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Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

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Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#151
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to say this. To add more: a single person (HM) might have biases for or against certain candidates. More people in the loop brings in diversity and helps to keep interviewers honest and consistent. Also these roles are usually high stakes and the cost of a bad hire is too high.

Quoted post unavailable.

[deleted]

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would argue that 30 hours invested in interviewing at a single company is a lot more work than you put in doing a couple phone screens and a one-day onsite. I personally abhor take-home projects because they tend to balloon in scope (I'm a perfectionist and want to put the best foot forward). With an on-site loop, when you're done you're done.

Yeah, a valid philosophy is that a company should have to spend at least as many man-hours interviewing me as I spend interviewing.

How would you feel if they offered compensation, say for your 30 hrs?

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#153
post #98
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Often, legally, firing people is harder than hiring. 2. Hire more, fire fast sounds good on paper but will destroy morale as the team identity will be constantly influx. 3. Engineers will spend less time onboarding newer engineers to the detriment of everyone because well, they might not just last.

Basically everywhere in NA has allowances for probationary periods with at-will employment. Moreover, prospective hires could start on contract. Morale is improved when team members feel like they have some control over their membership. It seems like you're assuming that a great many people would be fired; why so? In my experience, having worked for several such companies, firing is rare because even minimal filters…

I’m not saying you’re categorically wrong, but this doesn’t match with my experience, at all. If you’re an HM and this works for you and your company, great, but the HMs responding here don’t agree.

The processes you are questioning scale to thousands of people with varying backgrounds. It’s not an accident all of these companies do this. Your process places extreme trust in one group of people. It’s just so risky.

Also, resumes are mostly bullshit, IMO. Reference checks are complete bullshit, IMO. I’ve worked with my buddies at startups (who get lofty titles) and just have them give me reference checks. Other references have asked me for call scripts.

Also keep in mind that most of these big tech jobs are highly competitive. Your solution eventually requires a coin toss if you have limited spots. There’s only so much data you can collect from the process you propose. The natural thing is to then assess each candidate a bit more until you’re confident you’ve picked the right one. And then you’re here.

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#154
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to say this. To add more: a single person (HM) might have biases for or against certain candidates. More people in the loop brings in diversity and helps to keep interviewers honest and consistent. Also these roles are usually high stakes and the cost of a bad hire is too high.

Quoted post unavailable.

I’ve worked in tech for decades and I’ve never experienced a process with “7 straight white guys” much less every time.

First, how do you know the sexual orientation of interviewers?

Next, tech is like 50-70% Asian so it would be so weird to only have white guys doing programming interviews.

The guy pet is spot on as programming is way heavy in guys.

But I’m not sure why you would think that 7 interviews = 7 straight white guys.

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#155
post #56

There needs to be something like the SAT for computer programming. Getting a 1500 won't mean you're a genius but it will mean you can do the job, and then there can be 1-2 interviews for domain-specific skills and culture fit. I know many have tried this, some have built great businesses, but nobody has yet become "The Credential" but I do believe this will eventually exist.

I’ve had some companies give a Codility test, which is basically 3 leetcode-style problems, 30 min each, solvable in 10 or 15 lines of code, any language you want. Then the actual interview can focus on discussing your solutions and higher level questions.

(Turns out the company started as a 10% project of the first company I encountered that used it)

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#157
post #44

Having been an interviewer at a FAANG for many years, I can explain some of the logic behind it. I'm not saying this logic is valid , but it's how we got here, imho. First: we no longer trust the hiring manager alone, because probably they aren't a strong developer. We instead trust strong developers that are well trained at evaluating good devs. At the same time, we don't want to thrust a dev onto a hiring manager,…

> Can one interview really tell if you're good problem solving, coding, algorithms/data structures, and any specialization the role has?

Sorry, but if it can't, aren't you doing the interview wrong?

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#158
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to say this. To add more: a single person (HM) might have biases for or against certain candidates. More people in the loop brings in diversity and helps to keep interviewers honest and consistent. Also these roles are usually high stakes and the cost of a bad hire is too high.

Quoted post unavailable.

That is great signal for the candidate, though. If a company is putting all of their decision-making power into the hands of douchebros, it's best to make that clear in the interview process so that talented candidates can stay away.

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#159
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to say this. To add more: a single person (HM) might have biases for or against certain candidates. More people in the loop brings in diversity and helps to keep interviewers honest and consistent. Also these roles are usually high stakes and the cost of a bad hire is too high.

Quoted post unavailable.

I experienced almost that complete opposite of that, for sure..

Re: Ask HN: When did 7 interviews become “normal”?

#160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was going to say this. To add more: a single person (HM) might have biases for or against certain candidates. More people in the loop brings in diversity and helps to keep interviewers honest and consistent. Also these roles are usually high stakes and the cost of a bad hire is too high.

> these roles are usually high stakes and the cost of a bad hire is too high Really? High stakes? This fucking site. Have you ever worked as a software developer at a corporation? Nothing about it is high stakes. You spend most of your time dealing with useless idiots who report to other useless idiots, who report to other useless idiots, about a useless product they think is a great idea that every non-idiot knows i…

Google has has 6+ interviews since at least 2003
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