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Yeah, some companies do those (or a slight variation, called pair programming interviews). There are a lot of benefits of those, but also some drawbacks. First

Yeah, some companies do those (or a slight variation, called pair programming interviews). There are a lot of benefits of those, but also some drawbacks. First, it's much harder to scale in a consistent way. Second, and more importantly, you also evaluate how they code right now, on these specific technologies, not how well they would code with a bit of training. Think about it: There are a ton of new college grads who are better software engineers (or would be, with 6 months) than people with 20 years of experience. But a person with 20 years of experience who knows that technology will perform better in an immediate sense than the new grad. No interviews are perfect.

jakebasile 10y ago
> There are a ton of new college grads who are better software engineers (or would be, with 6 months) than people with 20 years of experience. Citation? How does having fresh recollection of algorithms that you will rarely if ever use outside of interviews make someone a better software engineer?
- gaylemcd 10y ago
  I didn't say it did. I wasn't saying that new grads are, on average, better than experienced hires. I was just saying that experience is not everything. An experienced hire will outperform a new grad on a "build this project in 3 hours" test. But the new grad might actually be a fundamentally better engineer - they might be smarter, more careful, etc. Given 3 - 6 months of training, the new grad might actually make better technical decisions. Obviously, the reverse can also happen: the experienced hire might be not only more knowledgable, but also smarter, more careful, etc. The problem with the "build a project in 3 hours" test is that it weights experience and knowledge so heavily that you end up eliminating people who could be great, with a little bit of training. Again, a new grad could also be a fundamentally terrible software engineer (there are fundamentally terrible software engineers with experience and with no experience). And in 20 years, they'll be a terrible software engineer with 20 years of knowledge and experience. They might be able to build a 3-hour project better than some smart inexperienced coder but I'd still rather hire the smart inexperienced coder (assuming I have some time to train them). Ultimately, ALL hiring processes are flawed.
  - jakebasile 10y ago
    A hiring process that can be gamed by reading a book sold by the process giver is especially flawed and morally corrupt. A hiring process that acts as if years of experience mean nothing and which reduces your career to a score on a web page generated by a terrible constructed test is especially flawed and inhumane. The companies that sell these products are profiting from hurting people.
    - Lewisham 10y ago
      > A hiring process that can be gamed by reading a book sold by the process giver is especially flawed and morally corrupt. Hahaha, please tell me another one Mr. Trump. > A hiring process that acts as if years of experience mean nothing and which reduces your career to a score on a web page generated by a terrible constructed test is especially flawed and inhumane. Being old is not an indicator of success. You seriously seem to live in some wonderland where the quality of a candidate just magically appears out of thin air. I want candidates to have studied. Studying isn't gaming. Studying is being smart. I want candidates that studied. Those that didn't I don't want. They don't want the job badly enough. I routinely test older candidates who can't program anywhere outside of the little box they made for themselves, and freak out when they see a programming language that isn't the one they've used for the last 20 years. Is that inhumane? Gayle is awesome. Cracking the Code Interview is a really great book, and I credit it for getting me through some of my interviews. Everyone here poking at her are people shooting the messenger for delivering the inconvenient truth.
      - jakebasile 10y ago
        I have no idea why I am being compared to Donald Trump. > Being old is not an indicator of success. I didn't say it was. A history of success is an indicator of being successful though. > You seriously seem to live in some wonderland where the quality of a candidate just magically appears out of thin air. You seem to love in a wonderland where a candidate's aptitude can magically get turned into a score on HackerRank. > They don't want the job badly enough. Yeah, fuck them for not wanting to waste time on your startup that will likely bomb in a year. How dare these people want a personal life. > I routinely test older candidates who can't program anywhere outside of the little box they made for themselves, and freak out when they see a programming language that isn't the one they've used for the last 20 years. Is that inhumane? And I've met hotshot new grads who think they're the best thing since static typing, yet can't benefit from years of experience in how software is made in the real world. > Gayle is awesome. Cracking the Code Interview is a really great book, and I credit it for getting me through some of my interviews. Everyone here poking at her are people shooting the messenger for delivering the inconvenient truth. I only now realized the user who I am going back and forth with elsewhere in this thread was the author of these books. I am pointing out the flaws in these types of interviews and how they are very overvalued. The book's ability to get you through interviews means nothing about how those interviews select for people who can do the job, only that the book was designed to help you get through interviews.
- MAGZine 10y ago
  How does repeating the same tasks every day for 20 years make someone a better software engineer? There are better and worse candidates in either camp. I developed software professionally for about two years before graduated. Is it 20 years? Nope. Conversely, it's more experience than many college grads. Working with super talented individuals with an express focus of learning/improving also gave me a hell of a lot more than "a fresh recollection of algorithms."
achr2 10y ago
I agree in principal - I was being slightly facetious (as I hope you were with the 6 month figure). But that said, you always need to gear your interview to the hiring goals. Hiring someone with no experience is a completely different effort than hiring an experienced dev or lead. It also certainly depends on the environment and task.

jakebasile 10y ago

> There are a ton of new college grads who are better software engineers (or would be, with 6 months) than people with 20 years of experience. Citation? How does having fresh recollection of algorithms that you will rarely if ever use outside of interviews make someone a better software engineer?

gaylemcd 10y ago
I didn't say it did. I wasn't saying that new grads are, on average, better than experienced hires. I was just saying that experience is not everything. An experienced hire will outperform a new grad on a "build this project in 3 hours" test. But the new grad might actually be a fundamentally better engineer - they might be smarter, more careful, etc. Given 3 - 6 months of training, the new grad might actually make better technical decisions. Obviously, the reverse can also happen: the experienced hire might be not only more knowledgable, but also smarter, more careful, etc. The problem with the "build a project in 3 hours" test is that it weights experience and knowledge so heavily that you end up eliminating people who could be great, with a little bit of training. Again, a new grad could also be a fundamentally terrible software engineer (there are fundamentally terrible software engineers with experience and with no experience). And in 20 years, they'll be a terrible software engineer with 20 years of knowledge and experience. They might be able to build a 3-hour project better than some smart inexperienced coder but I'd still rather hire the smart inexperienced coder (assuming I have some time to train them). Ultimately, ALL hiring processes are flawed.
- jakebasile 10y ago
  A hiring process that can be gamed by reading a book sold by the process giver is especially flawed and morally corrupt. A hiring process that acts as if years of experience mean nothing and which reduces your career to a score on a web page generated by a terrible constructed test is especially flawed and inhumane. The companies that sell these products are profiting from hurting people.
  - Lewisham 10y ago
    > A hiring process that can be gamed by reading a book sold by the process giver is especially flawed and morally corrupt. Hahaha, please tell me another one Mr. Trump. > A hiring process that acts as if years of experience mean nothing and which reduces your career to a score on a web page generated by a terrible constructed test is especially flawed and inhumane. Being old is not an indicator of success. You seriously seem to live in some wonderland where the quality of a candidate just magically appears out of thin air. I want candidates to have studied. Studying isn't gaming. Studying is being smart. I want candidates that studied. Those that didn't I don't want. They don't want the job badly enough. I routinely test older candidates who can't program anywhere outside of the little box they made for themselves, and freak out when they see a programming language that isn't the one they've used for the last 20 years. Is that inhumane? Gayle is awesome. Cracking the Code Interview is a really great book, and I credit it for getting me through some of my interviews. Everyone here poking at her are people shooting the messenger for delivering the inconvenient truth.
    - jakebasile 10y ago
      I have no idea why I am being compared to Donald Trump. > Being old is not an indicator of success. I didn't say it was. A history of success is an indicator of being successful though. > You seriously seem to live in some wonderland where the quality of a candidate just magically appears out of thin air. You seem to love in a wonderland where a candidate's aptitude can magically get turned into a score on HackerRank. > They don't want the job badly enough. Yeah, fuck them for not wanting to waste time on your startup that will likely bomb in a year. How dare these people want a personal life. > I routinely test older candidates who can't program anywhere outside of the little box they made for themselves, and freak out when they see a programming language that isn't the one they've used for the last 20 years. Is that inhumane? And I've met hotshot new grads who think they're the best thing since static typing, yet can't benefit from years of experience in how software is made in the real world. > Gayle is awesome. Cracking the Code Interview is a really great book, and I credit it for getting me through some of my interviews. Everyone here poking at her are people shooting the messenger for delivering the inconvenient truth. I only now realized the user who I am going back and forth with elsewhere in this thread was the author of these books. I am pointing out the flaws in these types of interviews and how they are very overvalued. The book's ability to get you through interviews means nothing about how those interviews select for people who can do the job, only that the book was designed to help you get through interviews.
MAGZine 10y ago
How does repeating the same tasks every day for 20 years make someone a better software engineer? There are better and worse candidates in either camp. I developed software professionally for about two years before graduated. Is it 20 years? Nope. Conversely, it's more experience than many college grads. Working with super talented individuals with an express focus of learning/improving also gave me a hell of a lot more than "a fresh recollection of algorithms."

achr2 10y ago

I agree in principal - I was being slightly facetious (as I hope you were with the 6 month figure). But that said, you always need to gear your interview to the hiring goals. Hiring someone with no experience is a completely different effort than hiring an experienced dev or lead. It also certainly depends on the environment and task.