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The rise of never-ending job interviews

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Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#321

Post by trhway »

Aeolun wrote: post #165
hardwaregeek wrote: post #10

If your application process starts with a human being—even better a technical human being—reaching out to me, followed by 2-3 interviews, followed by an offer, I am already on your side. If your application process starts with a HackerRank, followed by 2 phone interviews followed by on-site, followed by team matching, I will not be on your side. Oh and if there's random month long gaps in between stages, I will espec…

I don’t think there is such a thing as a junior compiler job?

compilers are 101 of CS with coding a major part of compiler being just a course project. Honestly, one of the most straightforward and simple things in the industry. At one of my previous jobs several senior undergrads (beside fresh grads which were frequently hired) were hired full-time to work on a major compiler suite. A nearby company doing a lesser known kind of bit more narrow specialized compiler suite were hiring even more of senior undergrads and fresh grads.

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#322

Post by m-ee »

bsder wrote: post #157
kxrm wrote: post #114

I am actually going through the hiring process now. I was a hiring manager at my last shop and I tried to be very respectful of the candidates time. The process was first interview was 30 mins and basically a getting to know you and us session. Second interview was a two hour technical interview with debugging/fix this function type question and a single from scratch example question in the candidates language of cho…

> If it's FAANG And that's really the issue. The FAANG's are throwing around so much money that people are willing to put up with almost any amount of abuse to be on the other side of the line. The FAANGs can deal out any amount of abuse and they will still have a line of applicants around the block--there is no negative feedback in the interview process no matter how bad they make it. > Hiring in Tech is broken and…

I've interviewed for ME, EE, FW, and SW roles. It's not better in hardware. There's an equivalent to all the things people are complaining about here. Take home coding challenge -> take home hw design challenge where they expect you to have access to expensive software. I got a FW challenge once that assumed I had two different dev boards on hand. Spot the bugs in this printed out code? Find everything wrong with this schematic in 5 minutes. Now quick what's the transfer function of this filter? I have a dozen more questions to get through.

I had an ME friend who got into an argument with an interviewer about the convection equation. The interviewer was completely wrong, eventually my friend admitted "Ok I literally have it pulled up on my screen right now, I think you're mistaken."

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#323

Post by neilv »

silisili wrote: post #119

My one and only Google interview went this way years ago. Each round they'd send me more books to study, which frankly I couldn't be bothered to read given the circumstances. My experience ended when an interviewer in round 3 or 4 asked me an obviously scripted question. I answered sarcastically, he got peeved, and I never heard from them again. I'm not claiming I'm Google caliber, whatever that means. Obviously I'm…

> the entire question was: What's not in a Linux inode?

Were they considering you as an experienced developer of a Unix/Posix filesystem, who would almost certainly know what an inode is?

Or were they considering you as someone who had been using a Unix so long and extensively that you had a chance of once having had to configure an older filesystem for huge numbers of inodes. Or a chance that, for some rare reason, you once had occasion to learn that the `ln` command isn't always used in conjunction with `-s`?

In either of those cases, you might then guess at what the question was getting at, in a slightly clever way. If you got it, then both of you could share a bonding moment of both knowing this thing not everyone knows, and it could be a quick warmup to better questions.

Or, if you didn't get it, you could feel thrown off, and insecure or negged, which is also a win for an evil interview process.

If I'm feeling punchy at 3am, an alternative theory is that they could be a recent CS grad, who'd had a class in which they were told to recite, after the professor, "What's not in a Linux inode is the filename," and that's what they think is important about that. (By way of introducing the separation between inode and directory entry in Unix, through catchphrase and rote memorization. Other professors would probably instead explain using a diagram or the code for structs.) (Theory variation: perhaps the only professor who ever said this phrase was at Standford, which would make calling for it an especially transparent shibboleth for frat-like alumni affinity, and an overly-precise filter for socioeconomic class.)

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#324

Post by nextlevelwizard »

5350-uiop-1130 wrote: post #306

I think the post-covid wfh job market has clouded something a bit which is that the tech industry in particular is becoming increasing oversaturated. There is so many people applying for positions now that companies are resorting to these more and more annoying filtering processes. My first job in this field 14 years ago was one interview and I got the job the next day. That would be almost impossible today. I blame…

As someone who is stuck with a "junior developer" who hasn't produced a single line of working code during past 1.5years in my team the "one interview and done" isn't working these days.

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#325

Post by konschubert »

raffraffraff wrote: post #309
atoav wrote: post #304

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird. When I was casting for actors instead of trying to "trick them into doing something bad" and throwing them out, I tried my best to get it to work with them, even if it meant I had to do something different. A casting is always stressful, they don't need me as an enemy as well. If they are not good enough with a ton of help, they won't be good enough period. If they are really good with a little of help, they c…

This. Help the person you're interviewing. You'll both get more out of it, you'll both enjoy it. If you're in a company that is expanding, you'll be interviewing a lot, so it's really important that it doesn't depress the shit out of you.

There is a risk that you accidentally do the thinking for them and give the answers for them without noticing.

Doing a collaborative interview requires careful attention by the interviewer, but I agree it’s worth it.

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#326

Post by burntoutfire »

trinovantes wrote: post #313
hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually this one might make sense, depending on the code and the position you applied for.

It was for a junior c# position so I doubt it's applicable considering Visual Studio will point out the problems. But I'm curious what position would this question make sense?

It doesn't sound that stupid, it checks whether you know the syntax of the language you'll be programming in.

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#327

Post by smt88 »

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #305
trinovantes wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I once had an in-person interview where they gave me a sheet of printed code and asked me to point out the syntax errors. Some interviewers are absolutely insane.

Actually this one might make sense, depending on the code and the position you applied for.

Your IDE can check your syntax. For people who have to switch between languages regularly, precise syntax memorization is difficult and a waste of time.

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#328

Post by mike_hock »

throwaway09223 wrote: post #249
peakaboo wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's so stupid, all of it. They try to come up with random questions that doesn't mean anything if the candidate remembers the answer at that point in time. I've read about Linux inodes. I know what they do. In fact I even have had Linux systems where I get inode related error messages because the partition had too many small files on it. But given that question, in that situation, I would likely not know what they e…

In terms of topical content it's a good question. The idea that the name is a link stored in a directory entry is a key part of filesystem architecture and anyone familiar with unix filesystems should be able to immediately talk about why. The problem here is that what could be an invitation to showcase knowledge is reduced to a vague, one-dimensional and non-obvious trivia question. There are a ton of valid answers…

> They tend to indicate the interviewer isn't competent freely discussing the subjects at hand.

Ding ding ding.

Even the question, as asked, was OK. The interaction with the interviewee wasn't.

OP's joke was clearly just asking the interviewer to be more specific. Instead of exploring the question with the interviewee (e.g. "well, can you think of something that one might naively assume to be in the inode, but that is not"), they get pissed? lolwat?

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#329

Post by ladberg »

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #305
trinovantes wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I once had an in-person interview where they gave me a sheet of printed code and asked me to point out the syntax errors. Some interviewers are absolutely insane.

Actually this one might make sense, depending on the code and the position you applied for.

Design mistakes maybe, but syntax errors are just not representative of any real debugging experience IMO.

Re: The rise of never-ending job interviews

#330

Post by rplnt »

hdjjhhvvhga wrote: post #305
trinovantes wrote: post #301

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I once had an in-person interview where they gave me a sheet of printed code and asked me to point out the syntax errors. Some interviewers are absolutely insane.

Actually this one might make sense, depending on the code and the position you applied for.

e.g. a compiler

But yeah, I think I've seen questions like that for an intern positions. It's basically a "have you ever seen this language?" to weed out people quickly.

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