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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”?

#511

Post by nelsondev »

daenz wrote: post #470
bobabob wrote: post #447

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's time we accept that the person we are talking to is who they say they are on their resume. Yea because we live in a place where everyone is super honest and no one is going to try and take advantage of that to make 500k a year. IMO, it doesn't work. Talk is cheap. I wouldn't have a job if I had to talk my way into any company, I'm an introvert, I suck at communicating orally. But I can solve problems a…

>Yea because we live in a place where everyone is super honest and no one is going to try and take advantage of that to make 500k a year. I would be THRILLED if I was put into some kind of a short probationary period, with limited access (and potentially restricted salary, with retroactive reimbursement) while I showed what I was worth. I personally have a hard time demonstrating that in short interviews, and it's on…

That can work for some, but imagine you already have a job, and time commitments, and it takes 5-10 companies to find a fit.

Spending ~1-2 months is expensive.

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

#513

Post by rafiki6 »

Too many people got into this industry, and too many people were able to easily switch between companies and boost their salaries absurd amounts. The big boys decided to use interview grinds to reduce turnover (that's why they all more or less have the same process) and all the people who started companies and came from these companies have been through and assume this process works due to the success of the big boys and they themselves being subjected to it.

The reality is this profession isn't that hard, and majority of people working in it are pretty much just plumbers using the innovations of true computer scientists.

We've managed to created a much more inefficient gatekeeping mechanism than just creating a proper certification process and commended ourselves for it and pretend it's somehow more meritocratic than just getting a comp sci/eng degree and license.

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

#514

Post by drewcoo »

We're all told to treat our running software as livestock, not pets. That means they're disposable, you start and stop them rapidly, etc.

If I'm being very, very kind, this kind of hiring practice means the company wants to treat you like a pet (in the best possible sense) and not livestock.

Probably it has more to do with data-driven decisions to optimize the hiring funnel. Or possibly voodoo.

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

#515

Post by igetspam »

hinkley wrote: post #386
tartoran wrote: post #297

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> PIPing and firing is a huge time and emotional energy suck, and it sucks So is the 7 interview gauntlet. But I guess it just shifts the burden on the candidates and externalizes cost.

It also selects for people who will put up with anything, which to a cynical manager might sound like a good employee, except that our job is to replace labor with machines. People who put up with anything are expensive. They keep billing you hours for tasks that could have been reduced to minutes by someone with a lower tolerance for BS.

I swear some of you have had terrible work experiences. I've been an engineer for the last 20 years. The first time I tried being manager, I sucked and it sucked. (I definitely sucked more because the place sucked but I wasn't great.) That was a decade ago though and I've gradually stepped back into management because I've had great leadership and learned a ton along the way. My primary goal as a manager is to ensure the team is happy and healthy, so that they are able to work effectively. Our hiring process supports this by ensuring we're not hiring dead weight, toxic people or engineers that can't provide value and drag the team down.

Where do you people work because I'd like to (a) avoid it and (b) poach people because your world view sucks and I can only assume that's a direct response to a shit environment.

To put it into perspective, my first 1:1 with everyone on the team includes questions like "what have previous managers done to help you be successful?" Managing people can be difficult but managers shouldn't be.

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

#516

Post by vikingcaffiene »

kube-system wrote: post #471
vikingcaffiene wrote: post #346

Hiring manager here. IMO the current tech hiring norms are gross and not sustainable. It feels like a weird hazing ritual and with the current market, is the single biggest reason you can't hire. Why on earth would someone burn a weekend on a take-home test for your startup when they have 15 other irons in the fire? At my current employer we got rid of all that ridiculousness. No take home test. No live coding. We've…

> You don't see accountants balancing books before they get hired. You sure do, and not just by a hiring manager's whim, but by law. Accountants have occupational licensing. > I think it's time we accept that the person we are talking to is who they say they are on their resume. This is a straw man, I have never "caught a liar" on an a coding exam. What they are helpful for doing is judging the quality of what it mea…

> Accountants have occupational licensing.

Forgive my ignorance, but is this during every interview? If I am reading this right this is a certification they'd need to get which would be on their resume. Do they need to re-prove those skills every time?

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

#517

Post by sgerenser »

ballenf wrote: post #207
mylons wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

how is it better than alternatives? this seems like a huge straw-man given almost every company that hires developers thinks they’re a large tech company and mimics their hiring process. it doesn’t seem like serious alternatives have been explored.

I've worked and interviewed at dozens of companies and literally never experienced a company that had more than 2 interviews plus a discussion with a hiring manager or HR. I make half-ish of a FAANG salary, but it's enough to comfortably support a family and I'm generally pretty happy and get to work on cool stuff. The only challenge I never get at work are problems that have huge scale components.

Interesting, I’ve interviewed at all of the FAANGs other than Netflix, plus maybe 10 or so much smaller companies. In general the smaller companies all seemed to want to emulate the FAANG hiring process with 4-6 rounds of interviews with engineers after an initial phone screen. I think only 1 or 2 of them limited their interview to just 2 rounds.

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

#518

Post by mylons »

azinman2 wrote: post #289
mylons wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

making the interview process similar to the job is a good first step. when I worked at Invitae this was my proudest achievement from my time there. I suggested that we change the interview process to a paired programming session that were situations from our day to day work. the candidate brought in their own laptop or was provided one (their choice). the session was 90-120 minutes and didn’t involve leetcode hard pr…

The problem with this is that many jobs require weeks worth of on ramping into internal systems, code bases, etc, not to mention many aspects of the job would be working on otherwise secretive stuff. I don’t think this would work at a FAANG, and many bigger companies.

of course — so you have to make it accessible to the candidate. using the internal code base is probably not the best choice. we had them write up a small API with specific requirements in the tech of their choice, and tried to have someone programming with them familiar with their choice of tech.

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

#519

Post by swader999 »

bluescrn wrote: post #416
hinkley wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It also selects for people who will put up with anything, which to a cynical manager might sound like a good employee, except that our job is to replace labor with machines. People who put up with anything are expensive. They keep billing you hours for tasks that could have been reduced to minutes by someone with a lower tolerance for BS.

It's probably also selecting for people who are unemployed and therefore much more able to attend the entire gauntlet than those already employed.

How would this really be possible while currently employed, kids, real deliverables?
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