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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”?

#781

Post by nickjj »

renewiltord wrote: post #770
nickjj wrote: post #757

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it’s the liability it incurs. A two week commitment. I just can’t see doing it for $4k. It’s just not worth it. In my opinion it's the opposite of a liability. You're getting practical experience to know what it'll be like to work at that place. More hours ends up being better because each hour you put in gives you more information. It's an opportunity to see how things are run, get to know the team (if you…

I’m trying to feel out why it bothers me and I think it’s because: - I will probably exit an interview process in an hour if the company isn’t a good fit - We’re not talking about normal employment here. This is in addition to my job.

You'd be able to exit the process if it's not a good fit using this method too. Perhaps even during an initial call before there's any type of contract mentioned.

Going for interviews while you're currently employed is also in addition to your job. It's just you're doing "real world" things in the contract based interview instead of answering technical questions or whiteboarding implementations.

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

#782

Post by jugg1es »

rendall wrote: post #727
jugg1es wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would agree with you if the interview process included ANY feedback to interviewees when they were rejected. Prior to COVID, I got flown to Seattle mid-week for 2 nights and interviewed well (the recruiter told me to start looking for houses). But 20 days later I was basically ghosted by my recruiter and I had to escalate to their manager to get a response that I was rejected. They gave me no feedback at all. The i…

> "...I failed the phone screen somehow by someone who sounded 20 years younger than me..." Consider, possibly, that the mismatch is explained in this sentence. I will absolutely give high weight to how the receptionist is treated by the candidate.

If you are implying that I was rude to this person, you are mistaken. I treated the interviewer with the same good nature and respect that I would treat anyone. The difference between someone less than 5 years out from school and someone who has been doing this for decades is that, when you are younger, you believe that software engineering skills have anything to do with what you learned in undergrad. I misspoke on a topic that I hadn't thought about for years and I heard the shift in his tone. When I interview people and they miss something that seems obvious to me, I usually give them another chance and think of a new way to ask the question.

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

#783

Post by jreese »

matheusmoreira wrote: post #530
jreese wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cover sheet has the words "Performance Improvement Plan", with key goals to achieve in a 30 day period, with the final page to be signed by me and my manager. https://cdn.n7.gg/pip/pip-1.png https://cdn.n7.gg/pip/pip-2.png Not every company is awful.

I wonder what these performance expectations are.

Basically boiled down to:

1) build a plan and make meaningful progress on a high impact, but stalled, project

2) communicate about progress and/or roadblocks to the team, and ask for help where needed to get past said roadblocks

3) be more proactive about finding and proposing high impact work, or areas where others could bring their expertise to help benefit my work or get it done faster

Details are confidential, of course.

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

#784

Post by throwaway743 »

namirez wrote: post #662
throwaway743 wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Totally. Or the interviewer felt insecure and threatened by their competence. If that's the case, they dodged a bullet.

Yes, I thought about both possibilities (discrimination and insecurity) but I want to remain positive and not attribute ulterior motives to the interviewer. It was an ironic experience though because, I believe, had my code been a bit slower I would have had a better shot at the interview.

Damn, yeah that is a pretty ironic possibility.

Either way, I hope you've found a good place to share your skills since that experience. Wishing you the best

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

#785

Post by tubs »

jugg1es wrote: post #343
StupidUser123 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m a HM at a big tech company with this format as well. Honestly, I really like it. I don’t want to hire the wrong person, it’s expensive and it makes my job awful for a while. It’s great getting data points on several programming interviews, system design, etc. That makes my sell interview so much easier because I can trust the process to assess their technical skills. You need multiple people because you’re consta…

I would agree with you if the interview process included ANY feedback to interviewees when they were rejected. Prior to COVID, I got flown to Seattle mid-week for 2 nights and interviewed well (the recruiter told me to start looking for houses). But 20 days later I was basically ghosted by my recruiter and I had to escalate to their manager to get a response that I was rejected. They gave me no feedback at all. The i…

At amazon your interviewer is supposed to be >= the job level you're applying for.

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

#786

Post by hirako2000 »

mamcx wrote: post #711
hirako2000 wrote: post #665

Earlier quoted context omitted.

maybe they just don't understand the questions. e.g: I challenge you to give an answer to my question? it's such a simple question, how could anyone not give the right answer. but it's as badly communicated as your comment, subject to interpretation and perplexing. now imaging being in a position of inferiority, in total fear to be asked about things you've never hear about before. like it happens not so rarely when…

> maybe they just don't understand the questions. Questions: - Reverse a string like "hello" without using the "reverse" function of your lang, ie: manually - Do it in the lang you prefer most - I will return later when you are ready - This machine is as your full disposal, so use anything you need. Seriously, if this is challenging, now imagine when facing actual requirements...

that part was because the parent comment was barely understandable.

this interview question is crystal clear and anyone applying for a software dev position should be able to provide a valid answer.

it doesn't remove the fear factor problem. but agreed. that's also why we got screening calls, in 10 mins even a tech recruiter can filter out wanna be engineers who can't answer super basic tech questions.

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

#787

Post by digisign »

R0b0t1 wrote: post #710
water8 wrote: post #637

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes but the damage that they’ll due to your reputation online will make you have to pay more for better talent. They are going to read the glass door and see your company environment as shit and say “I want an extra 20 grand” Not to mention the amount of technical debt high turnover causes for tech companies

Not that many people actually get fired in a hire fast fire fast workplace. The whole point of hiring this way is allowing yourself to not overprepare in an aversion to hiring poor talent. When you get a poor performer, you just let them go, but the average is not that bad, and you end up filling your billets faster where another company may not at all. The opposite is 7 interviews and shedding most of your applicant…

Indeed. I remember interviewing for several positions and could have done them with one hand behind my back. A ~year later they were still trying to fill the position but hadn't.

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

#788

Post by justinlloyd »

ihateolives wrote: post #766
justinlloyd wrote: post #737

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is possible that a candidate's social media presence is minimal or non-public, and that will lead to a dead end. But are you claiming that _your_ social media presence is minimal or non-public? Candidates are applying with their real names and a work history; not to sound creepy but they become very "findable" with that information. And I use that to judge "does this person know what he's talking about when it com…

It was a hypothetical question about whether you have plan B for when you do not find applicants presence in the social media to be enough to draw conclusions but you answered that now. I would consider most of these thing that you listed to have nothing to do with professional aptitude but the fact you took time to go through the process with random dude on the internet for some reason and then deemed these things i…

Thank you, it does speak volumes about me, but I am not taking it as the insult you think it is. You were trying to be clever by asking a question about "oh, but what if the person doesn't have much of a social media presence or makes it private?" And I proved that if you have a social media presence of any kind, it is easily discernable and those private little comments we all make when we think nobody is listening tells me whether I would want to work with them. Those things have nothing to do with professional aptitude, but you'd be surprised just how toxic some people can be in their private moments.

I deemed the points listed important enough to list here to indicate that you are findable, even when you think you're not. I was also careful about not just saying you're "X that works at company Y" with a bunch of links. Based on what I have read I think you are a competent, level-headed, well-rounded and reasonable person with strong opinions about what you want from your technology with a willingness to compromise. You're also an exceptionally competent developer and team lead and I wouldn't hesitate to hire you.

A social media presence, even when we don't want people to see it, can either accelerate the point to hire or the cut the interview short. I don't look to see if someone does drugs, binge drinks alcohol, enjoys going to fringe fandom conventions or spends their income on collectible dolls. I care that the person we're interviewing isn't expressing undesirable opinions about people of colour, sexual orientation or many other aspects that would bring undesirable prejudices in to the team.

Based on what I've read, your interview would consist of "when can you start?"

Regarding a "plan B" for no social media presence at all, then the interview process becomes much lengthier and more difficult for all involved.

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

#789

Post by novok »

deckard1 wrote: post #541
novok wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High stakes means high investment. You can’t just hire a dev and have them running in a week, their bad work could cost the company multi-millions in obvious and non obvious ways and proper onboarding takes months at minimum. On the other hand, a cashier can be replaced in a week, and they don’t effect the entire future of the company as SOP.

> their bad work could cost the company multi-millions That's such patently absurd bullshit. Google has a code review process. Almost any large tech company has this today. The review process is to ensure that it's a team effort when a major screw-up happens. You don't just let some new employee merge untested and unreviewed code. You know who I always see harming the company with outages and downtime? Seniors and ma…

You don't think those managers are "dealt with"? Lol yes they are, but it shows up in 'reorgs'.

And outages still occur even with code review, unit tests and alerting.

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

#790

Post by novok »

nowherebeen wrote: post #258
novok wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

High stakes means high investment. You can’t just hire a dev and have them running in a week, their bad work could cost the company multi-millions in obvious and non obvious ways and proper onboarding takes months at minimum. On the other hand, a cashier can be replaced in a week, and they don’t effect the entire future of the company as SOP.

> their bad work could cost the company multi-millions They is false and hyperbole to justify your argument. If a single employee can cost a big company like Google multi-millions, then there is a company structure problem. You make it sound like there are no system of checks. The very definition of being 1 in 10,000 employees at big corp is that no one is important enough to cost the company multi-millions.

You can tell when someone hasn't worked at a google sized company when...

Yes, it happens all, the, time. It's just not public information.

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