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Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

erikmcclure.com

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Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#241

Post by Rule35 »

theptip wrote: post #183

This is a great way to end up with a monoculture, with all of the fragility that’s associated with it. That might be a fun way to hire engineers 1-5 in a startup but it will hold you back in the end. Many good engineers have no interest in games, and won’t present well in that arena. You’ll get lots of false negatives. “Fizzbuzz is all we have...” is a myopic take. Interviewing is hard but not as hard as the article…

> but interviewers are really just selecting for people that think like they do.

No. We don't care how you get it done, but that you try in a way that would be worth paying you for.

My job isn't a calm safe place, it's the chaotic result of two departments and the proverbial rubber hitting the road in one spot. It's not intentionally bad, mean, hard, or long, and we weed out people who don't cooperate well, but every crazy thing you can imagine has happened.

But even in previous, easier, positions people were still put on the spot by being assigned to work with customer support on some issue way up the stack from their normal job, which required to be on a call with 20+ outsiders, from CEOs to SREs, and representing us and our department properly. The people on HN who talk about giving people calm interviews to see their true selves don't get it, the performance under a small amount of stress is far more interesting. Do you get mean and snappy, get entitled, shut down, or what?

If being asked, kindly, to solve a basic leetcode is too much then there's no way you'd be suitable for anything else we do.

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#242

Post by 908B64B197 »

imbnwa wrote: post #187
odshoifsdhfs wrote: post #171

Please don't. Better, I'll remove the please and go JUST DONT FUCKING DO IT. Hiring is broken because most people hiring aren't good at it and the people working in tech are pretty much idiots (I'm focusing more on SV-startup, 5hour discussion about aeropress, put people down because they chose vim or emacs - people kinds). From 'cultural' fit interviews (who the fuck cares if you are a sikh or an atheist, whiskey dr…

Thank you for writing this. It bothers me that the genealogy of leetcode has been completely obscured as it comes from competitive programming competitions whose primary demographic were who? Those smart people from Stanford or MIT. Once you realize the "who", it becomes even more clear for me why we're dealing with 'i have my social life at work, so I want people I can hang out with'-type people when we're preparing…

> as it comes from competitive programming competitions whose primary demographic were who? Those smart people from Stanford or MIT.

I mean, it comes from every intro to algorithm and data structures classes at every serious CS program.

> Not to mention that crowd is least likely to have any experience communicating with, say for example, Black folk, amongst other demos, as peers

Not sure what you are insinuating here... That folks from these schools or who do good at algorithms don't see black folks as their equals? That sounds incredibly racist.

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#244

Post by gentleman11 »

pbhjpbhj wrote: post #164
wideareanetwork wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well according to the thesis put forward here you aren’t a developer they’d want to employ . As a job seeker you need to identify these companies fast so you can avoid wasting your time on them.

That's not really how interview processes work. If factorio interviews fill all roles with competent personnel, reduces hiring of incompetent people, etc., then it could be "good enough". Sure, you miss a lot of people who would also be good [enough]. They're not saying people who can't play factorio can't develop; it's the opposite. The hypothesis is surely that the can't+can't group has a large overlap.

Why not use starcraft instead and filter by apm and multitasking? You are sure to miss out on a few good candidates but you will filter out a lot of people who cannot manage 3 bases really effectively while watching the minimap, while designing custom build orders that can survive in the current meta. It’s like interviewing boxers on their blitz chess playing ability because you want “people who can think ahead under pressure.” Please.

Skipping candidates “just in case” is like not hiring women “just in case” they distract the men. Those defensive hiring practices destroy diversity, diversity of thought, and the chance for a human to be evaluated in a fair or rational way.

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#245

Post by fghfghfghfghfgh »

ummonk wrote: post #210
tryonenow wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Isn't it racist and sexist to presume that women and POC won't play a game just because it's made by white men? How is that relevant? Is anyone else concerned over this kind of overt, casual, anti-white racism and misandry that has become socially acceptable as of late?

Don’t be disingenuous. It’s almost exclusively played by mostly white (and some Asian) men, often on the spectrum. And you know this is true and that it isn’t sexist or racist to point it out.

That's not the point. The point is the disingenuous, and sadly socially acceptable, argument that something is bad/wrong because it is made by men or white people

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#246

Post by imbnwa »

908B64B197 wrote: post #242
imbnwa wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you for writing this. It bothers me that the genealogy of leetcode has been completely obscured as it comes from competitive programming competitions whose primary demographic were who? Those smart people from Stanford or MIT. Once you realize the "who", it becomes even more clear for me why we're dealing with 'i have my social life at work, so I want people I can hang out with'-type people when we're preparing…

> as it comes from competitive programming competitions whose primary demographic were who? Those smart people from Stanford or MIT. I mean, it comes from every intro to algorithm and data structures classes at every serious CS program. > Not to mention that crowd is least likely to have any experience communicating with, say for example, Black folk, amongst other demos, as peers Not sure what you are insinuating her…

> I mean, it comes from every intro to algorithm and data structures classes at every serious CS program.

If you wanted to indicate the level of generality here you wouldn't have used the adjective "serious"

> Not sure what you are insinuating here... That folks from these schools or who do good at algorithms don't see black folks as their equals?

I said "least likely to have any experience communicating... as peers". Hard to talk about "culture fit" when you don't have experience gauging certain folk who're far from sharing your background. That's just simple empiricism, which is why the reciprocal notion is true for many Black folk as well. De facto segregation has ruinous effects.

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#247

Post by BurningFrog »

kentonv wrote: post #58

We used this a couple times at Sandstorm back in the day. At the end of the interview the candidate would play Factorio cooperatively with the team for a while. I think it is remarkably effective at identifying the kinds of skills and personality traits that a software engineer actually needs to have in day-to-day work. You can find out if someone is self-directed, how fast they work, whether they produce clean desig…

A reminder that the goal of an interview process is not to be fair. This is not a sports event or a court case.

Mostly your goals align with "being fair", but not always, and that's OK.

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#248

Post by iAmAPencilYo »

SamBam wrote: post #196
rhacker wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There really isn't. At the end of the day every company I have been in has: the asshole, the smart guy, the idiot, the guy everyone is scared of, the guy that can't be fired ("the originals"). Then you just kind of multiply them randomly depending on team size. These hiring articles are a huge pointless waste of time.

Makes me feel lucky to be in my job, and a jolt of gratitude every-so-often is a welcome thing, so thank you. I work with 8 other senior or senior-ish engineers, we are all basically taking a slight paycut (not too much, maybe 80-90% of rates we might get elsewhere) to work for a non-profit making interesting stuff for kids, and everyone is genuinely nice and fairly hard-working. I wonder if the "taking a paycut to d…

Hi, could you share a little of what you do? It didn't even cross my mind I can work for a non-profit, still get paid (not top dollar) and have a good community impact (kids in your case). Thanks!

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#249

Post by Rule35 »

tyingq wrote: post #9

I don't think there is any silver bullet way to do technical interviews. The idea that you can extrapolate a few hours of exposure to a person into a reliable predictor of future performance is somewhat silly to me. Any technique you use is going to be biased for people that are good at "X", where "X" is a tiny subset of what you need in an employee. Obviously, you still need to do interviews, but keep some perspecti…

I heard good advice for life and interviews (be they for work, marriage, etc).

For life, it's that you aren't your weaknesses but your strengths. Don't worry about filling the skill hole in juggling for instance, put that time into your strengths or hobbies. Be a better you, not a more complete someone else.

For hiring though, if you've assured basic competence you're now more interested in weaknesses than strengths. You don't need the world's best person in the role, you need someone who won't bring down the group - either in their incompetence, malaise, nasty behavior, or whatever.

So when being interviewing for a role don't worry about being the best, shoot for 60% and you're golden - but do your best to avoid showing even a single red flag.

Re: Technical interview methods pale in comparison to playing Factorio with someone

#250

Post by handoflixue »

zamalek wrote: post #233
plank_time wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hire quickly and fire quickly with a generous severance. That’s the only method that I’ve seen works effectively. Netflix does more with 2000 engineers that companies with 10-20x that. This also lets you take chances on engineers that weren’t “perfect” but had a lot of positives to offer.

You probably don't need Hadoop, and you probably don't need 10x engineers. > This also lets you take chances on engineers that weren’t “perfect” but had a lot of positives to offer. This is not true. An AS/HFA/Autistic person wouldn't survive very long at Netflix, because they biologically struggle with the goal-setting/performance review game. These individuals may have talents that are biologically unavailable to n…

I can personally confirm that there's at least one autistic person in a senior engineering role at Netflix.
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