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Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

darrenkopp.com

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Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#361

Post by esafak »

epolanski wrote: post #358
markwkw wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mechanical engineering interviews seem to do the same as software: "Engineers always ask about beam bending, stress strain curves, and conservation of work. Know the theory and any technical questions are easy." Basically an equivalent of simple algorithmic questions. Not "real" because it's impossible to share enough context of a real problem in an interview to make it practical. Short, testing principles, but most…

I'm a chemist by education, so all my college friends are chemists. Being asked a theoretical chemistry question at a job interview would be...odd. You can be asked about your proficiency with some lab equipment, your experience with various procedures and what not. But the very thought of being asked theoretical questions is beyond ridiculous.

Why, don't they get imposters? You sure run into people who can't code in coding interviews.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#362

Post by parpfish »

mrkeen wrote: post #208
cranberryturkey wrote: post #2

[flagged]

I very rarely see anyone try anything different in a 9-5 setting. People leave university, join their first job, and spend 3 years learning how to develop in one way, and only one way. At-work choices are rarely choices, because you just do the next thing the same way as you did the last thing. If you step out of line, management will reel you back in. A 'big' change is switching from Spring to Micronaut (or vice ver…

Sounds like the types of environments I’ve run into at either big tech cos or when you’re the tech guy in a non-tech company.

If you want to be able to experiment and change things, go to a startup.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#363

Post by epolanski »

gardenhedge wrote: post #237
kstenerud wrote: post #221

My approach to interviews over the past decade has been as follows: 1. My preparation for an interview involves researching the company, not technical matters. I don't brush up on coding interview questions. I've never done leetcode. 2. If I find the interview questions to be ridiculously off-topic (such as silly algorithm questions), I end the interview. You're not the kind of company I want to work with. 3. If I fi…

How do you end the interview? To me it seems like that might be awkward.

Not OP, but I do this too.

I generally ask the purpose of the question.

Sometimes there are valid reasons for why they look at very strong algorithm skills and then I simply admit it's not really my cup of tea nor my passion.

Sometimes they answer variations of "it's standard/it's how we do it" so then I propose whether we would like to code something more similar to what the daily job would be to which they generally play along, even happily.

But if some don't I then say that I don't see a fit.

Might be awkward but...who cares? I don't, they won't after 5 seconds the interview's over either.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#364

Post by godelski »

epolanski wrote: post #357
godelski wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> if a senior person can't in 30/45 min of talking with someone figure out the general experience level then the problem is them, really. This is why I've always been so confused. Why is the software engineering interview wildly different from the traditional engineering interview (seniors sit down with candidates and discuss how to solve a relevant proxy problem the team is currently undergoing (has the side benefit…

> Why is the software engineering interview wildly different from the traditional engineering interview I have my personal theory. 1) Top companies receive way more applications than the positions they have open. Thus they standardised around very technical interview as ways to eliminate false positives. I think these companies know this method produces several false negatives, but the ratio between those (eliminatin…

Yeah I buy this theory.

The problem I have with it is that for this to be a reasonably effective strategy you should change the arbitrary metric every few years because otherwise it is likely to be hacked and has the potential to turn into a negative signal rather than positive. Essentially your false positives can dominate by "studying to the test" rather than "studying".

I'd say the same is true for college admissions too... because let's be honest, I highly doubt a randomly selected high school student is going to be significantly more or less successful than the current process. I'd imagine the simple act of applying is a strong enough natural filter to make this hypothesis much stronger (in practice, but see my prior argument)

People (and machines) are just fucking good at metric hacking. We're all familiar with Goodhart's Law, right?

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#365

Post by godelski »

esafak wrote: post #361
epolanski wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a chemist by education, so all my college friends are chemists. Being asked a theoretical chemistry question at a job interview would be...odd. You can be asked about your proficiency with some lab equipment, your experience with various procedures and what not. But the very thought of being asked theoretical questions is beyond ridiculous.

Why, don't they get imposters? You sure run into people who can't code in coding interviews.

Because to actually have those types of conversations you have to have legitimate experience. To be a bit flippant, here's a relevant xkcd[0]. To be less so, "in groups" are pretty good at detecting others in their groups. I mean can you not talk to another and not figure out who's also a domain expert? It's because people "in-group" understand nuance of the subject matter.

[0] https://xkcd.com/451/

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#366

Post by dennis_jeeves2 »

xandrius wrote: post #257
hintymad wrote: post #239

Assuming that a company does not look for candidates who are naturally good at ICPC-type of questions or geniuses who can come up with amazing algorithms in a matter of minutes, there is actually a different way to do coding interview: just give a high-level description of a sophisticated enough algorithm to a candidate and ask the candidate to turn that into code. I think it strikes a good balance between depth in C…

I still don't get why such questions are even asked as most jobs I've ever had not even remotely touched those and I've touched quite a few industries, technologies and types of companies. To me, the value of a software engineer is to ask questions, make hypotheses and be able to iterate quickly. Balancing trees, leetcode and other algorithmic stuff on the spot sounds like bringing the dreadful education system struc…

> Also if a senior person can't in 30/45 min of talking with someone figure out the general experience level then the problem is them, really.

Actually most of them, including the really inexperienced juniors have 'figured' you out in less that 15 minutes, or at least they have decided whether to hire you or not in 15 minutes. But they have to put on a charade of being fair.

Also a 'white' older male is the least preferred even if he is smarter compared to all females and the minorities that are being interviewed as long as they are not terrible. Biases galore.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#367

Post by BeetleB »

feoren wrote: post #262
darrenkopp wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I, personally, cannot _think_ and _talk_ at the same time. It's just a stream of half-sentences, many of which my brain has already moved on from because what I originally thought won't work. After writing this article it became very apparent to me that I'm complete garbage at interviews, but I'll outperform and exceed at the actual job function.

In my work, if you literally cannot write any code while also discussing the code, and if you literally cannot express thoughts while also thinking them, then you actually wont exceed at the actual job function, at all. You're not the only programmer on the team. I don't know why people think communication skills are not required for programmers. You won't be coding the correct thing unless you can talk about what yo…

> In my work, if you literally cannot write any code while also discussing the code, and if you literally cannot express thoughts while also thinking them, then you actually wont exceed at the actual job function, at all.

Followed by

> You're not the only programmer on the team.

It sounds like you're implying some connection between the two, whereas most successful teams don't require the behavior your team is demanding. Including the ones with good communication skills.

I can write code well. I can discuss it well. I simply don't need to do both at the same time. Unless people are in a pair programming session, they don't need to openly discuss the code while they're thinking about them and writing them. They can discuss the problem before and after. Why do they need to discuss it while coding?

It's like telling journalists or authors "Hey, if you can't discuss your story with the editor while you are authoring it then you can't succeed here."

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#368

Post by pseudalopex »

rockemsockem wrote: post #193
teeray wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - licensing ensures only a minimum level of quality… people with licenses still do interviews, often just as grueling Agreed, I never asserted against these two points. The point of licensure is to make the first round, which is fairly routine at this point, more equitable and less susceptible to probabilistic effects. It also frees labor from administering this exam round to every candidate.

How often do other industries relicense? How often would you propose relicensing for programming jobs? My concern would be skill atrophy between relicensing and then you'd still want to do the same sorts of interviews.

Other industries do not require repeating the license exam. Many have continuing education or other professional development requirements. These can be expensive and time consuming but not difficult generally.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#369

Post by godelski »

glandium wrote: post #350
godelski wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Mechanical engineering interviews seem to do the same as software: I've been an engineer in the past (physics undergrad -> aerospace job -> grad school/ml). I have never seen or heard of an engineer being expected to solve math equations on a whiteboard during an interview. It is expected that you already know these things. Honestly, it is expected that you have a reference to these equations and you'll have memori…

We live in the age of ChatGPT. It might actually be time to assess how candidates use it during interviews. What prompts they write, how they refine their prompts, how they use the answers, whether they take them at face value, etc.

Sure, and we live in the age of calculators. Just because we have calculators doesn't mean we should ban them on math tests. It means you adapt and test for the more important stuff. You remove the rote mundane aspect and focus on the abstract and nuance.

You still can't get GPT to understand and give nuanced responses without significant prompt engineering (usually requiring someone that understands said nuance of the specific problem). So... I'm not concerned. If you're getting GPT to pass your interviews, then you should change your interviews. LLMs are useful tools, but compression machines aren't nuanced thinking machines, even if they can mascaraed as such in fun examples.

Essentially ask yourself this: why in my example was the engineer not only okay with me grabbing my book but happy? Understand that and you'll understand my point.

Edit: I see you're the founder of Archipelago AI. I happen to be an ML researcher. We both know that there's lots of snakeoil in this field. Are you telling me you can't frequently sniff that out? Rabbit? Devon? Humane Pin? I have receipts for calling several of these out at launch. (I haven't looked more than your profile, should I look at your company?)

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#370

Post by pseudalopex »

citizen_friend wrote: post #20
teeray wrote: post #10

The coding interview looks different when you view it for what it would be called in other industries: a licensure examination. It looks particularly insane to relicense for every single job you apply to. It also looks supremely unfair to have proctors for this exam with varying expectations and training to actually correctly administer it.

- licensing ensures only a minimum level of quality - people with licenses still do interviews, often just as grueling - licensed careers with high performers (lawyers, doctors, ib, etc) have other forms of filtering which are much more painful, like years of low pay internships Studying for a few weeks to solve fun puzzles to make 400k sounds like a deal to me.

> people with licenses still do interviews, often just as grueling

The licensed engineers I know think software interviews are insane.

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