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Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

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Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#181

Post by jimt1234 »

rocketbop wrote: post #130
AmericanChopper wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That SME guy sounds like an asshole, but I used to have an interview technique where I’d ask increasingly specific and low level questions about the candidates area of expertise until it got to the point where I’d be pretty confident they wouldn’t know the answer off the top of their head. I wasn’t adversarial or rude about it, I just wanted to find out if they were comfortable saying “I don’t know”, because not know…

I always say I don’t know in interviews when I really don’t, rather than try to bluff. Some interviewers don’t like this though. As with the parent, perhaps that’s actually a good thing as you avoid having to work in a bad environment. Other times though, you may be being interviewed with a bad egg who you’ll never actually need to work with in the actual job.

I love it when interviewees say "I don't know", so long as they follow up with some sort of mental process explaining how they'd find out the answer/solution. So, "You know, I'm not exactly sure how the new payments API handles excessive requests, I've only glanced at the documentation. I can look at the docs more closely and get back to you.", or even "I don't know how the new payments API handles excessive requests, but honestly, if we've reached that point, I might wanna investigate that specific issue first, and try to figure out why we're sending so many requests." - either of those responses are great, IMHO. The response I'm NOT looking for is basically, "I don't know [shoulder shrug]."

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#182

Post by more_corn »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #128
throwaway_1more wrote: post #124

I recently interviewed for a senior level role for a complex domain (payments), this is an area I have more than a decade of experience. The interviews went flawlessly because I know payments inside out, not just in US but in UK and most EU jurisdictions. The funny bit is that the role being senior, influencing, soft communication skills and managing conflict are even more important than the subject matter expertise…

That SME guy sounds like an asshole, but I used to have an interview technique where I’d ask increasingly specific and low level questions about the candidates area of expertise until it got to the point where I’d be pretty confident they wouldn’t know the answer off the top of their head. I wasn’t adversarial or rude about it, I just wanted to find out if they were comfortable saying “I don’t know”, because not know…

My first interview at a FAANG company was so awesome. The interviewer said “I’m going to keep asking you questions till you can’t answer anymore. That way I learn the limit of your knowledge. If I can’t it’s because your knowledge in that area exceeds mine.”

This framing has helped me ever since. It helped me emotionally to recognize that finding the limits of one’s knowledge is not a bad thing, it helped me get the job, it helped me interview people, it helped me hire people who knew more than me.

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#183

Post by more_corn »

kibwen wrote: post #10

The article implies that the interviewee assumes that the number is being chosen randomly, when Ballmer could actually be choosing adversarially. However, if the interviewee assumes that Ballmer is being adversarial, then you can pick a different value as your initial guess, which causes the probabilities to shift. Even the OP assumes that the interviewee will start guessing with 50, but, because of the way binary se…

Speaking of adversarial choices, the interviewee may wish to clarify that this number is an int and not a float :-p

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#184

Post by authorfly »

justusthane wrote: post #59

Is there a name for the fallacy where you attribute your success in life to your own intelligence, and thus assume that you are smarter than everyone else, and that you therefor must be right about everything? Sort of an opposite impostor syndrome?

A more unusual answer to this would be Luciferianism Temptations.. https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Luciferianism&old...

The temptation that when you are smart you should become the guardian of the world, a world based on your learnings, your ultimate truths, truths you find easier and more quickly found than by the lay-person. Or so the temptation goes. It allows you to license your morality; the ends justify the means. What you are doing evilly now will be paid off twice-fold by the good it will lead to later. Right?

There's the Fundamental Attribution Error and Dunning-Kruger effects too. And on behavior... Illusory Superiority combines with Moral Licensing (allowing yourself to be equally good and evil because you "match the two") and the dis-inhibition effect which people with greater success take more risks (including affecting other people negatively).

I think these effects all sort of combine. It's not necessary intelligence but power, at least as perceived by the individual that seems to be a bit of an issue (e.g. the individual who thinks they are smarter at doing X innately feels more powerful and then has less inhibition about expressing their superiority and trying to dominate over others).

We've all seen the person who ought to have moved on who hangs on to their former glory fail to understand they are not in prime condition and who tries to exert power they nolonger hold too.. to me that is the real opposite of imposter syndrome. it's when peoples perception of themself and social dynamics don't move with the times.

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#185

Post by mulmen »

cjblomqvist wrote: post #160
potamic wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they threw an obnoxious senior manager that kept interrupting me as I calmly answered the questions This is a red flag. To me this signals that a company not only has a toxic culture, but embraces it. Such places attract personalities who love conflict and once there are enough people, they set the culture. What doesn't get said often is that conflict is a failure of leadership. Often all it takes to resolve confli…

Personally, I don't like this kind of thinking that it's a failure of leadership first and foremost. Yes, of course leadership can both work proactively to prevent conflict, as well as try to minimize/react to situations. But, what about the conflicting people? Shouldn't they (in most situations), bear the most responsibility to not end up/turn a situation into a conflict? Sometimes I get afraid of comments that (in…

As an IC leadership picks my coworkers and my projects for me. Why should I be made responsible for the consequences of their decisions? What do you think leadership does do if not build successful teams? If I am expected to get along with everyone on my team then I expect to be allowed to make hiring, firing, and prioritization decisions. At which point I’m now leadership and we don’t need dedicated leaders.

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#186

Post by rexreed »

throwaway_1more wrote: post #124

I recently interviewed for a senior level role for a complex domain (payments), this is an area I have more than a decade of experience. The interviews went flawlessly because I know payments inside out, not just in US but in UK and most EU jurisdictions. The funny bit is that the role being senior, influencing, soft communication skills and managing conflict are even more important than the subject matter expertise…

In an environment like that you'll be respected a lot more as a consultant and paid advisor, even if you provide generic and mediocre advice, than as an employee providing high quality expertise. Toxic management loves overpaid external consultants and advisors more than their own, much lesser paid internal staff.

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#187

Post by zerr »

AmericanChopper wrote: post #180
zerr wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remember that you are talking to humans, they are flexible. You were being adversarial. If you could explain them in advance what you were trying to "read between lines", I'm pretty sure most/all of them would have changed their answers. So what you were supposing that was unfixable/permanent, apparently is fixable within 1 minute (of explanation).

Interviewing is by no means the perfect way to assess a candidate, but ultimately that’s what the purpose is. If I just tell candidates what I want them to say upfront, then why even bother with it at all? I want to assess what qualities they have that I want/don’t want, and what qualities they don’t have, as best I can. They don’t need to be perfect. Skills can be trained, personality characteristic much less so. Pe…

What you should care is a behavior. You should be open about what is expected. People change behavior all the time depending on the situation/group/company/context.

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#188

Post by more_corn »

dllthomas wrote: post #86
NickC25 wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the worst interviews I ever had was just like that. Often times, the "gotcha" part is just dumb and nonsensical, yet gives the interviewer(s) a sense of misguided (false) superiority, and wastes everyone's time. I would venture to say that 99% of the time it's complete un-indicative of how effective the candidate would be in the role. Referring to my aforementioned bad interview - the question, after all the t…

> How on earth does that indicate if a junior frontend dev can do their job or not? Playing devil's advocate, maybe a junior frontend dev that doesn't trust that they understand what someone is asking for and pushes back on bits that should be obvious will perform better (in some contexts?) than one that doesn't. For a junior role in particular, though, it really doesn't seem like that should be the threshold and it…

I hear what you’re saying, but really, this is a stupid question and a waste of everyone’s time. Instead you could give a real big report that has insufficient information or that contains a red herring to an improper assumption. The interviewer could then measure if the candidate properly pushed back, exposed an improper assumption and asked relevant clarifying questions. Like one would do at the actual job exhibiting the characteristics the question purports to measure.

The car example is just stupid. Could you image how idiotic you’d sound beginning by asking is it a real car? You’re basically accusing your interlocutor of operating in bad faith (which they were).

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#189

Post by eps »

rocketbop wrote: post #130
AmericanChopper wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That SME guy sounds like an asshole, but I used to have an interview technique where I’d ask increasingly specific and low level questions about the candidates area of expertise until it got to the point where I’d be pretty confident they wouldn’t know the answer off the top of their head. I wasn’t adversarial or rude about it, I just wanted to find out if they were comfortable saying “I don’t know”, because not know…

I always say I don’t know in interviews when I really don’t, rather than try to bluff. Some interviewers don’t like this though. As with the parent, perhaps that’s actually a good thing as you avoid having to work in a bad environment. Other times though, you may be being interviewed with a bad egg who you’ll never actually need to work with in the actual job.

Good answer format is "I don't know, but my best guess would be ..."

Re: Steve Ballmer's incorrect binary search interview question

#190

Post by Quekid5 »

cbsmith wrote: post #117
jareklupinski wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if you perform a character edit format instruction in EBCDIC mode with the leading zero specifier and the numeric value is too great to fit into the allocated field, after the instruction completes, what is the state of the program status word overflow field? "Is the computer operating on American electricity, or European?"

African or European. Everyone knows that.

How do you know so much about electricity?
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