Dear Startups: stop asking me math puzzles to figure out if I can code • Hacker News Board

Re: Dear Startups: stop asking me math puzzles to figure out if I can code

#351

Post by mattjaynes » Mon, Oct 28, 2013, 1:04 PM UTC

nether wrote: post #266

mattjaynes wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can confirm this works in my own experience of trial-and-error interviewing over 2000 applicants and hiring over 200 for my clients and myself (since ~2006). Nearly 100% of the applicants were remote, so I think that helped me from falling into traps of poor "traditional" hiring practices. The point of hiring these remote folks was to help accelerate whatever team I was on. It can be a great way to scale your exist…

> - filter out (gently fire) the ones that aren't as good God I would hate this. I'd rather be told that my work sucks, and shown examples of better work, so that I could actually improve and not just wonder if I was let go for some arbitrary reason. If I disagree with you BFD, life goes on, but I'd at least like to know if it was related to my output or not.

"Gently" just means that you are sensitive to the feelings of the person you aren't going to continue sending work to. That doesn't mean you can't tell them why. I often do tell them why - it really depends on how they took feedback earlier in the contract. If they are defensive and don't take feedback well, then I generally don't give them final feedback since they've made it clear they don't like it. However, if they've taken feedback well during the contract, then I give them final feedback that will help them improve and win future contracts.

The feedback I give is also gentle. Well, I guess everything is done gently. These are all good human beings your dealing with, so why not be gentle? Gentleness doesn't mean you aren't honest with them. It just means that you are considerate of their feelings when working with them.

Re: Dear Startups: stop asking me math puzzles to figure out if I can code

#352

Post by mattjaynes » Mon, Oct 28, 2013, 1:19 PM UTC

sdoowpilihp wrote: post #246

mattjaynes wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can confirm this works in my own experience of trial-and-error interviewing over 2000 applicants and hiring over 200 for my clients and myself (since ~2006). Nearly 100% of the applicants were remote, so I think that helped me from falling into traps of poor "traditional" hiring practices. The point of hiring these remote folks was to help accelerate whatever team I was on. It can be a great way to scale your exist…

You used the term "gently fire". I was wondering if you could elaborate on how you "gently fire".

In practice, it usually means that I start sending more and more work to the better workers until there is little work left for the worker that doesn't perform as well.

I guess you could think of it like a load balancer distributing work. If there is a worker that is less responsive or sending poorer results than the rest, then you start sending less and less work to them. Ultimately, you run out of work for them since it's all going to the higher performers.

At that point, there's no point in continuing the contract with the lower performer. So, then I will let them know and end the contract and give them the best review and feedback I can while still being honest about their performance.

It's worth noting again that these are short-term part-time contracts, so this already fits within the contractor's expectations. They don't expect this job to last forever and they're generally not too heartbroken if a contract ends. They are often working on multiple contacts simultaneously, so mine is just one of several contracts.

Ultimately all contracts end, even for the best workers. The nice thing about hiring temporary contractors is that their expectations are already set that this is a temporary engagement.

Re: Dear Startups: stop asking me math puzzles to figure out if I can code

#353

Post by mattjaynes » Mon, Oct 28, 2013, 1:25 PM UTC

NAFV_P wrote: post #254

mattjaynes wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can confirm this works in my own experience of trial-and-error interviewing over 2000 applicants and hiring over 200 for my clients and myself (since ~2006). Nearly 100% of the applicants were remote, so I think that helped me from falling into traps of poor "traditional" hiring practices. The point of hiring these remote folks was to help accelerate whatever team I was on. It can be a great way to scale your exist…

"filter out (gently fire) the ones that aren't as good." If the employee finds out you "hire more than you need of the top performers", you end up with a potential court case. If I found this out about a former employer, I would have pursued them to the end of hell.

Remember that these aren't employees, but are temporary part-time contractors. It's not really "firing", but just ending the contract earlier for some than for others. All the contracts end ultimately, I just keep the best performers much longer than the lesser performers.

Re: Dear Startups: stop asking me math puzzles to figure out if I can code

#354

Post by thraw » Mon, Oct 28, 2013, 10:31 PM UTC

taurath wrote: post #306

thraw wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) I think a lot of start-ups want to hire "smart" people. What does it really mean to be smart? Lately I cannot stop thinking about it. I have always been considered a 'smart person'. I am a self-taught freelance developer now - it used to be my hobby and somehow (mostly because I needed location-independent work quickly) it became my profession. I get by because everybody thinks I am smart but I feel like an impost…

I've been thinking about the same problem for a while, and I'm also a self-taught developer that looks way towards sociology. I have a little different spin on the main hurdles of doing programming. With proper tools and the right mindset, the entire goal of the organization process is that you DON'T have to think and hold 100 things in memory at once. It works okay for some problems, but any problem with a sufficien…

Exactly! I would say that complexity is the biggest problem form me. It makes it impossible to keep the whole mental model in my memory and I need to reanalyze and rebuild it constantly depending on the part of the problem that I am trying to solve right at the moment.