I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days • Hacker News Board

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#411

Post by wholien » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:31 AM UTC

ForrestN wrote: post #10

I find it shocking that Facebook would still be considered as a peer to these other companies in terms of desirability as an employer. I would only accept a position at Facebook, which seems to be building a fundamentally destructive product while going out of its way to behave unethically in many dimensions, if it was an absolutely last resort to pay the medical bills of some dying loved one or something. Why would…

Heres a case for Facebook, also on Vox: https://www.vox.com/first-person/2019/1/16/18183686/facebook...

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#412

Post by jahaja » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:33 AM UTC

draw_down wrote: post #334

jahaja wrote: post #195

It's interesting that software interviews have degenerated into literal auditions. Just as with auditions, you need to train specifically for them. Is there really a reason why software jobs can't hire in a blue-collar fashion where there's a background/experience + sanity check and a subsequent trial period? Even looking beyond that, is there any similar profession where interviews like these take place? I'm startin…

Well, first of all, define "sanity check". About trial periods, there are places that do those, and a lot of people hate it. There is a lot of risk involved in leaving a permanent gig to "try out" for another one. If they let you go at the end of the trial period then you're out on your ass. I personally would never do this if I were already employed- there's nothing in it for me but downside. But more broadly, lots…

Sanity check for me is what every company in almost every field do. Basically the main reason for interviews to exists. To confirm that what's on the CV and so on seem accurate using an in-person interview.

Assuming that you're American, what do you even mean by the risk of a trial? Aren't you guys on a permanent trial period with your labour laws?

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#413

Post by opportune » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:34 AM UTC

LearnerHerzog wrote: post #408

opportune wrote: post #407

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The easiest way to get hired at Google is to let them come to you, not to directly apply

The Field of Dreams approach. "If you build it, they will come"

Really, that's not far from the truth. If you've worked at other well known "good" companies and worked on hot/important stuff, and that info is on linkedin, you will probably get approached by a google recruiter at some point. And unless you fuck up your call with them to make sure you're interested and a real person, that basically guarantees you a first round technical phone screen, which is the hardest part of getting hired at Google. You can study as much as you want and be the best engineer possible, but that won't matter if you don't get to the first round interview.

You basically "build" a linkedin profile that comes up when recruiters search for technically hot things, and then they will come knocking

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#414

Post by gmatbarua » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:41 AM UTC

Though I empathize with senior people of the software industry, I will like to add some other perspective to this discussion. I am from the Oil and Gas industry in Operations domain, nothing to do with software. Previously I have worked for IBM as a software engineer. Hence, I have the perspective of both industries. From this discussion thread, it seems that senior people are looking for exclusivity and immunity. I can correlate it with seniors of my industry. My company is government owned. Here, seniors people (by age, not by rank / +1 rank but the same job responsibility) command juniors (by age, not by rank / -1 rank but the same job responsibility) and seldom do any work. They come to office late, leave office early citing family issues everyday. When I bring up the topic to my boss, he says I need to understand they are like that, can't help. Sometimes he says "Learn from them, how to get work done by others". Those others are younger people like us - 22 to 40 age groups.

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#415

Post by Stratoscope » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:41 AM UTC

SturgeonsLaw wrote: post #345

dacur wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Search for young people? So discriminate?

I read that charitably as "give newbies a chance"

I really try hard to apply the principle of charity, but as a 67 year old developer who is still working, I'm afraid it's hard to read "search for young and talented people" without thinking of it as illegal age discrimination.

That said, I do like the interviewing approach we're replying to, other than that "y" word... :-)

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#416

Post by theoh » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:42 AM UTC

SamReidHughes wrote: post #372

jsmeaton wrote: post #352

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly, it sounds like you may be geared more towards software architecture rather than software development. If you like the sound of the bigger picture more than the details, it might be something you could look into.

If you can't handle simple data structures problems you need to stay far, far away from software architecture.

That depends on what is meant by software architecture. If you mean the structuring of a system to achieve good or (particularly) consistent worst-case performance, maybe you are right. But if architecture is used to mean the design of a system to satisfy users (and present a clean, extensible, meaningful interface) then it's really a conceptual job that has more to do with design skills than optimized algorithms.

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#417

Post by jahaja » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:42 AM UTC

opportune wrote: post #392

jahaja wrote: post #326

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would that warm-bodies scenario even happen? I think there's an assumption here that these tests actually provide a lower false positive rate than a solid experience check or whatever non-puzzle interviews do. After all, one stark difference to an audition for a ballet, is that you can't fake your ballet skills, however, memorizing CS stuff may actually be possible. Furthermore, the hard part to memorize are the…

From what I've heard from hiring managers, when you open a position and interview applicants without the use of headhunting, the majority of applicants are wildly under-qualified, even if they do have some relevant experience. Also, I see no reason not to combine both a background check and a technical interview. You have no way of knowing what someone's actual contributions to a previous software project are, even w…

I agree that it would be hard to know an individuals specific contributions, but I can't see how a person can pass a good work-related interview if they're wildly under-qualified.

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#418

Post by joshuamorton » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:43 AM UTC

LaserToy wrote: post #399

cornellwright wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is BFS really that hard, especially if the interviewer is willing to talk it out with you and doesn't care a lot about finding the most efficient solution possible? I've been out of college more than 10 years now, do a mix of hardware and software (so am not coding all day everyday) and I can hack together algorithms like BFS if I spend a couple of minutes thinking about it. I get that there are many awful interviewe…

Bfs is just one of examples. I can ask you a question you will not be able to answer without knowing the answer. There is a reason it took researchers years to find those optimal solutions

This is such a cop out. It took millennia to invent 0. That doesn't mean that 0 is an exceedingly difficult concept to grasp.

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#419

Post by cornellwright » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:44 AM UTC

LaserToy wrote: post #399

cornellwright wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is BFS really that hard, especially if the interviewer is willing to talk it out with you and doesn't care a lot about finding the most efficient solution possible? I've been out of college more than 10 years now, do a mix of hardware and software (so am not coding all day everyday) and I can hack together algorithms like BFS if I spend a couple of minutes thinking about it. I get that there are many awful interviewe…

Bfs is just one of examples. I can ask you a question you will not be able to answer without knowing the answer. There is a reason it took researchers years to find those optimal solutions

Sure, you can come up with an algorithm question hard and obscure enough that no one will be able to answer it in the time given and no one will have bothered to memorize it because it's so obscure.

That doesn't mean all "implement X algorithm questions" are categorically bad.

Re: I interviewed at six top companies in Silicon Valley in six days

#420

Post by rapind » Sat, Jan 19, 2019, 1:44 AM UTC

scarface74 wrote: post #390

SamReidHughes wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you can't handle simple data structures problems you need to stay far, far away from software architecture.

In the real world software architecture is rarely about “data structures”. Software architecture is about teasing out the needs of the customer - whether that be internal or external - and knowing how to design systems that are maintainable, scalable, fault tolerant, etc.

Potentially two things here:

1) Gathering requirements.

2) Turning those requirements into data structures.

I think a lot of companies will separate those into different roles, but I strongly believe that's a costly mistake in most situations. There's a feedback loop. Requirements inform your data structures, but your data structures help you contextualize (not pollute) your requirements. If you're working with an existing system, you also want to understand current structures in order to guide requirements. By guide, I don't mean to ignore pain, but if you're building a system to support multiple clients / users, then the real trick is to figure out how to do that in a cost-effective and elegant way.

When these roles are separated, and the requirements are gathered without knowledge of the structures, I believe you're setting yourself for failure in the long term (spaghetti code / everyone gets something different).

Getting these to gel is the puzzle I'm personally passionate about. I don't mind what I would call the math side of programming / code puzzles, but it simply doesn't give me the endorphin rush that building a system that elegantly ties things together does. The best is when you're working towards that or have achieved that and inspiration for further possibilities, improvements, efficiencies start popping up.

I'm not sure how you test for this as part of the hiring process, at least not efficiently. I do think we get better at this with experience, but I doubt it's exclusive to seasoned developers.