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A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

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Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#191

Post by cloudjacker »

Pretty good but rule #4 is totally totally opinion without any consideration about why someone would be defensive.

So given that Amir of June is the only person doing this quirky interview style (where you actually pay them for their time), the interviewer still has absolutely no idea of this psychological gimmick Amir has baked into his process. Right at the very end!

Amir Yasin admits that he is elevating them into a contracting gig status, and contractors ARE THE EXPERTS! They have to be the expert! They have to make up stuff on the fly to defend their implementation, "its a feature".

But for Amir's warped interview process, of which the candidate is being bussed around on a literal auction block at other companies before having the luxury of getting his groundbreaking interview style, he still has this one random assessment.

Look, Amir is the one that elevated his tiny sample size of engineers into gospel. There likely was a literal 2 people that formed his and his company's entire opinion about Rule #4.

So I think it is worthwhile to point that out.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#192

Post by DenisM »

ahh wrote: post #10

This system is interesting but has a crucial flaw: I legally can't take part. I have a job now, which claims ownership over any tech-related IP I create. There are processes for getting exceptions, but a) you won't get them for actual job-related things b) I'm not asking Google for an exception so I can interview somewhere else. This is true for nearly anyone with a standard SV job. So if you're willing to restrict y…

If your current employer wants to take ownership of that micro project let them have it. Why do you even care?

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#193

Post by ghaff »

majormajor wrote: post #186
ghaff wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I don't understand the paid part at all. There's a concept around a lot of preliminary engagements between two entities called "skin in the game." The idea is that when something is completely free the other party will take advantage of it without any real serious intent to follow through on anything. Mostly this seems a reaction to the homework-type assignments where candidates are expected to spend a lot of time o…

I get this in theory, but the numbers sound too low for that to make a difference still. I could run 50 candidates through a $200 problem for 10K. That's still a pretty large mismatch between "amount of work done by the candidate" and "amount of work done by the interviewer," and is cost-of-doing-business money for recruiting for a lot of companies currently. Compare that to the cost of me flying people out (which is…

I get your point. But, in practice, there's a big difference in many situations between free and even a nominal sum.

I do agree that if people are flying around, that represents a fairly significant investment in any case. But in Silicon Valley, that often isn't true.

It's hopefully a case of coming up with processes that don't encourage people to waste others' time. But that also assumes some reasonable balance of power in the process.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#194

Post by ohwello »

tdeck wrote: post #110

Love the idea of paying people. That's great. However, consider the perspective of someone who already has a job in the industry. If every company did this, I wouldn't be able to interview at more than one per week. Not only that, but the Friday and Monday onsites mean I miss work on TWO separate days. This would be a non-starter for me if I had any decent pool of interest from other companies, although it's great fo…

Yeah, it makes sense to me as a sort of moneyball approach, to cheaply hire skilled candidates who are not as good at the standard evaluation process, are likely to have few competing offers, and who are willing to do extra work on nights/weekends.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#195

Post by toephu2 »

arielweisberg wrote: post #125
redwards510 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't mind homework, but companies need to start specifying their salary range up front. I've been having a lot of time wasted lately by getting through Tech Interview #1 or Homework #1, only to find out their max salary is laughable for San Francisco. "You should just find that out upfront" I hear you saying. Well that is not always possible. Recruiters either don't know the range, or lie about not knowing, or you…

100% This. I just wasted a bunch of time extracting an offer from one of AmaGooFaceFlix. Supposedly a top SV company with good compensation. Got an awful offer to relocate to an area where 1/4 to 1/2 the house costs twice as much and I would no longer be able to work from home. I would also lose a significant portion of my life commuting. The offer was comparable to what I made working remote from Boston. I don't mea…

Sounds like Amazon?

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#196

Post by davidbanham »

blazespin wrote: post #172
zachd1_618 wrote: post #49

This. 100% this. As many others are saying, I find that this is the most comfortable way for me as an interviewee to demonstrate that I do in fact know what I'm talking about. Put me in front of a room full of people and a whiteboard and throw something at me, and I'll freeze. Freezing in that situation and being a bad engineer are wholly separate things. Anecdotally, when I get one of these problems, I spent 20 minu…

This works, but make sure they spend the 2 hours in your office and not 12 hours at home solving a 2 hour problem.. The other problem is that when you pay them you generate all sorts of nightmaris legal liabilities.

Absolutely agree with the sentiment here. I have used this technique for a couple of years now, except that I kept the task to 20 minutes (and didn't pay people, since it's a short amount of time).

To save dragging people into an office for that time period, I set up a custom git server that marks the timestamps of their pulls and pushes. The instructions for the task are contained in the README of the repo, so as soon as they pull it they've started.

https://github.com/Prismatik/codescreen

It's critical to me that the limit is adhered to so that over time I can compare candidate responses on a level playing field.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#197

Post by developer2 »

rizzom5000 wrote: post #98
sillysaurus3 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's possible to not pay them. Most candidates will do this for free, as it's far better than traditional ineffective hiring practices. The thing is, there are always reasons why this method isn't viable. It's not till you try it that you notice huge gains.

That only makes sense if you're talking about people who are unemployed. As someone who is already employed full-time, I simply don't have the time to solve your problems for free just to see if you'd like to invite me over for an interview. I avoid these problems like the plague and very much prefer to whiteboard. If you pay me consultant rates, I can more easily justify the effort.

>> much prefer to whiteboard

Who would have thought? Maybe - just maybe - not everyone has the same strengths and weaknesses. The real answer here is obvious: present the interviewee with options. Forcing all potential hires to whiteboard is a terrible idea. Forcing all potential hires to do a take-home project is a terrible idea. It's extremely short-sighted and a little pompous to assume that any single interview format one chooses is going to magically sort everyone into neat little buckets of "good" and "bad".

If you force the whiteboarding approach, you are only going to wind up hiring social butterflies who have absolutely no nerves standing up in front of complete strangers and having all the answers on the spot. If you force the take-home project approach, you're turning off a lot of people who can nail a first impression presenting themselves and their skillset in person.

People are different. Applying the same interview type to everyone is going to target a specific set of strengths, and a specific set of weaknesses. And frankly, no business should be composed entirely of one type of person. Some diversity does wonders when assessing the overall strength of a team.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#198

Post by pitaj »

eranation wrote: post #33

This is great, except the over the weekend part. I have a wife and kids, I rather be with them than solve (even paid) challenges. I rather take half a day off, solve it right there in the environment and team that will potential work with you. I would encourage candidates to also reach out with questions during the challenge and see how they communicate ideas and react to suggestions. Other than that, completely agre…

It says that you should give them the option. If you don't want to do that, just finish it the day of the interview.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#199

Post by majormajor »

ghaff wrote: post #193
majormajor wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get this in theory, but the numbers sound too low for that to make a difference still. I could run 50 candidates through a $200 problem for 10K. That's still a pretty large mismatch between "amount of work done by the candidate" and "amount of work done by the interviewer," and is cost-of-doing-business money for recruiting for a lot of companies currently. Compare that to the cost of me flying people out (which is…

I get your point. But, in practice, there's a big difference in many situations between free and even a nominal sum. I do agree that if people are flying around, that represents a fairly significant investment in any case. But in Silicon Valley, that often isn't true. It's hopefully a case of coming up with processes that don't encourage people to waste others' time. But that also assumes some reasonable balance of p…

Yeah, sorting out serious people from those wasting time is a hard one. Though I'm generally pretty sympathetic to employees/candidates on that one - am I wasting your time if I'm pretty sure I don't want to leave my current place, but want to keep a hand in and know what the market looks like? I would say know, but I know some people who would disagree, and have decent reasons for it.

Even after that, the "experience candidate phone call to see if they're worth flying in" part is definitely the one where I have the hardest time, being not in the Bay Area. I was lucky to find some great local people, where the cost was lower, because that's an expensive one to have to get good at fast. You lose a lot of nuance over the phone, though some other people in the company have been having very good luck with homework in this case - but as a candidate-choice option, where they could still go the traditional route if they wanted.

Re: A Method I’ve Used to Eliminate Bad Tech Hires

#200

Post by Udo »

blazespin wrote: post #172
zachd1_618 wrote: post #49

This. 100% this. As many others are saying, I find that this is the most comfortable way for me as an interviewee to demonstrate that I do in fact know what I'm talking about. Put me in front of a room full of people and a whiteboard and throw something at me, and I'll freeze. Freezing in that situation and being a bad engineer are wholly separate things. Anecdotally, when I get one of these problems, I spent 20 minu…

This works, but make sure they spend the 2 hours in your office and not 12 hours at home solving a 2 hour problem.. The other problem is that when you pay them you generate all sorts of nightmaris legal liabilities.

> This works, but make sure they spend the 2 hours in your office and not 12 hours at home solving a 2 hour problem..

This goes against the core message of the article. The candidate is supposed to think about a problem on their own, and propose a well-reflected solution on Monday. That's pretty much the opposite of "sit down in this noisy corner in an unknown environment and give us something in two hours".

> The other problem is that when you pay them you generate all sorts of nightmaris legal liabilities.

If hiring a freelancer to do a little thing tends to generate all sorts of nightmarish legal liabilities, your company is either a government contractor or it has even bigger structural problems than hiring.

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