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Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

businessinsider.fr

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Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#91

Post by pbalau »

jimbobimbo wrote: post #24

The original article [1] describes new process in the context of PM interviews, which are different from software developer interview, no matter how technical PM is. The changes that I particularly like are: improvement in coordination between interviewers themselves, and stop sharing feedback between themselves until the very end. The latter really affects how next interviewers view the interviewee. [1] https://blog…

Well, FB did that at least 6+ months ago when I got trained for interviewing. As for the questions asked, there is an internal tool with various questions you are supposed to ask, with info about what signals you can get, how to extract more info and how to formulate your feedback. I was always told that I need to help the person I'm interviewing solve the problems.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#92

Post by jasonkester »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #71
jasonkester wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You use the term "apply for a job", which might explain the disconnect. The post you reply to isn't about applying for jobs. You don't want to "apply" for things. You want your google VP to be having a beer with your ex-boss and worrying that his pet project was going to fail because they just can't find a guy who can really $X. But your ex boss knows a guy who absoulutely can $X, and just finished $X'ing his company…

You clearly don’t work in the industry. Edit: I see from your other post you haven’t interviewed since 1999. Sounds about right. The hiring process does not work how you think it should.

Not true. I've interviewed for and landed several nice gigs since then. But as I said in that other post, always skipping the tech screen piece.

From talking with other devs in my peer group, this doesn't seem uncommon.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#93

Post by Jach »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #79
smsm42 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interviewed at Facebook and the tech part was completely sane and appropriate, the technical task was a bit fizzbuzzy but not something you'd need to spend nights digging into obscure algorithms book, but rather simple task which required some thinking, but not too much of it. No experience with Google or Netflix. As of looking at CV, I've seen people with great CVs that proved utterly useless and of course the opp…

I tech screened at Facebook and the whiteboard question was to partially implement a regex parser.

Meanwhile some of us are just happy if candidates know of the existence of regexes, even if they forgot the exact usage, and can mention using them rather than trying to write a parser from scratch when given a problem statement of extracting phone numbers of various formats from several thousand unstructured files of web page scrapes...

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#94

Post by izacus »

viraptor wrote: post #77
izacus wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fundamentally: Why are you having the "Can you code your way out of a wet paper bag" conversation instead of the "How much value can you add to this company" conversation? Because people lie. It's that simple. Referrals lie, CVs lie, friends lie to get friends in a position. Do understand that there's a fundamentally different set of problem a 40.000 FTE company has to deal with in comparison to a 30 person startup…

> Professions like laywers and doctors need to go through significantly longer hazing rituals At least for doctors this isn't universally true. There's continuing education/certification, (which you have to do every $period) there's public reputation, there's lots of networking. From what I've seen the interviews take few hours in one day and people usually already know each other.

Yes, but before that you need years of low-paid jobs and networking to come close to well paid positions. Applying at FAANG requires significantly less.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#95

Post by izacus »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #80
izacus wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Fundamentally: Why are you having the "Can you code your way out of a wet paper bag" conversation instead of the "How much value can you add to this company" conversation? Because people lie. It's that simple. Referrals lie, CVs lie, friends lie to get friends in a position. Do understand that there's a fundamentally different set of problem a 40.000 FTE company has to deal with in comparison to a 30 person startup…

Many people interviewing there are already among the most highly paid people in the world (lots of them are just moving around within that group) so that argument is pretty irrelevant.

Many (as in 10-30% at best) perhaps. Not even close to half or majority though, so I fail to understand how the argument could be irrelevant.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#96

Post by cheschire »

robocat wrote: post #90
cheschire wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You could just ask the candidate to explain how to use modulus correctly, and not even need to break out the markers.

Modulus is a rabbit hole - the mod operator has different behaviour for negative parameters depending on the language (and presumably other language specific quirks?) Here's another one: when does the abs operator return a negative number?

Why make it a trivia game? Explaining the basics of how modulus SHOULD work is a fairly generic concept that is trivial for a lot of coders to describe, but impossible for non-coders. It's an ice-breaker.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#97

Post by izacus »

jasonkester wrote: post #57
khazhoux wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you apply for a full-time software engineering position at a large company today, you will be run through the all-day series-of-hourlong-interviews, even if you are a referral. It is possible for the hiring manager to work closely with recruiter and recruiting coordinator to craft a more customized interview process, but that's rare (and, impossible at a place like Google, which decentralizes hiring). The value of…

You use the term "apply for a job", which might explain the disconnect. The post you reply to isn't about applying for jobs. You don't want to "apply" for things. You want your google VP to be having a beer with your ex-boss and worrying that his pet project was going to fail because they just can't find a guy who can really $X. But your ex boss knows a guy who absoulutely can $X, and just finished $X'ing his company…

You've essentially described nepotism here - if FAANG would follow this model, they would never hire some of their best contributors because those contributors didn't live in the Valley their whole life to network with bosses. I prefer a process that's at least basically meritocratic to the old boys club type of hiring at any time.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#98

Post by smsm42 »

lazyasciiart wrote: post #79
smsm42 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I interviewed at Facebook and the tech part was completely sane and appropriate, the technical task was a bit fizzbuzzy but not something you'd need to spend nights digging into obscure algorithms book, but rather simple task which required some thinking, but not too much of it. No experience with Google or Netflix. As of looking at CV, I've seen people with great CVs that proved utterly useless and of course the opp…

I tech screened at Facebook and the whiteboard question was to partially implement a regex parser.

How partially? I could probably do a very simple one, without backtracking (though they'd need a big whiteboard if they want full code there) but if it's something like PCRE then I don't think Facebook headquarters have enough whiteboards to fit the code :)

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#99

Post by yogthos »

b_tterc_p wrote: post #54
mancerayder wrote: post #39

Great, now can Netflix, Google and Facebook do this, too? Not because I want to work in these places, but because they influence everyone else and as a senior engineer in the systems space I feel I shouldn't need to study days or weeks for fizzbuzz sorting algorithms questions that are designed to test comp sci recent grads. I have a proven career, and was never suddenly stumped in a project due to not being able to.…

Fizzbuzz is a trivial test to detect people who are basically fraudulent in their claims of programming ability. You shouldn’t need to study for it. Sorting algorithms, sure.

Yup, my experience is that FizzBuzz level complexity is roughly what you want for interview problems. I find that and some questions about algorithms and data structures tell you all you need to know.

Re: Microsoft changed how it interviews software developers

#100

Post by porpoisely »

mancerayder wrote: post #39

Great, now can Netflix, Google and Facebook do this, too? Not because I want to work in these places, but because they influence everyone else and as a senior engineer in the systems space I feel I shouldn't need to study days or weeks for fizzbuzz sorting algorithms questions that are designed to test comp sci recent grads. I have a proven career, and was never suddenly stumped in a project due to not being able to.…

The problem is that resumes can be deceiving. If you've worked long enough in the industry, you've met a few incompetent people with stellar resumes. It's why having google on your resume opens a lot of doors. Everyone respects google's vetting/interviewing system.

Also, fizzbuzz isn't anything you really need to study for (certainly not for days or weeks). It's something you should be able to work out during the interview if you truly have developing experience. But then again, I've known people with amazing resumes who couldn't even understand the fizzbuzz question itself.

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