Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

old.reddit.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 448 posts

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#201

Post by Macha »

dookahku wrote: post #81
billy99k wrote: post #2

I once had a SW interview with a job that had a 2-hour long personality test. No tech questions. Just random questions to test my personality. It started out simple, like 'what was the last book you read' to more in-depth situations that had nothing to do with the job. The manager interviewing me (who admit he basically just started managing a month prior) told me he just read a 'great book on management' and wanted…

Canonical made me do a personality test. From what I understand, Canonical culture isn't great, either. The whole process sounds a lot like what you are talking about -- just hoops to winnow out people for the sake of winnowing.

Having seen Canonical's personality test, while it's impossible to verify without their marking methodology, it feels explicitly classist (which in the US probably means it produces racist outcomes too)

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#203

Post by ziddoap »

gamepsys wrote: post #162
331c8c71 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Slavery was also legal one day. And I bet there was also some "science" (if only political) to back it up. Just sayin)

I'm confused, I thought I was very critical of these tests in my comment.

>I'm confused, I thought I was very critical of these tests in my comment.

It wasn't until the last sentence of your 2nd paragraph where you make any negative remark about them. Up until that point, your comment reads like it is justifying the tests because they are legal. At least that's how I read it.

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#204

Post by vidarh »

frfl wrote: post #28
georgel wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This has been my experience as well. The more hoops a company made me jump through the less they were offering to begin with, and the culture was not great. My last gig was great in that aspect. My client found my LinkedIn, we had a quick 15 minute call to discuss the project and I was working for them the next day.

Imagine the tens of thousands of dollars saved if you had a 15 minute (okay 15 is a bit short unless someone vouches for you or you're a well known open source contributor etc, maybe 1 hour or 1.5 hour, hell even 2 hour) technical conversation and the other engineer is like, yeah this person's worth bringing onboard. Might not work in all cases, but really, if you're trying to sniff out a pretender vs someone who can…

Most 'pretenders' I've come across over they years have outed themselves by cheating in the most idiotic ways on screening questions and failed to answer the most trivial coding questions because they've been so bad that they didn't understand even the level that was expected.

So I'm inclined to think your 15 minute intuition is nearly enough - the worst people reveal themselves very quickly. And so does the best people. Where a little bit more time might be needed is sometimes in the middle, but it's rare for more conversation to change the initial judgement.

Over nearly 30 years, there have been borderline cases where we might have overpaid someone, and a couple I'd have preferred not to have hired, but who still could deliver, but I don't think we've ended up with anyone who were bad enough to justify these kinds of extensive hiring processes.

I tend to see these complex hiring processes more as tests to determine which candidates are willing to jump through hoops and prove their eagerness and loyalty. E.g. when a FAANG sent me a reading list.... I declined, pointing out that if I needed to study for their interviews they weren't testing my skills, but how desperate I was to work for the. Their recruiters called me back a couple of times to try to convince me again.

I can understand them doing so, because they can, and getting people to who will see it as an achievement to get past these barriers might be worth it to them, but to me it just felt like I didn't want to work in an environment where people were so eager work there that they'd put up with that.

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#205

Post by NegativeK »

strictnein wrote: post #181
squeaky-clean wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interviewed at Burger King in college, the manager told me I was the only applicant in their system to get above 80% on the personality test. It was incredibly easy things like, "How many minutes are acceptable to show up late for your shift? 5 minutes, 15 minutes, 30 minutes, being late is unacceptable". Or "If you knew there were no cameras able to see you, and no other employees around, how much money is okay to…

In college I worked at Circuit City selling computers. Lots of similar questions. "Is it okay to take display merchandise if others are doing it?" type stuff. Definitely weeds out some people I guess.

Seems like it'd weed out people who are caught easily..

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#206

Post by mistrial9 »

ChrisMarshallNY wrote: post #174
billy99k wrote: post #2

I once had a SW interview with a job that had a 2-hour long personality test. No tech questions. Just random questions to test my personality. It started out simple, like 'what was the last book you read' to more in-depth situations that had nothing to do with the job. The manager interviewing me (who admit he basically just started managing a month prior) told me he just read a 'great book on management' and wanted…

That was the way that I interviewed. I never gave a coding test in my life. I never made a technical error, but I think that I did hire a couple of folks, over the years, that didn't integrate into the team that well. Not sure the personality test would have made a difference. Sometimes, the only way that you can tell how someone will do, is start working with them.

the first time I saw a pressure-interview for high skill coders was on campus at Apple, and the interviewing team was from Microsoft HQ. The project was audio-related and required excellent coding skills and knowledge of digital sound and associated mathematics. This was in the early 1990s IIR.

After complete astonishment at the focus on "performance coding" also known as obey my commands now.. by tech-bros from MSFT, the immediate thought was "this is a new style of engineering management that emphasizes the authority of the interviewer over talent and skill fitting"

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#207

Post by kemayo »

tick_tock_tick wrote: post #193
billy99k wrote: post #2

I once had a SW interview with a job that had a 2-hour long personality test. No tech questions. Just random questions to test my personality. It started out simple, like 'what was the last book you read' to more in-depth situations that had nothing to do with the job. The manager interviewing me (who admit he basically just started managing a month prior) told me he just read a 'great book on management' and wanted…

Personality tests are stupid but I don't know if I'd be willing to join a company that didn't do any-kind of whiteboarding/live coding exercise. I've interviewed way too many people who can't write a for loop. Fizzbuzz is supposed to be a joke not something people legitimately fail but it happens all the time.

I'm fine with a coding test, and okay with whiteboarding / live-coding so long as people are accepting of it just being roughing-out the code rather than expecting to produce something polished... but 5 hours of it? That's ridiculious unless you're paying people for the interview.

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#209

Post by schmookeeg »

dave333 wrote: post #62
schmookeeg wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get an ASMR-like response from taking tests/quizzes, even these sorta pop-psych nonsense ones. Apparently I'm a "mentor" at FedEx. It resonates. :) My current client had me sit one of these after 2 years on the job. That one labeled me "Debater". I argued with them out of principle. I think that if their HR people used it to screen me before I started, I would not have gotten the gig at all. :D

The test is pretty easy to game just by giving answers you think make you a good prospect - traits you would aspire to but don't necessarily achieve. I too got a Mentor rating whereas in reality I am retired and much closer to a lazy shy procrastinating individual contributor who never gets anything done!

Yeah you'd think everyone would save some time and treasure by just reducing the thing down to "Are you a jerk? Y/N"

...until I saw my boss's THREE HUNDRED page manual on how to interpret the results of these tests. There is apparently some entire industry behind these "tools". I've learned to limit my criticism of what is very clearly, to me, a load of weak-signal hogwash. They may as well throw chicken bones or read tea leaves from where I sit, but then again, I sit from a place of certainly smaller net worth than whoever is peddling this stuff, so round and round we go? :)

Re: I applied for a software role at FedEx and was asked to take a personality test

#210

Post by awskinda »

tick_tock_tick wrote: post #193
billy99k wrote: post #2

I once had a SW interview with a job that had a 2-hour long personality test. No tech questions. Just random questions to test my personality. It started out simple, like 'what was the last book you read' to more in-depth situations that had nothing to do with the job. The manager interviewing me (who admit he basically just started managing a month prior) told me he just read a 'great book on management' and wanted…

Personality tests are stupid but I don't know if I'd be willing to join a company that didn't do any-kind of whiteboarding/live coding exercise. I've interviewed way too many people who can't write a for loop. Fizzbuzz is supposed to be a joke not something people legitimately fail but it happens all the time.

[dead]
Post reply on HN