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Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

darrenkopp.com

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Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#371

Post by godelski »

blindriver wrote: post #318
godelski wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Unless you have data to show that your "different way" produces better results, your idea sounds exactly the same as every other idea, which is basically garbage. Do you have evidence that the standard coding interview works? (There's evidence that it doesn't) I'm with you that the claim might be too strong to say "this is the way" but that's because I'm of the (very strong) opinion that interviewing is an extremel…

> Do you have evidence that the standard coding interview works? No, I think that they are all garbage. The only way to really hire is by having a vibe check to see if they are someone the team wants to work with, making sure that the person seems competent and has a reasonable chance of being very productive, and then hiring them quick. Give them a month and if they don't seem like a good fit, then fire them, with 2…

Seems we're on the same page: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40291828

> Give them a month and if they don't seem like a good fit, then fire them, with 2 months severance.

And this! I think this is quite effective and efficient. You aren't wasting anyone's time and making sure the person has adequate time to find their next income source. It immediately makes me respect you and I think would build high employee loyalty.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#372

Post by darrenkopp »

josephg wrote: post #317
basil-rash wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a fairly common condition, along the same lines as aphantasia (lack of inner-picture, rather than inner-voice). I do not believe there is any “cure” for it.

I don’t have a sense of a persistent inner voice either, but I can verbalise my thoughts just fine. It feels to me like the part of my brain that turns thoughts into English sentences automatically goes to sleep when it’s not being used. And that brain power can be used for something else. When I’m doing particularly hard programming work, I can’t have words said near me. Even music with lyrics messes me up. I think…

i am the same except i use music (lyrics and all) to drown everything else out. i don’t. price the lyrics at all, but my brain is processing them because every now and then i suddenly break out of focus and am like “wait, what the hell did that song just say?” usually on comedy songs

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#373

Post by epolanski »

One thing I personally do with candidates nowadays is just...talk.

Ask them general stuff I'm genuinely interested for their opinion but that would very quickly display the proficiency of the person without ever coding any line.

Question such as, for a web development job:

1) favorite way to manage git history

2) what do they like/dislike about different CSS authoring solutions

3) how did he manage localization on his previous projects

4) candidate's opinions on different frameworks/libraries

5) candidate's debugging approaches

6) opinions on latest updates to the ecmascript

And I can go on and on. As you simply chat and exchange ideas it is so blatantly obvious who's able and who's not. There are no right/wrong answers and it's totally fine to not have experience or knowledge about this or that but in one hour you can touch so many topics about your current projects and candidate's past that you can indirectly understand the level of seniority and proficiency of the candidate.

And anyway, all of this is useless. Because the most brilliant and knowledgeable candidate could spend all his day playing videogames and pretending to work anyway, so why would I put so much emphasis on those skills/knowledge rather than the individual/professional I have on the other side of the screen which is way more relevant?

I need people I can *trust* as coworkers. People I can assign tasks and know they will be done or that the candidate will communicate.

I don't need puzzle solvers. I really don't. I couldn't care less.

At the end of the day you need to optimize the interview for what you need from your colleagues. I need trust, reliability, communication, professionalism, effort.

I can sense those from chatting and I can have a good idea. But by having you implement Levehnstein's distance I just have no intel.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#375

Post by _akhe »

dilyevsky wrote: post #139

Classic mistake of overthinking it and failing to realize what interviewer really wants - which is to make sure the candidate can actually write code, like at all. The question itself doesn't really matter as much as it's just a pretext. I actually asked a variation of this question for many years at Google and it was clear within first 5 mins who has been writing code day-to-day and who's been mostly "brining key st…

I disagree, I think it's a failure of recruiting if you got someone into an interview who can't code "at all". That must mean nobody at the company is technical "at all" either then, if you are getting people that far along without having any clue if they even write code at all.

I don't have this problem - I can easily tell who is good and who is not good by looking at their stuff online, which repos they are contributing to and what their contribution is. I look at personal projects - I can easily tell what parts they wrote vs didn't because it's usually specific to the project.

I can tell from their blog posts and comments, especially GitHub comments - I can even see if they're pushing features at 11PM on a Friday if the obsession piece is crucial to the hire.

People who say all their work is hidden under NDA or they're new grads and haven't done anything yet - sorry, if there's nothing to view online I just wouldn't qualify you to interview.

Though I have given out 50+ code tests in my career because I had to, I would never choose to do this, if given the chance when hiring someone I would never give them a code test. I think it's an amateur move and wastes everyone's time. At its best (as in the case of CTCI interviews) it's an exclusivity filter for academics who memorized the optimal data structures for algorithms as taught in school, but the candidate might not have any of the skills needed to build app features, perform DevOps, etc. or even operate a Terminal - CTCI doesn't cover anything async, nothing about UIs, APIs, databases, services, git, design, file formats, etc. it's purely academic sport. And like I said, a good developer's work should be highly visible anyway - skip the random code test.

I would spend the recruiting effort finding specific developers using specific technologies that aligns with the role and making them excited about the opportunity rather than canvasing 1000 code tests out to anyone who applies.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#376

Post by hintymad »

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…

The past decade is the golden age for software developers, so we had lots of options. I was wondering if we will still have so much freedom as the market has increasingly become the buyer's one.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#377

Post by josephg »

mewpmewp2 wrote: post #334
josephg wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Skill gives you the gift of choice. You know how to write it either way around and it’s up to you to decide. Being able to correctly decide when to hack something inefficient together and when to optimise is another skill issue. It’d make a good interview question, that.

Yeah, but leetcode does not necessarily give you that skill or even prove it. And a talented problem solver would be able to find optimal and practical solutions when they are required and are not premature even without doing leetcode. You might get false positives as well. E.g. you get people who are tunnel visioned on leet code, cracking the coding interview and other common system design books, they know all the a…

Of course. I’ve interviewed over 400 people in my career and I’ve never directly asked someone if they’ve done leetcode problems. I don’t care about actual leetcode. Looking at someone’s progress on leetcode as a replacement for an interview would be a terrible idea.

As an interviewer, I care about their skills - technical skills (like debugging ability and CS knowledge), social skills (can we talk about our work together?) and judgement. Your ability to understand data structures and algorithms is signal, but there is a lot more to a good candidate than knowing how to make a bit of code run fast. Knowing when to make code fast is, as you say, just as important.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#378

Post by esafak »

xandrius wrote: post #270
roenxi wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The roughest outline for hiring as far as I can follow it is start with 100 resumes, filter it down to 10 by picking ones that are nicely formatted, then filter down to 1 by interviewing. Each level of filtering should be structured so that it biases towards technical competence. It isn't really a licensure examination because, as you point out, the industry doesn't bother to put the resources in to make sure anythin…

Got any tips/suggestions on how not to be filtered out because of "formatting"? Got any great examples to share?

I'm allergic to resumes that recite every single technology the candidate has ever used, leaving little said about what they accomplished using said technologies.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#379

Post by esafak »

arp242 wrote: post #123
rednerrus wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm in ops and we've found that simple exercises are better at weeding people out than complex ones.

This reminds me of this discussion on cocktails and bartender skills from a while ago https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36492450 "The martini may be simple, but it is not easy to make an excellent one. It's a very solid test of a bartender's skill because, unlike many drinks, ingredients alone cannot carry the cocktail. A piña colada for example, is mostly about ingredients (are you using a good coconut cream? fre…

And chefs are supposedly asked to cook eggs.

Re: Coding interviews are stupid (ish)

#380

Post by epolanski »

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 be a chemist you need to graduate in chemistry.

What would be the point of asking theoretical questions?

There's just no way in hell people can remember even 10% of what they studied in college, book knowledge isn't really the goal, rather than teaching you how to learn and master the topics.

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