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I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

triplebyte.com

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Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#51

Post by wdewind »

tptacek wrote: post #40

When someone can’t answer an interview question about relational databases, it might be that they don’t know anything about relational databases. I thought you all were better than this. Why are you asking questions about relational databases? Why not just have candidates accomplish the thing you're assessing with an actual relational database ? I know you're work-sample-literate! But if your feedback emphasizes comm…

Isn't a lot of the job of software engineering to quickly and concisely communicate complicated concepts? Might this actually be an accurate work sample? How else might you measure something like this?

Also the next few lines kinda address what you are saying:

> It also might be that they know them inside-and-out but aren’t used to answering questions on the fly, or that our question didn’t use the vocabulary they’re familiar with, or that they misheard the question and answered a different one. It made quite a difference just to phrase the feedback in a way which acknowledged all those possibilities.

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#52

Post by agumonkey »

dep_b wrote: post #14

Getting rejected at Triplebyte was actually a pretty good investment time wise. Guess the whole thing costed me three hours in total and I got quite a list of things to improve and how. It was clear it was tailored towards the interview not just a larger generic mail. There are tons of companies that give you a generic email after you completed an IQ test, a questionary, open questions and of course the 8hours+ homew…

less applicants ? more customers ? error in judgement ?

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#53

Post by mpeg »

nosseo wrote: post #45
mpeg wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's interesting that you pat yourself on the back about it, I think the whole Triplebyte interview process is poorly thought out, including your email comms. I did your online code quiz and got sent an email about doing a 2-hour technical interview, without really knowing much about what the job I was supposed to be applying for was. On the interview, since I didn't really want to waste 2-hours on something I didn't…

Yeah, another disadvantage of feedback is that some people really resent suggestions on how to improve - they can come across as condescending. I definitely would rather get feedback to someone who wants it even if this annoys someone who didn't, but I think lots of companies are making the opposite tradeoff - and that's part of why feedback is so rare in the industry.

I don't think the suggestions are bad per se. The reason they come across as condescending is because they're obviously very generic and they're sent to people who, in the current market, can be picky about who they want to work with.

Ultimately your whole business model is competing with tech recruiters, and my recruiters will call me to give me feedback from a role application, you have reduced that human touch aspect to an email with a few links to hackerrank.

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#54

Post by jopsen »

hunterjrj wrote: post #11
Insanity wrote: post #3

At least you get a response even if it is a rejection letter. I have heard - not experienced - that sometimes you just don't hear back from the company at all, which seems worse to me.

This happened to me. Several rounds of interviews with a well known colored-hat company, then... nothing. No response to follow-ups either. What was especially frustrating to me was that up to that point, the tone of both the conversations and email exchanges was very positive and cordial. I would have expected a "Thanks, but no thanks" follow-up at least, especially considering I was an internal referral from a Sr.…

Lots of companies are a mess internally.

If in 2-3 weeks you haven't heard from the recruiter, you should ping them back, if no response don't was further time and move along.

Interviews often seem like hit and miss. I would recommend training at geeksforgeeks.org just to refresh dynamic programming, etc. But beyond that you're better off applying multiple places.

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#55

Post by pmiller2 »

nosseo wrote: post #37
thaumasiotes wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Try again in three months" > Why? I wouldn't do anything different. But they will. The interview process is stochastic; exactly the same performance from you will lead to different results on different attempts. > Getting rejected at Triplebyte was actually a pretty good investment time wise. Guess the whole thing costed me three hours in total and I got quite a list of things to improve and how. It was clear it w…

That sounds like a feedback email from a couple years ago - am I right about that? We've definitely gotten better at this over time.

How so?

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#56

Post by rossdavidh »

So, good article, but another point occurred to me while reading it that wasn't covered. I think that writing a good email explaining the rejection, might be a good exercise for the company doing the rejecting. "Well, why are we rejecting this person, exactly?" Of course, this will only be true if the email is honest (if diplomatic). It could serve as an institutionalized review of whether candidates are getting rejected for the right reason. Building feedback loops into a company's internal process can be a very powerful thing, even when there's no bonus or penalty involved for the person doing the writing.

I wonder, does Triplebyte have any kind of annual summary of why candidates are getting rejected?

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#57

Post by gmueckl »

tptacek wrote: post #40

When someone can’t answer an interview question about relational databases, it might be that they don’t know anything about relational databases. I thought you all were better than this. Why are you asking questions about relational databases? Why not just have candidates accomplish the thing you're assessing with an actual relational database ? I know you're work-sample-literate! But if your feedback emphasizes comm…

Maybe good oral communication skills are part of these particular requirements? We don't know the details of the interview. But I don't understand why it should be wrong to ask a candidate a question that he should be able to answer and see how he reacts.

For some jobs it may even be appropriate to ask questions that the candidate cannot answer and see the reaction. Does he admit that he does not know? How does he phrase it? Is he making things up to cover for his lack of knowledge? And so on.

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#58

Post by FLUX-YOU »

PascLeRasc wrote: post #15
nosseo wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get why companies don't do honest rejection letters, but this there's no excuse for whatsoever.

It'd be nice to have some kind of public list where we could report companies that ghost, to warn other engineers to stay away.

You can't trust this because candidates do get petty when they get rejected and invent or omit details. That happens often on glassdoor.

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#59

Post by pmiller2 »

shawn wrote: post #41
thaumasiotes wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "Try again in three months" > Why? I wouldn't do anything different. But they will. The interview process is stochastic; exactly the same performance from you will lead to different results on different attempts. > Getting rejected at Triplebyte was actually a pretty good investment time wise. Guess the whole thing costed me three hours in total and I got quite a list of things to improve and how. It was clear it w…

While we specifically designed the take home project track to help overcome the difficulties of coding under time pressure with someone watching, we do still need to see a certain level of programming during the interview. “How to set up a test that works and then completely ruin the results by doing nonsensical things during a dumb ritual that our entire industry seems set on preserving.” Question for Triplebyte: wh…

I went through TripleByte 2 years ago and got much the same feedback. I was left with the same feelings, on top of the feeling of having wasted a bunch of time. TripleByte only makes sense if it can fast track you to enough companies to make the investment worthwhile. And, even then, I think, at the time (maybe still now), they only let you skip technical phone screens. Never mind that their process is more or less equivalent to the standard tech on-site (which, IMO, means it should at least count for something at the client companies.)

Re: I know why rejection emails suck – I write them

#60

Post by jstarfish »

wrecursion wrote: post #10
Insanity wrote: post #3

At least you get a response even if it is a rejection letter. I have heard - not experienced - that sometimes you just don't hear back from the company at all, which seems worse to me.

It absolutely is worse to not hear back at all. As someone who has dealt with this recently, the one positive thing I can tell myself about the experience is that I would not work for a company that cannot be bothered to write a rejection letter. It reminds me of a restaurant I worked at in my youth - because the owner and her daughter were so conflict averse - rather than fire someone, they would just slowly write t…

> because the owner and her daughter were so conflict averse - rather than fire someone, they would just slowly write them off the schedule.

Firing someone (without cause) leaves you open to having unemployment claims filed against you. Writing them off the schedule so they're forced to quit on their own accord negates that leverage; underemployment claims are harder for complainants to pursue/win.

Restaurant owners being the stingy type, I guarantee you this wasn't done to avoid hurting employee feelings.

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