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Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

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Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#521

Post by crdoconnor »

DannyBee wrote: post #497
ozgung wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're saying Google's recruiters don't tell what position they are interviewing for and that they found a 20+ years experienced engineering manager holding patents on computer networking under-qualified for an ordinary site maintenance position. Well, that sounds like a dumb recruitment process.

First, it is definitely standard process to tell him (if they didn't, that's a definite failure). Again, remember you only have one side of the story here. I like to try to gather facts before assuming things. IE Ready, aim, fire, not fire, ready, aim. Admittedly more difficult in this case (and certainly, i have no access to it) Second i'm going to point out a few things: Experience may translate into wisdom, it may…

>Judging an entire recruitment process based on one side of a story from a person who's clearly upset about an interview,

It's not just this guy. There have been others: https://twitter.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768

There's another measure I use to measure the quality of their hiring process. The output. Namely the track record of products Google has developed in house in the last 10 years.

I've also heard a few stories about friends applying for a position and being shunted by the hiring process into the hiring funnel for other (plainly unsuitable) positions. When I hear a very specific criticism from two separate places it's hard to stay skeptical.

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#522

Post by ww520 »

lordnacho wrote: post #13

I'm amazed he knew things in such detail. I mean who would know just how long a MAC address is? Or what the actual SYN/ACK etc tcp flags are? You just need to know what they're used for, and if you need the specifics, you'll find out with a single search. He seemed to know that as well though. Kernighan for bit twiddling algos, that kind of thing. It's a bit strange to have someone non-technical interviewing a techie…

I would have failed the question. I don't remember how many bytes in a MAC address. That's something that can be easily looked up.

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#523

Post by mooreds »

mankash666 wrote: post #473
mooreds wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

May I assume this is tongue in cheek?

Absolutely not. The reason so many Google upper management types sport beards (case in point, Sundar Pichai), is the chronic lack of time from working nights as data-center technicians/network engineers. How else can you explain Google's up-time and low-latency? :)

Right. Who has time to shave when you're busy examining network traffic?

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#525

Post by probinso »

The problem is Google doesn't need you. Google gets onefinity applications per day. If they shave %90 percent of cold applicants this way then they will not hurt for more applicants. A company that large will gain it's best participants by reference.

-----------------------------------------

my interview with google was very short.

them: what is 2 ^ 37?

me: can I use a calculator?

them: no

me: then we are done here.

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#526

Post by inopinatus »

lordnacho wrote: post #183
user5994461 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder what would happen if ordinary people recruited for medical doctor jobs? Would you be comfortable rejecting a guy who'd been in medical school for 10 years based on his not knowing what the "funny bone" is? Wouldn't you tell your boss that you felt a bit out of that league? It's amazing you can get someone to do this without them going red in the face. The medical recruiter asks to see the diploma. The doct…

"Diploma says DO, not MD. You don't get the job." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_MD_and_DO_in_the...

Given that osteopathy is pseudoscientific dogma, that's not an unreasonable outcome.

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#527

Post by falcolas »

DannyBee wrote: post #497
ozgung wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're saying Google's recruiters don't tell what position they are interviewing for and that they found a 20+ years experienced engineering manager holding patents on computer networking under-qualified for an ordinary site maintenance position. Well, that sounds like a dumb recruitment process.

First, it is definitely standard process to tell him (if they didn't, that's a definite failure). Again, remember you only have one side of the story here. I like to try to gather facts before assuming things. IE Ready, aim, fire, not fire, ready, aim. Admittedly more difficult in this case (and certainly, i have no access to it) Second i'm going to point out a few things: Experience may translate into wisdom, it may…

> SRE is not an ordinary site maintenance position by any means

Then why ask about the nitty gritty details required by maintenance personnel as part of the screening process - things I would rather have my high level employees looking up rather than relying on a possibly faulty memory.

> Judging an entire recruitment process based on one side of a story from a person who's clearly upset about an interview, and 3 sentences i wrote on hacker news, seems ... silly.

This kind of opinion is not formed in a vacuum. It's formed of the dozens of posts that appear every year about how someone who seems qualified is turned down for spurious reasons like "being unable to reverse a binary tree on a whiteboard". It's what makes this particular post so believable - it fits the stereotype. Even your own developers who post here say "yeah, that's more accurate than inaccurate." Perhaps it wouldn't hurt to "undercover boss" your way through the interview process...

Speaking for myself, and only myself... I turn down all Google recruiters because I know I would not pass Google's interview process. Not because I don't have the skills, but because I don't have a college degree. Because I don't see the return on investment for studying for the next 6 weeks just to pass the interview process, especially when I won't even know if I'm getting a job I'll enjoy.

> I think i'm just going to leave it alone because it's not clear to me the discussion is going to get any more reasonable.

How about the responses from your own employees which are pointing out that they see the problem too. Are they being unreasonable?

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#528

Post by btilly »

geofft wrote: post #508
btilly wrote: post #487

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are right that several of these questions could be due to his misunderstanding the questions asked at the time, answering the wrong one, and then remembering what he thought he was asked. But it is beyond my imagination to reconstruct a plausible conversation that could result in the one recorded without there being considerable ill will on both sides.

Here's a thought experiment: read the article, replacing the interviewer-side questions with ones that make them sound more plausible. (This is the side that we should believe to be less accurate, if only because the interviewer isn't reporting their questions.) Pretend you're the interviewer, and ignore the internal monologue. For question 5, you asked about an inode, and were told about an inumber, and got back an…

Your imagination is better than mine. :-)

The conversation that I'd have to reconstruct has a very combative interviewee. Which would also fit said interviewee deciding to write up the article that I read. Which would mean that Google dodged a bullet.

I find it interesting to note that his site is down. There are a lot of possible causes, but it isn't good advertising for his webserver software.

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#529

Post by serge2k »

joesmo wrote: post #398
sfrailsdev wrote: post #392

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From what I've heard, google intentionally screws with timing, who you will be speaking to, and other factors in order to try to understand how you deal with changes in circumstances.

Yeah, I've heard this too. If it's true, it just shows what assholes they are when it comes to respecting people's time. Which I think is the original point of the article which comes in loud and clear: Google will waste your time; don't interview there.

Unfortunately they will just ignore the complaints and move on to the next resume in the pile.

Re: Google's “Director of Engineering” Hiring Test

#530

Post by throwaway2016a »

lucb1e wrote: post #410
throwaway2016a wrote: post #276

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm a student (not someone with 10 years of experience) but I knew that. 3 bytes for the vendor block, 3 bytes for the device. That is why you know the answer. Come back in 10 years and let us know if you still know it. What you think might be mainstream in a computer science class are rarely used in application. And if they are they can be easily looked up. I used to know the exact effective distance of a CATV cab…

> What you think might be mainstream in a computer science class are rarely used in application. Uh actually my classes didn't teach me that. Side projects did.

Kudos to having side projects. That's awesome.

The point still stands though. First, it is much easier to have side projects when you are in school so the causal relationship might still be there just one step removed. But the more important point I was making was that school or a side project or even a project at work, if people go 10 years without using it, they forget things.

As an aside, you may want to drop the "Uh" in-front of your sentences. It conveys a certain tone that I'm not sure you are doing intentionally.

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