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Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
131–140 of 534 posts
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#132I had an interview question. What would you do if two different people were emailing a spreadsheet back and forth to track something? I said I’d move them to google sheets. There was about five minutes of awkwardness after that as I was interviewing for software developer. I was supposed to talk about what kind of tool I’d build. I found it kind of eye opening but I’m still not sure what the right lesson to learn was…
So my cofounder was talking to Stripe about an acquihire (this was after I’d left.) As part of it, he had to do a systems design interview. He got the prompt, asked questions about throughput requirements (etc.), and said, “okay, I’d put it all in Postgres.” He was correct! Postgres could more than handle the load. He gets a call from Patrick Collison saying that he failed the interview and asking what happened. He e…
> They made him do it again and he passed.
I would hire the "just use postgres" dude in a heartbeat without re-testing, if the numbers made sense, and perhaps give a stern talking-to to the interviewers. But then again I'm not a unicorn founder, so what do I know.
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#133Earlier quoted context omitted.
So my cofounder was talking to Stripe about an acquihire (this was after I’d left.) As part of it, he had to do a systems design interview. He got the prompt, asked questions about throughput requirements (etc.), and said, “okay, I’d put it all in Postgres.” He was correct! Postgres could more than handle the load. He gets a call from Patrick Collison saying that he failed the interview and asking what happened. He e…
I feel like if that's the thought process, that should be stated up front There's a ton of incredibly talented neurodivergent people in our ecosystem who would trip up on that question just because of how it's framed Because how is the interviewee to know if you're testing for the technically sophisticated answer no one in their right mind would ever write or the pragmatic one?
Or just add a couple zeros to all the requirements until postgres is a worse solution than whatever the interviewer envisions. Isn't that the point of stating throughput requirements?
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#134I had an interview question. What would you do if two different people were emailing a spreadsheet back and forth to track something? I said I’d move them to google sheets. There was about five minutes of awkwardness after that as I was interviewing for software developer. I was supposed to talk about what kind of tool I’d build. I found it kind of eye opening but I’m still not sure what the right lesson to learn was…
> What would you do if two different people were emailing a spreadsheet back and forth to track something? I realize this is part of an interview game, but perhaps the best response is still to ask why this is a problem in the first place before you launch into a technical masterpiece. Force the counterparty to provide specific (contrived) reasons that this practice is not working for the business. Then, go about it…
I actually really prefer your answer. I would likely counter with, “what potential issues could you see with doing things this way?” But a) you’ve shown me that you don’t charge into solutions without first attempting to define the problems, b) your follow-up answer reveals to me what kind of things you think are important, and c) I’d probably quickly ask something like,”let’s assume that in the past, we’ve had issues with missing changes when emailing this back and forth,” and encourage some more dialogue.
I do dislike interviews where a candidate can fail simply by not giving a specific, pre-canned answer. It suggests a work culture that is very top-down and one that isn’t particularly interested in actually getting to the truth.
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#135I had an interview question. What would you do if two different people were emailing a spreadsheet back and forth to track something? I said I’d move them to google sheets. There was about five minutes of awkwardness after that as I was interviewing for software developer. I was supposed to talk about what kind of tool I’d build. I found it kind of eye opening but I’m still not sure what the right lesson to learn was…
So my cofounder was talking to Stripe about an acquihire (this was after I’d left.) As part of it, he had to do a systems design interview. He got the prompt, asked questions about throughput requirements (etc.), and said, “okay, I’d put it all in Postgres.” He was correct! Postgres could more than handle the load. He gets a call from Patrick Collison saying that he failed the interview and asking what happened. He e…
It's crazy the original interviewer allowed it to come to this which sounds like a waste of time for everyone involved, instead of simply saying; "Very good that is a legitimate solution to the problem. Now let's pretend you have to build something new, what would you do?"
Why on Earth did the company have to be so willingly obtuse and stupid about it including what sounds like the CEO (well at least he gave him another shot, but there doesn't need to be implicit assumptions about the "point of the interview", just come out and address it head on explicitly.)
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#136If you're at a place that rewards complexity, you might be able to pitch simplicity as something that to get right, requires deep understanding of complex information theoretic concepts and deep understanding of ontological knowledge about the domain (it helps that this is true https://benoitessiambre.com/simple.html ). You can talk about the Bayesian Occam's Razor ( https://benoitessiambre.com/abstract.html ) and about minimizing the entropy of code ( https://benoitessiambre.com/entropy.html ), of tests ( https://benoitessiambre.com/integration.html ) and even of infrastructure ( https://benoitessiambre.com/pgcentrism.html ).
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#137Earlier quoted context omitted.
So my cofounder was talking to Stripe about an acquihire (this was after I’d left.) As part of it, he had to do a systems design interview. He got the prompt, asked questions about throughput requirements (etc.), and said, “okay, I’d put it all in Postgres.” He was correct! Postgres could more than handle the load. He gets a call from Patrick Collison saying that he failed the interview and asking what happened. He e…
Sorry, I didn't get it. What was the 'right' answer?
distributed virtual abstract factory
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#138what a pub/sub hater
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#139Earlier quoted context omitted.
You can't measure the impact of not creating a steaming pile of complexity.
Really you can. You look at the engineers who create steaming piles, and you look at the ones who don't. Over a year or two, the difference is easy to spot. For people who care to spot it. If there's no competent front-line technical management who can successfully make this simple comparison, then, sure, in that case the team may be fucked.
It's easy to gloss over this assessment but ultimately this needs to be a key decision point for where you choose to work. No matter how well you manage complexity as an IC or a lower tier leader, if your upper tier of leaders don't value it, it won't last. Simplicity IME is not a "tail that wags the dog" concept. It's too easy to stomp out if nobody in power cares.
Re: Nobody gets promoted for simplicity
#140Earlier quoted context omitted.
So my cofounder was talking to Stripe about an acquihire (this was after I’d left.) As part of it, he had to do a systems design interview. He got the prompt, asked questions about throughput requirements (etc.), and said, “okay, I’d put it all in Postgres.” He was correct! Postgres could more than handle the load. He gets a call from Patrick Collison saying that he failed the interview and asking what happened. He e…
> They made him do it again and he passed. I would hire the "just use postgres" dude in a heartbeat without re-testing, if the numbers made sense, and perhaps give a stern talking-to to the interviewers. But then again I'm not a unicorn founder, so what do I know.
Eh, it's a good answer and shows good instincts, but they still want to know how he would design a system if one was necessary. There's no need to be ridiculous about any of this from either perspective, which is why it should never have been a "fail" without the original interviewer simply saying "That's a solid answer now tell me what you would do if you had to build something new". I mean look how much time he wasted for everyone including his own CEO by being stubborn about it.