411–420 of 432 posts
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When I interview, I don't spend much time reading the resume beforehand, but I'll ask a few specific questions about it during the interview. If one assumes nobody reads their resume, however, then what benefit would they get from lying?
A resume is not an interview.
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It’s perfect code with 105% test coverage and there are amazing meetings and everyone is as smart as they think they are.
So if I'm understanding your cynicism correctly, the code at FANGs sucks and so the solution is to lower the hiring bar?
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> In the last company I worked in London, only one team (DevOps) did not follow scripted interviews. It was the least diverse team, not just in terms of representation, but in terms of diversity of thought. Did this result in poorer job performance for the DevOps team, or any other negative business results that were specific to that team? If not, who’s to say which interviewing method was better or worse? As an inte…
> Did this result in poorer job performance for the DevOps team, or any other negative business results that were specific to that team? If not, who’s to say which interviewing method was better or worse? It did. And even if it had not in this particular case, it will hurt the company in the long run. There is not even a shred of doubt in my mind that diversity (of thought) is the best investment that leads to succes…
prove it. oh wait you can't.
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Thank you! That is a very interesting world indeed. But, just focusing on the algorithms part of it, I never could answer how exactly a specific algorithm worked, but I've had to use many algorithms in my "normal" job. I just know "oh this needs a modified DFS, or A*, with custom heuristics, or a priority based permutations generator". I cannot answer how any of this works in detail on the fly, but I know where to lo…
Is it sufficient? Depends on your interviewer and other factors. I personally wouldn't fail anyone for not knowing absolute specifics(unless they claimed to know as much). I would expect some 'algorithmic thinking' and basic familiarity. The interview is also based on a fair bit of luck. In my case, I was asked about virtual memory, and I had literally just days before done a deep dive through the Linux VM subsystem.…
Also, my statement was not blanket statement, nor that I wrote more code than others. I was referring to a very specific set of problems that I was working on and not generalizing that I'm better than all googlers. There are many people who are way smarter/better than I am. I'm just saying not being in FAANG does not mean one is not good enough.
I think the interview processes put a bar on if one willing to put in the amount of specific kind of work needed to get in or not. In its own way, it is a good filter (for them)
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As I near the entry into my 30s, I begin to see this more and more clearly. I used to be EXCITED about my job, about a project, about a task. It also made me very stressed and made me take things personally when they didn’t go according to “my vision”. Back then, I’d have read this sentiment as “jaded” and “cynical”. But as I mature, I find the balance, and I find truth in these words.
Oh yes. Getting genuinely excited about a project is a recipe for burnout, especially when the project doesn’t go in a direction that continues to excite you. I’d argue that an employee who can work on a project despite his lack of excitement is better than one who needs this excitement to function. What excites me are things like enjoying time with my family, the idea of making enough money to retire in my 50s inste…
I wish I could a 2-3 hour interview where I (or the candidate) showcase one of my projects and explain the architectural details and decisions in addition to showing any cool/hairy/insane code that got the job done. We can discuss those things and see how to improve them, or laugh at the crazy solutions. Honestly how many times do I need to rehearse these dumbass algos (blah blah blah, so I'll optimize for space with…
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They don't have problems with the questions. They are not able to write a simple C++. And they are applying for a C++ dev job.
I would think that could get filtered out on the resume check with no relevant experience. Are they lying on the resume?
These guys are applying for C++ dev jobs but are completely unable to write a program. Most of these fake programmers have studied electronics (not CS) or have studied in a country where you can buy a degree.
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They don't have problems with the questions. They are not able to write a simple C++. And they are applying for a C++ dev job.
I would think that could get filtered out on the resume check with no relevant experience. Are they lying on the resume?
C++ is a particularly badly affected language for some reason. I think there are a lot of people who learned C++ once, a long time ago, then moved to Java as quickly as they could when it came out. But nobody likes to admit that maybe they lost a skill they once had, so they keep putting it down on the CV regardless. And then when asked to write something like hello world, they don't remember how to use std::cout or whatever.
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You can’t remove the identifying details and talk about the technical challenge and usage in a generic sense? Your system or software is that specific? Can you give a now public example?
I can, and that’s usually what I do, but there are identifying details about the very specific domain which AWS only has a single product in. So I can talk about architecting a system, about customer feedback and redesigns, but I can’t talk about work I did that will span another three years. I think at FAANG it’s usually fine — most people have good enough examples even without their full repertoire. But at mid ente…
Sorry, to be clear, I mean can you give an example of something you couldn't use as an example, but is now public.
I've worked at GAMMA, and agree, it's very doable to turn my work generic and talk about it in-depth, compare it to alternatives, etc. so that was the main driver in asking for an example.
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It's hard to tell if it's hysterical without knowing the Cost/Benefit for the company. How empowered are new senior hires, and how expensive is the time of the team? At larger companies senior engineers are often phenomenally expensive and at smaller companies controls over potentially business ending operations are usually minimal. A friend of mine at a FAANG recently dealt with a bad hire. Their guess was that in t…
> Their guess was that in the 6 months the bad hire was there they cost the company maybe ~5 million between wasted engineer time and delayed release schedules after people kept having to put out their fires. I've worked with one or two of those, but I've also been on interview loops that rejected candidates who went on to massively successful careers at a different FAANG. The cost of false positives is relatively ea…