Take-home interviews • Hacker News Board

Re: Take-home interviews

#61

Post by bjones22 » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:37 PM UTC

geebee wrote: post #46

I thought Gayle Laakman McDowell, who wrote "Cracking the Coding Interview", wrote a good article about the problems of take-home interviews. http://www.gayle.com/blog/2013/09/18/companies-who-give-cand... At the core of the problem is that this approach can be used to burn a lot of a candidate's time without an equivalent investment from the company. I've mentioned this before - I applied (maybe 5 years ago) to a co…

A test is only as good as the engineer who glance's at it with the fate of the candidate in his/her hands.

In my experience 90% tests get 10% of the attention of other assessments.

Re: Take-home interviews

#62

Post by msluyter » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:38 PM UTC

I did one of these when I applied at my most recent position. It took most of the weekend and actually it was a lot of fun. But I doubt I'd do it again if it required more than a few hours of my time. Any test that time consuming is arguably biased against those with families.

Some advice to those doing take home tests: write (good) comments and include tests.

Re: Take-home interviews

#63

Post by x0x0 » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:39 PM UTC

brianwawok wrote: post #4

Seems good, I like the choice. In discussions on this topic I see a lot of: "Programming on the spot is hard, let people program at home"! But then other people say "Why should I program for free at home, my resume clearly shows I am already a skilled programmer. All this will do is cater to young people without families, or those fresh out of school". I am not looking to hire devs right now, but I am thinking about…

I like the idea of getting paid $500 or even $1k for a take home test. It's frankly a simple matter of respect. For employers, they're just asking you to do one task, but for employees, talking to 4-6 companies in an interview cycle can easily be 40 hours of interviewing and another 40 hours of work on top of that.

I'm at a point in my career where I mostly refuse take home tests because I'm busy and I value my free time. Getting paid would make me much more willing to jump through hoops. Particularly when that day of vacation cost me $350 after taxes, so it's not like I don't have skin in the game already.

Re: Take-home interviews

#64

Post by jpeterson » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:39 PM UTC

hanlec wrote: post #7

As many other parts of an interview, I've always found the blackboard coding session extremely strange. When was the last time you coded in TextEdit with no docs around, no time to think, standing up, and being watched over the shoulder?

In 15 years as a software engineer at companies large and small, I have never seen anyone code on a whiteboard (outside of interviews, anyway), nor have I.

Re: Take-home interviews

#65

Post by lordnacho » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:39 PM UTC

bjones22 wrote: post #56

lordnacho wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You did an 8 hour test for them at full concentration, and they didn't even get back to you? Please name these idiots.

Not OP, but as someone who took a 6 hour test at full concentration, with no feedback other then a polite 'no', there are a few reasons I don't out them. 1) I didn't score well on the test. It's within reason they read this post and release my scores with a 'it was because he scored low'. Future employers then come across my scores and deny me. 2) Don't bite the hand that's like the hand that MIGHT feed you. You don'…

Make a new account and Glassdoor them.

Re: Take-home interviews

#66

Post by vinchuco » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:41 PM UTC

Wondering if under this model an unethical person could set up a fake interview process with real assignments to get unpaid work done by others who want the job.

Re: Take-home interviews

#67

Post by eplanit » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:43 PM UTC

jzila wrote: post #2

This is great. I especially love that candidates are given a choice, so if they prefer the traditional technical interview they can choose that. Normalizing performance between the two interview types will be challenging, but I think the benefits to be reaped far outweigh the difficulty of the challenges.

Agreed. My reaction was "finally!". I really do not approach software engineering as Performance Art -- and I never write code on white boards when I work. I've been fortunate to have been asked only once to do such a performance in an interview, and my reaction was unfortunately (and unexpectedly) like the candidate they described. In that case I didn't write anything on the board, but instead explained verbally how I would approach the problem. They actually gave me a "take home" problem to solve. I was able to go to my office and produce a solution like I normally do, and then sent them the sources and test results.

Very glad to hear that folks are breaking free of this long-lived trend. I also interview candidates on behalf of my clients. Personally, I find the most effective technique is to choose items from their CV, and have describe in detail (with a white board) how they did it, what challenges they faced, etc. Then, pose to them a hypothetical "but what if you were constrained by X or Y, how would you adapt your solution", etc. It is very easy to spot a charlatan or liar in these questions. If they really did what they claimed on the CV, this type of session gives them great latitude to demonstrate and expand on what their capabilities are.

Re: Take-home interviews

#68

Post by Vraxx » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:43 PM UTC

dmitrygr wrote: post #38

Gauging ability to operate under pressure is valuable too...ever tried to fix a bug on a device that was supposed to ship yesterday, under the pressure of the entirety of the hierarchy above you all the way up to the CxO? It helps to know if the candidate you hire will handle that, or fall apart just when you need him/her to do the job he/she is paid for.

For what it's worth, the author included this footnote about what you mentioned.

"1. The stress of interviewing seems to be different than the stress of performing a job. None of the people we've spoken to who do poorly in interviews report problems performing under deadlines at work, or when a website is down and there's pressure to get it back up."

Re: Take-home interviews

#69

Post by Udo » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:44 PM UTC

As someone who is still technically waiting - after a month - for his phone interview, I like the idea of doing some actual coding. If you have to make people jump through hoops, at least you might try and make the hoops at least somewhat meaningful.

Edit: I just pressed the button on my TripleByte dashboard to switch to the "project-based" track, but then I get redirected straight back to the same "we're sorry" page I've been seeing all along.

Re: Take-home interviews

#70

Post by VLM » Wed, Jul 29, 2015, 8:45 PM UTC

bbcbasic wrote: post #43

Software developers huh! What other role requires you to complete an exam to be considered for a job (or even just an interview). Moreover a 4-8 hour exam with no syllabus. No 'past papers' etc. I think this should stop. In it's place, developers can have a pet open-source project, which they submit with their application. The point is that the same project can be submitted for a hundred applications if needed, savin…

Software devs have extremely low social status, despite pretty good pay.

Honestly I'm glad they don't watch "Survivor" and make us eat bugs or do weird obstacle courses. Seriously. You treat people like dirt, they're gonna resent it and complain on HN and some Stockholm Syndrome victims will back up the abusers.

Another example of the low social status is those horrible open offices, like a call center. Ugh.

Another example of immensely low social status is crazy work hours.