzed on Liver anatomy every time they wanted to interviewed for a job. It makes no sense and is borderline irrelevant to their actual job of you know doing brain surgery.

Doctors routinely need to update their certification by taking a formal exam; which includes subjects that they never except when studying for said exam. You don't need technical screenings when just getting through the front door involves passing a rigorous certification process.

> Doctors routinely need to update their certification by taking a formal exam

They don't in any place in the US I have lived.

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#93

Post by [deleted] »

saagarjha wrote: post #66
d4mi3n wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This limits options that are unwilling to meet your requirements; places you would have passed on due to insufficient salaries anyway. If you're willing to take lower salaries, lower your minimal salary requirements to receive more of them. Dictating salary reqs up front does two things: 1. Reduces time wasted on folks or orgs that don't want to pay your rate. 2. Immediately moves discussion away from a dance around…

It limits your options down . If you say you're looking for $100/hour, and the recruiter was planning on giving you $150/hour…guess what offer you're going to get?

[deleted]

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#94

Post by [deleted] »

tootie wrote: post #58
dolebirchwood wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently had a technical interview where I stumbled the whole way through, but I kept my attitude lighthearted, asked plenty of dumb questions, and am pretty sure I even said "Oh, geez, I'm an idiot" at one point. They acknowledged that I was a weak candidate, but they liked me enough to extend an offer amounting to a 33% salary increase over my current job--and with an additional 33% bump after 6 months if I can p…

That doesn't seem to apply at FAANGs. I had some positive interviews where I went out of my way to build some rapport and it got a lot of smiles but no offer. It definitely worked at the completely not FAANG company that I work for now. I think I'm probably better off this way.

[deleted]

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#95

Post by arnvald »

nrmitchi wrote: post #45
Bahamut wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can confirm as a senior engineer at a FAANG. I've rejected people for showing negative non-technical traits but being ok technically, and recommended people for hire with not the best technical skills but with excellent non-technical/leadership traits. Life is too short to work with assholes if it can be helped.

> I've rejected people for showing negative non-technical traits I'm not an expert, but this can be a really slippery slope to implicit bias creeping in to your hiring decisions, especially if these traits are outside of your area of interview/expertise.

> especially if these traits are outside of your area of interview/expertise

I think determining whether the candidate is kind of a person that I would like to work with in one team should be everyone's area of interview

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#96

Post by dragonwriter »

deeeeplearning wrote: post #22
nobodyandproud wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The advice of going on interviews semi-regularly is one that I tell everyone soliciting advice (even my direct reports, though only once and only if conversation veers that way!). I don’t mean the leetcode hoops (etc, though that is part of the game) but once you’re in the door. It’s a unique skillset that degrades fast, not unlike dating skills.

Imagine if a Brain Surgeon was quizzed on Liver anatomy every time they wanted to interviewed for a job. It makes no sense and is borderline irrelevant to their actual job of you know doing brain surgery.

> Imagine if a Brain Surgeon was quizzed on Liver anatomy every time they wanted to interviewed for a job.

If software developers had the kind of exams getting initially licensed, and the ongoing continuing education requirements imposed to maintain their licenses, that regulated professions tend to have (doctors, lawyers, nurses, even schoolteachers), then they probably wouldn’t have every hiring process trying to compensate for the absence of such prior screening.

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#97

Post by CobrastanJorji »

MattGaiser wrote: post #28

> Keeping those skills sharp even when you’re not job hunting. Can I just add "Leetcoder" as a part time job on my resume? It is amusing how in this industry, your ability to interview will not at all be improved by spending time doing your job unless it is algo heavy. It is a separate job entirely.

I've had this discussion during interviews as a disarming technique. Candidates will sometimes express nervousness at the beginning and say stuff like "I'm terrible at interviews" or "it's been a while since I've had to do this kind of programming," and I try to respond by making it clear that I understand that the whiteboard coding has very little in common with the actual job and that I'm not judging them, so when I dutifully proceed to ask them to invert a linked list, they hopefully don't feel as judged when they approach the problem. Seems to help at least a bit. Mind you, I'd prefer NOT asking those questions, but I'm not empowered to make that change at my workplace and I'm honestly not sure what I'd replace it with if I were.

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#98

Post by frongpik »

tootie wrote: post #52
vincentmarle wrote: post #9

The hardest part about interviewing is that there is no feedback loop; I once interviewed at 10 companies within 2 weeks and got rejected from all of them, but to this day I still don't know what part I need to improve upon.

Same. I interviewed with Amazon twice and it's like a 10-hour meat grinder. No offer either time and I have no idea what I did wrong. I absolutely don't get those wide open questions like "How would you design 1-hour delivery?" (real question btw). As someone who has done a lot of consulting work, my instincts are never, ever try to answer such a ridiculously broad question on your own with no context. The answer to…

Your interviewers rarely have real world consulting experience, meeting with clients and solving real problems tied to real money. What they mean by that "1 hour delivery" is a system design question that must be answered along the standard system design template, which is completely detached from reality. You should lookup up those system design interviews on youtube, ala "design a tinyurl service".

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#99

Post by adamredwoods »

ju-st wrote: post #73
adamredwoods wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have had opposite experiences. Many of my interviews were straight evaluations on technical ability, many of which I failed. Amazon in particular, I had told the interviewer that my day-to-day was in C#, but they continued to ask rigorous javascript questions, of which I could explain most of the answer, but failed to find the very specific javascript answer they were looking for. As a result, I was blocked by Amaz…

Did you apply for a C# or javascript job?

IIRC, entry-level developer, including javascript. I don't believe I applied to any jobs that were strictly javascript.

I accept the failed interview, but this doesn't explain why I was banned for failing a technical interview. Amazon is a big place.

Re: Interview advice that got me offers

#100

Post by hfkldjsjfkdj »

These blogs are just for procasinators to feel productive. If you landed the interview then it is just about practicing through a lot of questions. The time you finished reading this comment and this blog, some people out there have already completed a mock interview or a leetcode question. I wonder who made greater gains.
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