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I've worked with someone like this. This person had a higher education in computer science and provided an alledgedly great (never saw it myself) graduation pro

I've worked with someone like this. This person had a higher education in computer science and provided an alledgedly great (never saw it myself) graduation project in C#. After they had started the job, I should occasionally help them getting traction with our technologies (Java-based), but they failed to understand even basic things. When trying to solve a problem while pair programming, they would just google it, click the first result link, literally copy the first code snippet there, pasting it randomly somewhere in our code and see what happens. I used to stop them and discuss the code line per line, but they failed to understand even basic concepts, like what an object is. At an early stage, I had once mentioned how C# is rather similar to Java and they would surely get up to speed quickly, but they vehemently objected and stated how it was a completely different thing. At this point, I'm still not sure whether their provided project was fraudulent or maybe just patched up with WYSIWYG tools. The rather small company I was working at almost went down the drain, and they were still wondering why. I told them it's due to this and another similarly poor hire, that they needed to change their recruitment, and that even a simply fizzbuzz whiteboard test would have revealed the problem. For the next wave of interviews, I compiled a couple of simple whiteboard-optimized tasks about writing fizzbuzz-like code, understanding simple data structures and basic mathematical skills. While they appeared rather simple, it was astonishing how some apparently competent, experienced devs completely struggled there. Obviously, it's not a perfect indicator of real world skills, and some candidates being medicre there (but not exactly bad) turned out to be rather good later. TL;DR: Do whiteboard fizzbuzz interviews. They cannot be faked and may save you lots of trouble, which is probably worth those 15 minutes each.

twic 10y ago
Even better than a whiteboard fizzbuzz, do fizzbuzz on an actual computer. Find out ahead of time what their preferred language is, set up a development environment for it, then sit down with them for an hour and have them go through one or two simple tasks, talking to them about their thought processes. Fizzbuzz, reversing a string, parsing a date-time, counting letter frequencies in a string, anything around that level. Basic stuff. If you can't do problems like that, you aren't a programmer. I think it's an essential filter that should sit near the start of any hiring process.
- AstralStorm 10y ago
  However, such filters can go top far if you receive an automated (!) test where you get to correctly parse two (!!) pages of text and then it is still not clear.
- blauditore 10y ago
  Computers aren't ideal for interactive interviewing situations either. The problem is that when operating a computer, people tend to have trouble keeping up a conversation (thinking out loud) at the same time. When on a whiteboard, problems naturally need to be short and simple due to limited space, writing speed and editing capabilities. This leaves more room for interaction between interviewer and candidate, like planning an approach or discussing written code. Also, whiteboards are handy to sketch solutions non-programmatically, with diagrams etc. Of course, there's the trade-off that the enviroment differs more from actual day-to-day work.
coredog64 10y ago
15 years ago I had a boss who hired someone from the local state university with a degree in CS who was (allegedly) a defense of his thesis away from a masters in CS. I wish he would have copied/pasted code from Google: Instead he used to bother me and my co-worker constantly, to the point that we nicknamed him "the interrupt controller".

twic 10y ago

Even better than a whiteboard fizzbuzz, do fizzbuzz on an actual computer. Find out ahead of time what their preferred language is, set up a development environment for it, then sit down with them for an hour and have them go through one or two simple tasks, talking to them about their thought processes. Fizzbuzz, reversing a string, parsing a date-time, counting letter frequencies in a string, anything around that level. Basic stuff. If you can't do problems like that, you aren't a programmer. I think it's an essential filter that should sit near the start of any hiring process.

AstralStorm 10y ago
However, such filters can go top far if you receive an automated (!) test where you get to correctly parse two (!!) pages of text and then it is still not clear.
blauditore 10y ago
Computers aren't ideal for interactive interviewing situations either. The problem is that when operating a computer, people tend to have trouble keeping up a conversation (thinking out loud) at the same time. When on a whiteboard, problems naturally need to be short and simple due to limited space, writing speed and editing capabilities. This leaves more room for interaction between interviewer and candidate, like planning an approach or discussing written code. Also, whiteboards are handy to sketch solutions non-programmatically, with diagrams etc. Of course, there's the trade-off that the enviroment differs more from actual day-to-day work.

coredog64 10y ago

15 years ago I had a boss who hired someone from the local state university with a degree in CS who was (allegedly) a defense of his thesis away from a masters in CS. I wish he would have copied/pasted code from Google: Instead he used to bother me and my co-worker constantly, to the point that we nicknamed him "the interrupt controller".