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Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

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Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#161

Post by qkeast »

creato wrote: post #117
eikenberry wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are right about hiring not being that much different but your prognostications are way off IMO. > - people are probably going to have to fly out for interviews, again. Fly where? Many companies don't have offices anymore. > - awkward and/or neurodivergent people are going to have to learn social skills again. Ahh... the age old, "just do better" position for neurodivergent people. Classic bigotry. > - And yeah, y…

Requiring people to be able to interact with other people is not "bigotry".

I'm deaf and rely on real-time captions for calls. In an in-person interview scenario, I'm at a huge disadvantage and not able to perform at my best. In a video call, I'm on equal ground.

It's not as simple as "requiring people to be able to interact with other people."

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#162

Post by mystraline »

roguecoder wrote: post #142
mystraline wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Some people think it's perfectly normal to stretch the truth on a resume, and to lie in an interview. So marketing works in the company's favor, and not the candidates? Its a tough pill to swallow, but bending the truth and lying seems to be the way folks get jobs now. Perhaps not lying... But I've thought about the 1pt font white on white mega-tech-list attached to Workday resumes to get past THEIR ai-slop filters…

Lying isn't marketing. If you lie in marketing, people can sue you. It is one thing to frame your experiences in ways that are relevant to what the job is looking for: it is not only unethical to fabricate experiences, it is counter-productive. I will be checking references, and if their reports of the role you played on a project don't match yours I will not be hiring you. If you don't have references who can speak…

> Lying isn't marketing. If you lie in marketing, people can sue you.

That is also fungible as well. Some lies just aren't catchable, like experience with skills that you teach yourself quickly, or go through a quick online course. Not saying I should, but "fake it till ya make it" is a definite thing.

> If you don't have references who can speak to the work you did, I also won't be hiring you.

There's also a reason I'm leaving the role, and usually you don't want people near your position to know youre looking.

And also, demanding references is the old AI slop - you're only going to give glowing references. Nobody gives bad references. And the worst case is you have a friend answer, or you buy one of those reference services (yes, theres a service for that).

> know that is frustrating, and I am sorry you are in that place, but lying will not help.

I think you're missing the point of the type of 'lying' I was referring to. Workday uses an absolute terrible AI, that uses keyword search. With my resume, the human readable text is accurate and me, but to this ai-slop scanning woukd scan 1pt listicle of every keyword.

Its not lying, but it is. Play stupid AI bullshit games, get gamified AI slop solutions. And I hate it. But even having a discussion with someone would be a start.

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#163

Post by roguecoder »

robocat wrote: post #152

> For prospective job candidates, my advice is still that "the truth will set you free" Is that really good advice? If you have the wisdom of knowing when to embellish and when to blur, then you're more likely to get a job and more likely to fit in. I'm a spectrum, and generally I'm over-truthful and I notice my habit regularly affects me negatively.

Providing too much information will weigh against candidates, sure. Filtering information to what is relevant is a very useful skill: it saves time, helps listeners focus by not overwhelming their working memory, and lets the speaker communicate clearly with show-not-tell.

Saying something that is untrue is completely different from blurring or glossing over some of the details. The interviewer can always ask follow up questions if they want to hear more details: lying removes the opportunity for accurate understanding.

Saying something that is untrue might sometimes help someone fraudulently land a job: if it is believable, if they can back it up when asked, if the company never finds a way to check and if they never contradict themselves at all.

But it is just as likely that the answer "I don't have any experience with that, but I would google '' and start from there" would have done a better job with no possibility of being summarily and appropriately dismissed if they get caught.

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#164

Post by forthwall »

I had a similar but different run in with bad AI use in interviewing earlier this month. I was interviewing a candidate during a technical screen, and I had earlier noted that it was ok to use AI, as that was how modern development is going forward, I would just observe how someone would develop with it. In my technical product screens I try to tell the developer, it's time for them to show off what skills they feel the most comfortable at.

What happened though was the candidate decided to paste the entire challenge prompt into cursor and I watched cursor fail at completing the assignment. I tried to nudge them to use their own skills or research abilities, but alas did not come to fruition, and had to end the interview.

The crazy part was they had 8 years of experience, so definitely have worked before not using AI, so it was very strange they did that, especially since they remarked that the challenge was going to be easy

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#165

Post by [deleted] »

Aurornis wrote: post #6
theamk wrote: post #2

An interesting story! I've also had an AI cheater during phone screen, but they were pretty clumsy... A question of form "You mentioned you used TechX on your resume, tell me more what you did with it" was answered with a long-winded but generic description of TechX and zero information about their project or personal contribution. Another thing that I can take away from that is "take home project" is no longer a goo…

> Another thing that I can take away from that is "take home project" is no longer a good idea in AI times Take-home projects were never meant to be evaluated in isolation. It was common for candidates to have their friends review the take-home or even do it for them. You had to structure the take-home so the candidate could then explain their choices to you and walk you through their thought process. When you got a…

[deleted]

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#166

Post by crooked-v »

MrDarcy wrote: post #31
crooked-v wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I rejected an applicant earlier this year who was obviously reading off another screen for every answer (as in, blatant pauses while I could literally see their eyes moving back and forth). I don't understand if they thought I wouldn't notice or what.

This situation terrifies me as an autistic person. I can’t fathom maintaining eye contact while taking the time to think about a response to an interview question, even over a video call. I at least look up toward the ceiling while thinking so maybe that’s sufficient to not give off cheating vibes.

I'm not looking for eye contact, and if that person had been just the same but with their eyes closed I would have thought much better of them. I would have still rejected them anyway, because the whole performance wasn't great, but it obviously wouldn't be any ChatGPT thing.

But this was a case of someone staring at a specific place off-camera while "thinking" while their eyes very visibly went rapidly left and right for 20-30 seconds, and repeating the same thing for literally every question, even the ones that were intentional freebies based on their resume that they should have been able to instantly answer.

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#167

Post by crooked-v »

zanecodes wrote: post #55
MrDarcy wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This situation terrifies me as an autistic person. I can’t fathom maintaining eye contact while taking the time to think about a response to an interview question, even over a video call. I at least look up toward the ceiling while thinking so maybe that’s sufficient to not give off cheating vibes.

Closing your eyes is always an option, if you're trying to think deeply and without distraction. It helps a lot to explain your stream of consciousness as you think, even if it's disorganized, and you're definitely not cheating if your eyes are closed!

With current trends, I'm starting to wonder if telling people to answer all the questions with their eyes closed is a viable interviewing strategy.

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#168

Post by godsinhisheaven »

no-dr-onboard wrote: post #45

I keep coming back to this phrase used in this post: "it was scary". Yeah, hiring is scary. Hiring is insanely expensive on all fronts. Firing people is difficult, it's expensive and legally exposing. Hiring the wrong person, allowing them access your systems and potentially exfiltrate your IP to them is a hazardous but necessary venture. The thing is, none of these things really changed with AI. People have been lyi…

Neurodivergent people have always had to learn social skills, plenty of people come off as weird/insane/awkward over zoom

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#169

Post by Tcepsa »

scarface_74 wrote: post #96
angra_mainyu wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take home projects >>>>> live coding sessions, unless you're interviewing for some kind of twitch streamer position. Just have a 1 hour or 2 hour call with candidate where you guys go through the project.

I would never spend time doing a take home test. The best paying companies never require it, so why would I jump through hoops for nothing but middling compensation on the other side?

If they do it properly and walk through it with you afterwards, it can be a good opportunity for you to assess cultural fit as well based on the conversation that you have; are they hypercritical of unimportant details? Do they acknowledge good design and decisions? Do they offer their own insights, and if so, what do you think of those insights?

Also, you might find yourself in the unfortunate position of looking to find a job without already having one; many people find that a compelling reason to "jump through hoops for nothing but middling compensation"

Re: Interviewing a software engineer who prepared with AI

#170

Post by saxelsen »

crazygringo wrote: post #136

I'm not sure what this has to do with AI, except for being a buzzword to add to a title. People have been lying about their experience since time immemorial. You don't need an AI to do it, you can just ask a friend with experience to invent a few plausible projects you could have worked on, and solutions you might have found. Or just look at a bunch of resumes online and read a few blog posts of people describing the…

Yup.

I personally wrote that I had experience in a programming language I didn't, back for an interview in 2010. I got called out on it too..!

My wife has run a couple of marathons and her friend called her up to hear about her experience, because she was putting it on her resume for a job. She got it (probably not because of her running experience).

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