Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem • Hacker News Board

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#191

Post by vfc1 » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:25 AM UTC

blauditore wrote: post #173

vfc1 wrote: post #164

The problem is that there is almost no correlation between how candidates do in whiteboard interviews, and the ability to perform the job on a day to day basis. Also, and the article says it: you are being tested mostly for personality compatibility with the interviewer, which again has nothing to do with the ability to perform the job. This plus the fact that the interviewers are volunteers, creates overtime an effe…

> The problem is that there is almost no correlation between how candidates do in whiteboard interviews, and the ability to perform the job on a day to day basis. What else would you use as metric? Talking about technical topics? In my experience, there are people good at talking about those things, but miserably failing at the actual job. Introducing simple whiteboard programming tasks in addition has helped weeding…

There are some very solid alternatives to this current system, which lets face it some of things that they make you do in an interview are borderline ridiculous and its a matter of lucj more than anything else.

For the technical part, I would as screening value forms of unforgeable proof of technical competence, such as Github profiles, meaningful open source contributions, stackoverflow contributions.

Next for the technical part, a homework assignment. Homework is much more close to the real world experience: get a task and would you have to figure it out.

Then the technical interview would be to explain the homework. There the only goal is really to confirm that the person did the homework themselves rather than anything else.

For the behavioral part, a full battery of psychological tests, to weed out psychopathic traits mostly.

There are alternatives, the current interviewing system is not a good solution.

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#192

Post by vfc1 » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:28 AM UTC

GlennS wrote: post #176

vfc1 wrote: post #164

The problem is that there is almost no correlation between how candidates do in whiteboard interviews, and the ability to perform the job on a day to day basis. Also, and the article says it: you are being tested mostly for personality compatibility with the interviewer, which again has nothing to do with the ability to perform the job. This plus the fact that the interviewers are volunteers, creates overtime an effe…

Are you sure? I don't think the pseudocode whiteboard exercises are pointless, I think they're a useful filter. You can make them simple, and anyone remotely competent who isn't completely crippled by nerves should be able to zip through them. They don't have to be about esoterica. I just want to know that the candidate can attack and break down a problem, even if they don't know how to do all the bits immediately. A…

The problem is, there is a huge disconnect between hash tables and the work we do every day, so why to use that as a criterion?

Homework exercises seem like such a better way to go, its much closer to the actual work experience. And its easier for the interviewer, all they have to do is to assess if the person actually did the exercise themselves.

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#193

Post by rl1987 » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:29 AM UTC

jdck1326 wrote: post #68

farcat991 wrote: post #60

Do people realize that there is no effective solution to this problem of hazing like interviews? There are probably millions of High IQ people applying and vying to work at Google. Tomorrow Google could decide to add juggling competitions in interviews in addition to algorithm jargon and while it would lead to a lot more bitching from interviewers, it wouldn't matter to Google as they would still get their fill of qu…

There aren't millions of high IQ people applying and vying to work at Google.

High IQ or not, Google does have millions of people applying every year.

https://qz.com/285001/heres-why-you-only-have-a-0-2-chance-o...

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#194

Post by zozbot123 » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:32 AM UTC

MarkSweep wrote: post #71

SquishyPanda23 wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, I went through the interview process and I actually really enjoyed it. My attitude going in was that I was evaluating what it would be like to work there, and I treated the interviewer as a coworker solving a technical problem, where I was taking the lead. The questions I got were pretty much exactly the sort of hing you see on LeetCode, but I hadn't seen any of the questions before. I know from studying for ot…

> Everybody was super nice, they all wanted you to do well I had the same experience. Afterwords I thought I did pretty well because I got to a solution to all the problems eventually. Later when I discussed not getting the offer when a friend who works at Google. He said they try to guide the interviewee to a solution before the time limit. Which is reasonable, you want the interviewee to feel more confident and not…

> You can't show any weakness solving a problem, less they offer you a "helpful hint" and record a black mark against you.

This is really the crux of the problem. And the definition of 'hint' becomes real blurry at times.

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#195

Post by zozbot123 » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:33 AM UTC

To any hiring managers that might be reading this, please watch this alternative method of interviewing:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cfyWvJdsDRI

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#196

Post by chaosite » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:36 AM UTC

username90 wrote: post #148

colechristensen wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My (pre?) interview with Google was little more than trivia questions. Example: the numerical value of SIGTERM. I could have talked about signals and how they were used for 20 minutes, but a nontechnical phone interviewer just wanted trivia answers.

Only SRE are asked those questions, you aren't asked questions like that as a SWE.

Recruiters ask horrible questions. If the recruiter has to ask you a technical question, it will be a bad question, because the recruiter doesn't have the expertise to understand the answer.

So you're left with bad questions which have single answers, mostly involving rote memorization.

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#197

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:39 AM UTC

ender7 wrote: post #115

starpilot wrote: post #24

Yet another "trust the system" message from the authority figure who enables the system. Similar: - Police officer: Just follow our instructions, be cooperative. - Car salesman: Just be upfront with what you want. Tell us about yourself, and we'll earnestly try to help you. The message is the same; the authority "just wants to help," but in reality the relationship is adversarial to a larger degree than it is coopera…

Some perspective from the interviewer's side may help here: - A Google interviewer's (and I would assume any interviewer's) primary goal is to come out of the interview with enough confidence to give a positive or negative score. If they sit down to write feedback and have to give a neutral score, the interview wasn't productive. This means that the interviewer is just as eager to find evidence for a positive score a…

[deleted]

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#198

Post by glenneroo » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:50 AM UTC

sigstoat wrote: post #99

tjpnz wrote: post #93

I've heard a lot of really positive accounts on their interviews but mine was nothing like those. My interviewer showed up late and basically spaced out for the entire 40 minutes. He clearly wasn't listening to a thing I was saying - I was verbalizing everything and I had to keep prompting him when I wanted to clarify something. Certainly not a conversation despite everything I had seen and read about their interview…

> I asked the interviewer at the end about what he liked about working at Google and all he had was that he liked the commuter allowance. Incredible. the interviewer i had couldn't even manage to come up with anything he liked about google, when i asked. then he went on to complain about being forced to do interviews.

There are probably laws against it (at least in California) but the variation in interview experiences in this thread indicates that Google could possibly benefit from recording (video or at least audio) of interviews for quality control.

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#199

Post by fsloth » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:50 AM UTC

hueving wrote: post #183

ender7 wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some perspective from the interviewer's side may help here: - A Google interviewer's (and I would assume any interviewer's) primary goal is to come out of the interview with enough confidence to give a positive or negative score. If they sit down to write feedback and have to give a neutral score, the interview wasn't productive. This means that the interviewer is just as eager to find evidence for a positive score a…

>The system is _highly_ prejudiced towards suppressing false positives. This is the right decision, This is textbook Google propaganda that has been repeated at least since I last worked there 5ish years ago. It's bullshit though because the ratio of competent to incompetent engineers was the same as at FB, MSFT and NFLX (with the latter tending to prune the fastest). Just because you generate a system that spits out…

"The reason Googlers never care to critically question the sorting hat is because it picked them."

I think this is a truism about the quality of most organizations - people who thrive in a specific organization coalesce into the organization and enhance those qualities within the organization that are specific to them.

I presume the fact that Google uses non-professional recruiters makes the recruitment process more about cultural alignment than it absolutely needs to be to gauge the capability to add value in a software engineering process.

Re: Google's interview system: it's not about solving the problem

#200

Post by stale2002 » Mon, Nov 05, 2018, 9:58 AM UTC

blauditore wrote: post #173

vfc1 wrote: post #164

The problem is that there is almost no correlation between how candidates do in whiteboard interviews, and the ability to perform the job on a day to day basis. Also, and the article says it: you are being tested mostly for personality compatibility with the interviewer, which again has nothing to do with the ability to perform the job. This plus the fact that the interviewers are volunteers, creates overtime an effe…

> The problem is that there is almost no correlation between how candidates do in whiteboard interviews, and the ability to perform the job on a day to day basis. What else would you use as metric? Talking about technical topics? In my experience, there are people good at talking about those things, but miserably failing at the actual job. Introducing simple whiteboard programming tasks in addition has helped weeding…

Sure, give someone a problem slightly harder than fizz buzz just to make sure they aren't a complete fraud.

But the difference between someone who can solve an easy whiteboarding problem and a hard one is merely the fact that they practiced for months doing it. It is unlikely that solving the hard problem is much of a signal other then that.