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Lot of advice below on how to toughen up for interviews, but I'm going to give a contrarian view: you can't toughen up if it's not in you already. Tech intervi

by kzhahou 11y ago

Lot of advice below on how to toughen up for interviews, but I'm going to give a contrarian view: you can't toughen up if it's not in you already. Tech interviews are an exhausting, often humiliating experience. Some companies claim to do it better (e.g., see Asana's post a few days ago) and more humanely, but by and large the process is designed to break the candidate: to see the limits of their skills and aptitudes. Excellent in theory for the company, but very hard on the candidate. Even if you do mostly-great in an interview, you'll probably not quite finish the programming assignment, and feel like a dunce for it (and you'll know the answer on your walk back to your car). If you don't get an offer, it will serve as confirmation of your ineptitude and you'll kick yourself for it. It's super tough and I have very good friends --and easily world-class 1% engineers-- who have crumbled during the process. My advice: you seem to know yourself pretty well. That's so valuable. Play to your own strengths and don't bother trying to toughen up for interviews. Oh, advice #2: get into an awesome job via a friend, if you can, and maybe your friend can make sure they don't haze you too hard. Good luck!

meddlepal 11y ago
I don't think tech company interviews are purposefully setup to be brutal gauntlets but I think what in reality occurs is a team needs to hire quickly, members tap into past experiences and then build a process. This process may be wildly inconsistent or draw from past negative experiences. Before you know it you've built a brutal hiring process. I think the real problem is developers lack hiring and interview training.
- arthurcolle 11y ago
  I think you have hit the nail on the head, my interview experience at a single company (currently employed, didn't interview anywhere else) had a very high variance in terms of questions/approaches so I can see this playing a significant part in determination of appropriateness of a potential New Hire. Personal experience is important in terms of rapidly evaluating a candidate! If a team is composed of 10 people and you interview with each and each brings something a little different to the table, that seems OK to me. It gives a candidate exposure to the people they would be working with, kind of like dating.

by kzhahou 11y ago

meddlepal 11y ago

I don't think tech company interviews are purposefully setup to be brutal gauntlets but I think what in reality occurs is a team needs to hire quickly, members tap into past experiences and then build a process. This process may be wildly inconsistent or draw from past negative experiences. Before you know it you've built a brutal hiring process. I think the real problem is developers lack hiring and interview training.

arthurcolle 11y ago
I think you have hit the nail on the head, my interview experience at a single company (currently employed, didn't interview anywhere else) had a very high variance in terms of questions/approaches so I can see this playing a significant part in determination of appropriateness of a potential New Hire. Personal experience is important in terms of rapidly evaluating a candidate! If a team is composed of 10 people and you interview with each and each brings something a little different to the table, that seems OK to me. It gives a candidate exposure to the people they would be working with, kind of like dating.