Software engineering has been turned into Star Search: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FfRihaJxozo
When is Musk finishing that rocket to Mars?
We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
121–130 of 190 posts
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#122As an interviewer, I believe take home tasks are unfair and also poor return on investment. Take home tasks incentivise candidates to burn as much time as possible on the task. Consequently, they are a test of who is willing to put a week of work even when the instructions say it should not take more than 3 hours to complete. I prefer pair programming with the candidate on the premise that if I ask you to spend 2 hou…
As a candidate, I vastly prefer a take-home to live whiteboarding or pairing. That background sensation of being observed and evaluated greatly interferes with my ability to concentrate and perform at my best. (I'll note that I have no problem pairing in real-world work scenarios! I love discussing problems with my team. It's the artificial pressure injected by the interview process that really gets to me)
I have been in situations were I had to pair program for an interview. The artificial pressure is true, I don't know how to react and even speak out when I'm trying to show my coding skills.
I don't have issues with whiteboarding and pair programming with my current teammates. I can speak up and have enough confident to do. But its not the same in an interview situation. I prefer take-home as well.
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#123Studies [1] show that a work sample test is the best predictor of candidate performance on the job, which is why many software engineering teams use take-home tests as one step in their hiring process. But designing an effective test is difficult and time-consuming. For example, candidates are reluctant to complete tests that are too long or not engaging enough. But make them too short and teams won’t get the signal…
After scanning the first page, I quickly noticed "Want something unique to your team? Tell us what you need." I'm not a marketing guy (by any stretch) so maybe my opinion isn't worth much, but I think this is outstanding - provide something already useful, and then invite people to purchase your customized even more useful stuff. It's always nice to see something well done — kudos! (You seem to be focused on software…
Thank you! I appreciate this because I think I'm terrible at marketing.
I happen to be an Applied Math major and spent years teaching competition math classes, though this was a while ago. If I can be helpful, shoot me an email: alex@trytapioca.com.
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#124Earlier quoted context omitted.
Received 5 PRs, awarded the top 3. You can actually see them https://app.algora.io/algora/challenge/pulls/5 We clarified it in our bounty issue that only the best-winning submissions would get the bounty. Other folks have chosen to award all PR submissions regardless of hiring outcome. The format is up to the company hiring. You're making a great point! It's exactly about what we ask from people who don't get hired.…
I mean you do you, but it's a total farce to call this paying people for their time. You're paying people who win your little contest, which is what hiring already is before your startup tries to insert itself as a middleman.
I'd call it an early experiment and what we could afford at the time to evaluate candidates for a SWE summer internship. Maybe other companies will like this approach and offer challenges that pay much better, with different setups & time horizons. Ex a user turnt his challenge into a 3-month contract-to-hire arrangement that paid $15k to the person who did the work & got the job.
Ultimately it's about getting the right signals. Real work produces the best signals. The rest of the mechanics are a WIP :)
Really appreciate your input, thanks a lot!!
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#125Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not being too focused on technical prowess doesn't mean being oblivious to code quality, so no I don't think they are contradictory.
And you don't think that wording can easily be taken as "we focus too much on technical skills" while simultaneously saying "pair programming doesn't guarantee technical expertise"? Many people would think code quality is part technical prowess, at least. If anything it at least showcases the importance of clear communication and how easily things can get lost in the details.
There is also the principle of the benefit of the doubt where, in doubt, assume the writer is not a complete idiot. Goes a long way to filling these communication details without forcing the writer to write a philosophical thesis.
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#126It's my turn today to complain about website building instead of content: When macOS developers write in CSS "overflow: scroll;" they get the same behavior as they do with "overflow: auto;", but they don't realize that viewers on Linux and Windows now see ugly default operating scrollbar at all times, especially ugly when the dropdowns aren't supposed to have horizontal scrolling. Test web software on two browser and…
Oh dang, thanks for flagging this. It's fixed now :)
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#127I actually don’t mind take home tests, but I want the company to also burn resources as to disincentivize ghosting. Problem with take homes is that you can spend hours and then they can spend seconds or minutes reviewing. At least with traditional interviews the time spent is equal for both parties.
Agreed. That's been exactly my experience on the few I did before I refused to them. The onus is all on you and your only interface is basically a flakey recruiter. There's no guarantee that any will every look at your submission.
As a candidate, it's an awful feeling to spend time only to get ghosted.
It's usually not malicious, just disorganization. From a hiring manager's perspective, it's too easy for things to slip through the cracks. When the volume of candidates increases, it's hard to keep track of all the zip file submissions + individual repos while making sure the eng team reviews them all.
This is one of the problems my team is hoping to solve through software. So far, we're seeing teams working with us getting back to 100% of candidates (often with personalized feedback), with median times as fast as 1 day. I hope we can reduce the frequency of terrible take-home experiences.
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#128It's my turn today to complain about website building instead of content: When macOS developers write in CSS "overflow: scroll;" they get the same behavior as they do with "overflow: auto;", but they don't realize that viewers on Linux and Windows now see ugly default operating scrollbar at all times, especially ugly when the dropdowns aren't supposed to have horizontal scrolling. Test web software on two browser and…
Oh dang, thanks for flagging this. It's fixed now :)
Beautiful!!
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#129These are great in theory. In practice, I've regretted the handful of times I've done them. It seems like some companies use this as a way to "waste" less of their interviewers' time. One particular dysfunctional company that everyone here would recognized gave me the feedback: you're one of the candidates out of nearly 200 that did this [7-10 hour take home test] and passed! Then they ghosted me for a month before a…
That's awful! I'm sorry you had to go through that. The intent isn't usually malicious, but some teams (esp larger ones) are really disorganized and don't value candidates' time enough.
My team is doing our best to create the "perfect" take-home experience and reduce the frequency of these horror stories.
Re: We compiled a library of realistic engineering take-home tests and ranked them
#130I think a lot of people are getting hung up on the fact that these challenges take a long time. Yep, and that's a problem... But the goal of having a candidate work on a real problem is a good once. IMO a far better approach is to do a live exercise with them. Not a leetcode problem... take an existing codebase and add a feature to it, fix an issue with it, etc. Heck, you don't need them to complete everything, but y…
Why not, you know, interview them? See if you like them, see if they are reasonably knowledgable about what you need them to do. Putting people on the spot doesn't mean they can or can't develop software or solutions. Sending homework is even worse though.