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Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

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Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#31

Post by geebee »

Thank you for writing this post. It was informative. A few comments from a fellow software developer who is approaching 50...

I don't think the coding test isn't there because people think you're lying, it's there because we have no industry wide, respected entrance exam. Actuarial interviews don't (to my knowledge) contain a whiteboard vector calculus exam, but this isn't because people just sort of believe actuaries, it's because you have to pass a rigorous exam on these topics to become an actuary. I sometimes wish we had something like this in our field (not necessarily a legal requirement, just something that is widely recognized as legit). I'd be happy to put the time in and really study for a proper exam, but I'm not as interested in doing this over and over for companies that may administer and conduct these exams frivolously and in secret.

Also - I actually do agree that it's bad if someone can't write fizz buzz, but every interview exam I've taken has been vastly more difficult than fizz buzz. It's "find all subsets of a set of integers that is divisible by the sum of a different subset of integers". At a whiteboard, in 45 minutes. These aren't impossible problems, but they're much tougher than fizzbuzz.

I am saddened, angry, and relieved to hear of your problems with homework. The response you got back makes me realize that the two times I've done a homework assignment were probably pretty typical. I won't do this anymore, and I do accept that this will limit my career options. It does anger me, though, when the companies who do this complain about a shortage of engineers.

True story: I did an on line exam and take home homework assignment, waited over a month (crickets chirping) to hear back, pinged the recruiter politely now and then, and finally got a one liner "we've decided not to continue at this time.' A few weeks later, an article with came out with a picture of the CEO of this company standing next to President Obama, who nodded gravely as the CEO talked about the desperate shortage of software developers.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#32

Post by d23 »

pg_bot wrote: post #6

Number 2: No One Believes Anyone Can Actually Code It's surprising to see the number of people who interview for lead technical roles that cannot code, or whose work is exceptionally sloppy. Incompetence is more commonplace than the author believes, even at the highest level.

Yeah. In all honesty, I would prefer _more_ of our interviews be straightforward coding problems that are reflective of the job the interviewee is going to be doing. Not whiteboarding. Not pseudocoding. Not puzzle problems. Just: write some code, let's see how well you google when you get stumped, let's see how clean your code is, let's see how quickly you implement it relative to other people, let's see how well you document it, let's see how well you collaborate with the interviewer.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#33

Post by ChuckMcM »

I find the coding thing interesting as well, in part because there is coding and there is coding.

I suspect it is the difference between "coding ability" and "coding fluency." In the former a candidate can apply known patterns of a give language to a problem and with just a few searches on StackOverflow get it working. A person who has code fluency can create the algorithm in the language of your choice, pretty much on the spot.

In the music world you meet people who can play a song on the keyboard that is note perfect, but they can't transpose it into a different key. Its the difference between playing the keyboard and using the keyboard to express a musical concept.

Can you speak a language if all you have done is memorize an extensive phrase book? Yes, are you fluent? No.

The number of candidates who really understand the nature of coding and so they can quickly adapt to any idiomatic language is still quite small in my experience.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#34

Post by mrfusion »

Klathmon wrote: post #19
golergka wrote: post #2

> When did an entire industry of people get pre-judged as lying? That's the kind of thing that happens when people lie. Everybody who's ever hired engineers knows from experience that a simple Fizzbuzz test is still, unfortunately, a very usable candidate filter. A lot of candidates with years of real work experience simply cannot write code. How else can we find this out?

A few years ago I was approached about a new opportunity, and through the course of the interviews I was given a generic fizzbuzz-like coding challenge and I completely bombed it. I got flustered, I got stuck on something trivial, and I ended up running out of time with not much to show for it. It was in a language that I had been using for 5+ years at that point, using a framework that I had just finished architecti…

I think this is most people who “can’t code”. Just nerves

I’ve been in that situation myself.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#35

Post by maxxxxx »

positr0n wrote: post #10
opportune wrote: post #5

So the author is complaining about coding tests and being doubted for knowing how to code... yet converted 15 technicals into only 2 onsites.

Could just be age discrimination. I've worked with more than a few people who are very suspicious of people over 40 who are "still just coders," saying that it shows the candidate lacks ambition or they must not be that good since they never advanced to a more senior role like very-senior-principle engineer or management.

This is such a weird industry. Most current devs will be still coders when they are over 40. Only a few can make it to management or high level lead engineer roles. There are not that many openings for that kind of role. I used to work as mechanical engineer and there it was totally normal to have engineers who were 60 years old.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#36

Post by Ocerge »

tboyd47 wrote: post #20
LandR wrote: post #12

> Number 1: It Takes Longer than Ever to Get Hired Last twice I've looked for a developer job, I got offered a position and was hired within 2 weeks. > No one believes that anyone can actually code. Quite rightly, most devs can't code. > Extensive homework is now normal. Not been my experience, I've done some homework assignments but none were ever more than 1 hours work (and then even the standard of the tests were…

All my best jobs were found via recruiters. Different strokes, I guess.

I found my current gig by using a recruiter I was referred to by a respected coworker, and it's by far the best job I've ever had (out of 5 or so). Super small sample size I know, but if you can find a recruiter that you can trust/isn't just pimping you out for a payday and nothing else, you can skip a ton of bullshit.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#37

Post by tboyd47 »

logfromblammo wrote: post #15

Every time I see another iteration of this kind of article, it screams out to me that we need some kind of worker's cartel that can enforce an embargo on companies that don't meet some minimal standard. Part of the problem is that companies keep getting more applicants than they can handle, no matter how hostile their interview process becomes.

I agree, but the problem is that unions notoriously favor the older, entrenched generations of a profession over the newcomers. Talk to people from NYC (a place with still much union influence) and you see a stark difference between the old folks and the younger folks in how they view workers' unions.

Software development is already so heavily dependent on enthusiastic young people that I don't see how a union could get enough traction without completely reinventing the idea of a union in people's minds.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#38

Post by nathanaldensr »

jiveturkey wrote: post #24

sounds like a naive candidate to me. surprising (but not shocking) for someone with so much experience. if he’s 50 yo, assuming same career since graduation, his first mistake is applying for senior roles. senior is 5-7 years experience. he should be applying for staff roles at minimum and up to principal. i guess you’re not supposed to slam posts here but this article is more of the same old same ole. i would like t…

In my experience, getting hired for those "post-senior" roles is even more ridiculous than for senior roles. You often run into biased, judgmental, and insecure directors and vice presidents who seem to be terrified that you know more than them. I say this as a 37-year-old with nearly 20 years of experience. Sometimes, people don't want to believe that you know what you're doing.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#39

Post by brandall10 »

Been coding professionally since '99 - C/C++/C# until 2012, then Rails/React/Angular over the past 6 years. I guesstimate I've been on some 50 interviews.

If anything I feel that things have gotten better, although this may be a difference between my former enterprise Windows-stack life vs. open source tech life. The main differences I see are:

- Take homes are more prevalent... but I recall only one which has taken more than a half day, and that was fair as I was relatively new to Rails at the time. I actually like doing these for jobs I'm interested in as they give me an opportunity to flex my skills.

- There's about a 50% chance that you get a CTCI type interview vs. a more pragmatic, what-you-experience-on-the-job type domain modeling, write out in code in Rails (or whatever framework being used) type of pairing. When I'm on the hiring side I focus on the latter and feel it's quite effective. When I was starting out you almost always got the CTCI type.

I typically red-flag potential employers who don't sufficiently validate the skillset of potential hires. I've worked with plenty of people who were terrible, it's one of the reasons I transitioned to Rails.

Re: Things I Learned from a Job Hunt for a Senior Engineering Role

#40

Post by AndrewKemendo »

I guess I don't understand why companies do this process.

When I was hiring Senior engineers for Computer Vision and 3D rendering jobs my process was thus:

1. Post job and simultaneously search for engineers we thought were a good fit technically

2. Reach out to people I thought were qualified based on their specific previous work that was related to the job I was hiring for

3. Review submitted applications for relevant experience

4. If we thought it was a technical fit, we would do a 5. If we were satisfied with that, send them a 6. Review code, speed and communication

7. Send a hire/no hire decision immediately

From first contact through Steps 4-7 it would ideally take less than a week, depending on the candidate's schedule.

We were only burned on this process twice.

Once the guy kept trying to negotiate salary up over two weeks so that he could get a higher price somewhere else.

The second time, the guy did well with initial production, but over time he ended up using local college interns to write his code, who got other jobs and his commit speed fell off of a cliff.

Since we are a remote team, trust was paramount, and we trusted quickly by default. Nobody ever had complaints about the hiring process and we had a higher than average success rate for hiring fantastic developers and getting quality code into production quickly.

We never asked current salary because it wasn't relevant. I knew what I could pay and that's what was offered. If they asked for more and were worth it, then I would try and find money to make it happen, but generally it wasn't an option.

I would do it the same in the future.

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