Who Y Combinator Companies Want • Hacker News Board

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#271

Post by geebee » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:14 PM UTC

ryandrake wrote: post #8

> "We’ve seen that most engineers only have the stomach for a limited number of interviews. Investing time in the wrong companies carries a high opportunity cost." I suspect in addition to not having the "stomach" for an unlimited number of interviews, they don't have the vacation days to burn for them. Let's say you are working already and have 10 days a year vacation (pretty standard). With these ridiculous all-day…

It's not surprising. A lot of lawyers will tell you that passing the bar was one of the more grueling things they've had to do. Here's a blog post about a guy who did it with 100 hours of study.

http://blakemasters.com/post/37113468298/pass-the-ca-bar-exa...

The bar exam is three grueling days. 100 hours of study is two and a half weeks of full time work.

If you interview at three tech companies, I don't think it's at all over the top to say you might study for a few weeks in total, especially if you are rusty, and the interviews are often quite grueling as well and do last all day….

Ok, I'm stretching, I won't put one iteration of interviews at bar exam levels, but we are starting to get there. Now keep in mind, we do this over and over and over in our field. And while the bar is tough, at least you know roughly what will be tested - tech interviews are often a completely moving target. And while the bar does have continuing education requirements, you don't have to do the 3 day massive study thing over and over (unless, in some cases, you move to a new state).

I really do think this is a severe problem in our industry that causes higher levels of attrition than we realize. I suppose it could be one of those "tragedy of the commons" type things, where each company benefits from long and difficult interviews, but the cumulative result is either 1) people not wanting to enter the field, or 2) people giving up on interviewing for new jobs and staying with their existing employer even if they are burned out, or 3) people quitting and going into a different field or role entirely where they can escape this hazing.

I also think this is something hiring managers should realize before saying that there is a a shortage of programmers. Your own interview processes may be contributing substantially to this "shortage".

Oh, one last thing - excellent article, thank you for writing it! Absolutely fascinating, and it explains a great deal.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#272

Post by axplusb » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:17 PM UTC

I would be interested in A/B comparison of company responses according to immigration status (i.e. whether or not a candidate needs visa sponsorship). Any data available?

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#273

Post by j2kun » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:19 PM UTC

I am very interested in which of these companies are the outliers. What is the one company in the table that expressed a dislike for product-focused programmers? Which are the few that like academic programmers?

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#274

Post by thaumasiotes » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:21 PM UTC

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #168

ammon wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cost of a real work test is much higher, both to the company, and to the applicant. Some companies take that approach (weebly for one), but it means that some of the best programmer will not apply, and it only makes worse the problem of having to aggressively pre-filter (based on credentials, or something else). You are 100% correct that most research into interviewing has show it to be far less predictive than c…

The best programmers do apply. Whatever you think a work-hire test is, that wasn't it. A work-hire test attracts the best programmers. It doesn't repel them. It's a chance to demonstrate their skill. It's also far better: anything is better than the fake contests they're currently forced to endure. Which would you prefer? Spend a couple hours remotely fixing some bugs and adding a feature on a fake iOS app, or spend…

Triplebyte does notionally allow you to apply (to Triplebyte) via a trial project. But it's in addition to the interview(s), and the feeling they get from you during the interview trumps the project. They gave me the following feedback:

> This was a tough decision and one that we were on the fence about. We really appreciate you taking the time to work on the take home project. We're aware this requires a substantial time commitment and we are really grateful that you invested the time in completing it. We thought you wrote a great, very full featured [trial project]. It was especially impressive how much you dug into the academics behind [the project].

> However we made the decision because we felt that while going through the project together during the interview, we didn't see the fluency of programming when adding to it that we had hoped for. While we specifically designed the take home project track to help overcome the difficulties of coding under time pressure with someone watching, we do still need to see a certain level of programming during the interview. This didn't seem to be the case here, where making changes to the project seemed to be slower and more difficult than we'd have liked.

tptacek had some advice for hiring-through-a-work-test that I (from my armchair) agree with, which is that it's important to give everyone the same work test so your applicants are comparable. There's a little bit of tension (I don't think it's unresolvable) between that and "The test needs to be set up so that the candidate can demonstrate they can do exactly the same things all other employees do on a day-to-day basis, or it's not a work-hire test".

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#275

Post by aaronem » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:21 PM UTC

kabdib wrote: post #144

kafkaesq wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We’ve seen that most engineers only have the stomach for a limited number of interviews. Investing time in the wrong companies carries a high opportunity cost." Yet it's amazing how many companies treat candidates' time as basically worthless, and infinitely replenishable.

Yeah, the "two week trial period" (or one week, or week-of-evenings, or whatever) is a non-starter for the experienced programmer who doesn't really need a job. And these are the folks that you want to attract. High bars can really turn out to be self-sabotage.

> the "two week trial period" (or one week, or week-of-evenings, or whatever)

Good God, is this actually a thing? I mean, a probationary period after hire is one thing, but if somebody actually had the gall to tell me I'd have to spend a week or two working for them before they decided whether or not I was actually working for them, I believe I'd walk out on the spot.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#276

Post by noarchy » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:22 PM UTC

LordHumungous wrote: post #267

noarchy wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe where you are (and how unfortunate). But in a decade-plus of doing this, I haven't been asked things like that since I was trying to find my first job in software development. At that point, asking CS 101 questions made sense, since I didn't have much in the way of products shipped, and so forth.

How unfortunate why? Is it unreasonable to ask a candidate to know CS101? I would never work for a company that didn't ask engineer candidates those questions.

>How unfortunate why? Is it unreasonable to ask a candidate to know CS101?

Not at all. For a junior position. But that's a difference of opinion with which we may have to live. For more experienced candidates, I'd be far more interested in what they've done to apply their knowledge in real-world scenarios. I need them to be able to do more than hypotheticals.

>I would never work for a company that didn't ask engineer candidates those questions.

And that's fine. Small point to add: I see at least one regional difference, with regards to the terms being used - I never see software developers called "engineers" unless they have an engineering degree. Maybe that's just my part of Canada, I don't know. Perhaps it is more of a protected term here.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#277

Post by j2kun » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:22 PM UTC

ammon wrote: post #34

majormajor wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not at a YC company, but yeah my guess would be that it's hard to get the trend followers on board with other stuff. I've anecdotally seen myself a lot of candidates (esp at the recent-university/recent-MS level) who've taken some ML courses cause it's trendy and sounds interesting but (a) don't have a serious enough interest in it or knowledge of how to apply it well enough to be a good fit on our ML teams and (b) a…

Author of the post. I think that this is exactly right. I don't know what motivated the companies to put that policy in place (they just told us that they had this preference). But I can speculate. There is an epidemic of interest in ML. Four out of 5 college grads we speak to list it as an interest. I think that interest has grown to the point where it's no longer any kind of signal about technical strength, and per…

What about we academic programmers who have real experience and knowledge about ML. Is that still a negative sign? Or does the academic part make it worse :)

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#278

Post by freebish » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:23 PM UTC

vonmoltke wrote: post #133

ammon wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, they sort of are, just not explicitly. The standard process is to have 2 to 5 interviewers, each asking their own question, and pass everyone who get at least one strong yes, and no strong noes. This ends up with a random factor, but ultimately favoring people at least one real strength. The interviewer who sees this strength will fight for them. We've seen people with high skill variance (great at one thing, b…

> no strong noes This is the problem. It allows one interviewer with a pet peeve to torpedo an otherwise excellent hire. Where I work, whoever ends up on the wrong side of the majority needs to make a case good enough to convince the majority to switch. Being strongly in the minority is not good enough. The culture of accepting high false negative rates leads to the "no weaknesses" hiring the GP was complaining about…

I agree, but this is also a management failing, in not noticing the pattern.

I've been able to successfully hire good people by noting that some interviewers are never satisfied with any candidate. Once the pattern is clear, I either remove them from the hiring process, or politely disregard their opinion.

Hiring only with 100% consensus is a sucker's game. Some of my best hires have involved judging which "no" could be overridden safely.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#279

Post by ryandrake » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:25 PM UTC

aerovistae wrote: post #53

ryandrake wrote: post #8

> "We’ve seen that most engineers only have the stomach for a limited number of interviews. Investing time in the wrong companies carries a high opportunity cost." I suspect in addition to not having the "stomach" for an unlimited number of interviews, they don't have the vacation days to burn for them. Let's say you are working already and have 10 days a year vacation (pretty standard). With these ridiculous all-day…

Of course, if one plans things well, one has the leeway to leave one job and take a few weeks off before finding another...

I would never leave a job before finding a new one. Too much uncertainty especially in today's rough hiring market. You'd want at least 6 months of living expenses saved up to burn while you job search, probably more, and most people don't have that.

Re: Who Y Combinator Companies Want

#280

Post by FLUX-YOU » Tue, Dec 08, 2015, 9:25 PM UTC

ammon wrote: post #206

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The best programmers do apply. Whatever you think a work-hire test is, that wasn't it. A work-hire test attracts the best programmers. It doesn't repel them. It's a chance to demonstrate their skill. It's also far better: anything is better than the fake contests they're currently forced to endure. Which would you prefer? Spend a couple hours remotely fixing some bugs and adding a feature on a fake iOS app, or spend…

EDIT: I thought that sillysaurus3 was talking about a work trial period (days or a week), but it seems they are talking about asking question during that interview that are similar to actual work. I retract me objection :) If only it were that easy. I am not at all opposed to work-trial tests. They are almost certainly more accurate. But a high percentage of programmer will never apply to a company that requires one.…

Why don't we let the interviewee choose between a few interview methods? Or bypass it if they think their public code proves their ability?