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Hiring Without Whiteboards

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Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#421

Post by shmolyneaux »

0xFFC wrote: post #58
shmolyneaux wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're willing to associate your username with your personal identity, you could link to your projects/CV in your profile. Other commenters may be able to identify what recruiters are looking for and why your resume was dismissed. Also, to the point of the post, do you consider whiteboard interviews to be good or bad for your situation? With covid it's harder for companies to find which applicants should be interv…

I can send my cv privately to you. About the leetcode thing, yes, I used to be pretty code. If you send me a link right now, I might not be able to do it, since I am living under huge stress right now, but with 1 week or 2 training I can get 80-90% in the coding challenge easily.

I'm not in a position to help get you an interview at the moment, so I'd feel uncomfortable asking for your resume. Participating on Hacker News and GitHub is an avenue for networking. Without linking to information about yourself you may not be able to take full advantage of that.

I'm sorry to hear about your stress. The worst part about the recruitment process is that it doesn't put folks in a typical development situation. I hope you're about to find something!

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#422

Post by emmanueloga_ »

nathanaldensr wrote: post #420
kelvin0 wrote: post #358

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've had one such interview go really bad. I am normally a very trusting and confident person, but that interview destroyed me for days. This was for an internship on my first year of uni when I just started learning to code C and C++. The position was for a Junior programmer (which I was). At some point the interviewer asks which I would choose in a project, C or C++ and reasons why. Basically answered that it depen…

I rarely see it talked about just how much ego plays a part in interviewing. In fact, I'd wager it plays one of the biggest parts of the interview process. If you get even one interviewer that is bitter, unhappy, on a power trip, or otherwise a sociopath, you're not getting hired. Many folks hate interviewing candidates; it can put them in a bad mood. They're going to take it out on you because it's safe.

Ego issues sometimes apply to the interviewee as well. I once had to interview someone that clearly thought the interview process was beneath them. This person answered every question as if it was a stupid endeavor and we should just hire them since it was just obvious how great they were.

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#423

Post by logicslave »

Planktonne wrote: post #334
logicslave wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right but in some ways this is what they need. Someone who can stare at computer science material, that is probably boring, for long periods of time. Someone who has a good memory for details, can remember routines. Can "solve" problems that have been solved before by applying theory. Someone who is willing to follow the rules and go through the process.

Remembering the solution to a problem isn't the same as solving it. Testing if people can regurgitate solutions is at best pointless.

Alot of people cant do it. If facebook is paying 450k to developers who can regurgitate leetcode I'm willing to bet theres some signal there. Its a pretty big assertion to claim the opposite

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#425

Post by unishark »

twic wrote: post #412
unishark wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or just offer both options. I certainly wouldn't eliminate the opportunity for unemployed people to get a little cash, just because of contract issues that gainfully employed people might have.

There are tax implications, for both employer and employee, to paying the candidate, at least in the UK. It would be quite a lot of headache for not a lot of money. Donating to charity has tax implications for the company too, but they're much simpler.

I'm not a corporate accountant or anything, but I've been on both sides of this and it's very simple to pay people for outside work in the US.

And for that matter, giving real-but-unpaid work to do as part of an interview may be illegal. So paying for your time may be something companies are doing to protect themselves taxwise, not just for good will.

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#426

Post by tchaffee »

usgroup wrote: post #414
tchaffee wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> IMO bite the bullet, over hire and then collect the cream based on evaluation That sounds at the least unethical and perhaps illegal in some countries. You're messing with people's lives, their ability to pay their mortgages, support their children, and other commitments they might have. While hiring mistakes sometimes happen, you should not be using firing as a tool to make your hiring more cost effective. And I a…

Applicants should know what the process is; I'm not sure why you'd assume that would be kept from them? It's perfectly normal for hiring / firing sales, traders, and other performance oriented professions. Nothing forces people to apply ... mortgages, children etc. It really depends on whether as an employee you want a meritocracy or an easy time. Personally, I wouldn't be adverse to this sort of practice; and compan…

> I'm not sure why you'd assume that would be kept from them?

Where did I assume that?

> nothing forces people to apply

Agreed. I already predicted that the reputation gained from this practice would have talented developers avoiding a company involved in such a shady way of hiring. I'm damn good at what I do and "we will fire the ones who don't work out to avoid doing interviews" is a huge red flag for me. You lose, not me. Companies are competing for developers; experienced developers don't need your company.

> it really depends on whether as an employee you want a meritocracy

A meritocracy is great. Your company just lost at it. There are far better companies I could work for where the interviewing process isn't based on laziness now and fire people later. Want to win in the meritocracy competition between companies? Learn how to interview. I know how. That's why I can hire great devs. Haven't had to fire anyone ever in my career. So that's who you are competing with in this meritocracy. Companies who get the hiring process right.

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#427

Post by hansvm »

langitbiru wrote: post #197

Maybe we should give options to candidates. If I were to hire software engineers, I would offer every option to them: 1. Whiteboard interview 2. Opensource contributions 3. Take-home assignment 4. Becoming contractors for a short period 5. Etc So if they fail whiteboard interview, they can redeem themselves with their opensource contributions. If they don't have opensource contributions, then they can take home our a…

That's not necessarily a bad approach aside from the cost to the hiring organization to maintaining so many workflows. It lines up with, e.g., Triplebyte's and Google's studies about how a candidate's success in a role is tied much more closely to the moments where they impressed you the most rather than any kind of minimum bar you need to meet or some kind of average performance. By giving the candidate the opportunity to impress you however they're best able to do so you could plausibly get a stronger signal.

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#428

Post by learc83 »

autarch wrote: post #384
learc83 wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>This can add a lot of overhead, and some candidates may have jobs that forbid them from accepting outside work How is this enforceable? Even in the case that someone finds out about it, what’s the company going to do? Sue the interviewing company for the rights to a few hours of work?

Well, if the employer finds out you violated your employment contract in this manner they could sue you, or perhaps even the other party that paid you. But IANAL, I'm just saying that contracts forbidding side jobs are not unheard of.

>or perhaps even the other party that paid you

What are the damages?

As for suing you? Again what are the damages?

It’s almost certain there are no damages assuming you are just working on a take home project not something that they are going to actually use to compete with your employer.

Just because something is in the terms of your contract doesn’t actually mean you really need to worry about a lawsuit.

A company might fire you if they find out, but the chance that they fire you is to small to worry about.

And even if you don’t do take home work for pay, you don’t want your company finding out you are interviewing. Taking a token payment doesn’t change anything practically.

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#429

Post by autarch »

learc83 wrote: post #428
autarch wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, if the employer finds out you violated your employment contract in this manner they could sue you, or perhaps even the other party that paid you. But IANAL, I'm just saying that contracts forbidding side jobs are not unheard of.

>or perhaps even the other party that paid you What are the damages? As for suing you? Again what are the damages? It’s almost certain there are no damages assuming you are just working on a take home project not something that they are going to actually use to compete with your employer. Just because something is in the terms of your contract doesn’t actually mean you really need to worry about a lawsuit. A company…

IANAL. I am just saying that some employment contracts forbid side work. I imagine many companies would prefer not to get in the middle of that, and so might be reluctant to pay people for work done in interviews.

Re: Hiring Without Whiteboards

#430

Post by hejja »

fogetti wrote: post #256
hejja wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

100%. if properly trained, interviewers ask questions that build without throwing the kitchen sink at you. whiteboard interviews (when done holistically) assess for signal, not binary correctness - do you have a solid framework to build a solution? - are you considering multiple approaches / data structures / complexities - referencing similar problems, vocabulary, situations to illustrate breadth of knowledge sure,…

You can confirm the same using a take-home assignment and a code review together with the candidate. Or even with an on-site pair programming. Neither of those require whiteboards.

pair programming, for sure

if done right, whiteboarding should be almost the same as pair programming -- an iterative dialogue

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