6 ms·

There is no standard way to interview a software engineer. Whenever one of these threads come up we see multiple posters explaining their process, and while eac

by 40acres 10y ago

There is no standard way to interview a software engineer. Whenever one of these threads come up we see multiple posters explaining their process, and while each process has it's upsides and downsides, no two are exactly the same. For a company the size of Google, with the amount of applicants they receive, I would assume that an interview standard is absolutely necessary. It's not perfect, but for 95% of developers out there you know EXACTLY what you're going to get when you interview Google. I think there is something to be said about that. Google recruiters tell you what the interview will be like, they give you study materials, and are pretty gracious with scheduling. If you don't like the process, that's fine, but I think Google in particular has done a good job of standardizing their process. It may not work for individual cases, but I would assume it works well for the company.

overcast 10y ago
The problem here is that he wasn't pursuing it, they were pursuing him. Maybe the issue lies in the actual recruitment process, and not the stupid interview questions.
metaphorm 10y ago
the problem with the way Google interviews is that, despite it being heavily standardized, it is not sensitive to non-algorithmic skills and talents that interviewees have. It will _only_ pass candidates who are unusually good at algorithm puzzles, on whiteboards, under time pressure.
- codazoda 10y ago
  This seems to be the type of employee Google is looking for, in which case, it works great.
  - pmontra 10y ago
    Maybe it's not what they are looking for. Maybe it's only the easiest test, like looking for the keys under the lamp post. It could also be that this way of hiring people turned the company into a specific direction, more attention to the sw and less to the customers.
    - lallysingh 10y ago
      Or visa-versa, that the company always cared more about the sw than the customers, and the hiring methodology reflects that.
    - maverick_iceman 10y ago
      It seems to be working fine for them.
      - Apocryphon 10y ago
        Is it?
        maverick_iceman 10y ago
        https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=goog https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...
- Adverblessly 10y ago
  When I was interviewed for a job at Google I was told there would be 5 different interviews measuring 5 different things: Pure Algo (which I view as "let's see that your CS grades were earned and not bought") Pure Coding (let's see if you have a reasonable coding style and design and are proficient with at least one language) Algo & Coding (a bit of both that makes sure you can solve a simple problem and code it [i.e. work entirely through a problem]) Software Design (so more on your skill in designing code - finding the right abstractions and interfaces etc.) Systems Design (your ability to design complete, large scale systems at a very high level) And this is more or less what I got, which seemed fair and logical to me. I agree that it is not tailored to the interviewee's individual skills (for example, your special training in cyber security is unlikely to give you an extra edge), but it makes sense for "good overall software engineer", and if you aren't also a good overall software engineer in addition to your special training in cyber security, then you are probably not what Google is trying to find. Also, it does look at your skills in coding and design which are both non-algorithmic. Now whether or not this experience is shared with other interviewees, or matches what you are looking for is something else :X
- munificent 10y ago
  > it is not sensitive to non-algorithmic skills and talents that interviewees have. I work at Google and do interviews (though I don't enjoy them). We do ask questions around domain expertise, software design, etc. It's not all just coding and algorithms. A good question: 1. Has a low enough floor that a poor candidate can still make some progress and not feel like they are doing poorly and get stressed out. 2. Has a high enough ceiling that a strong candidate doesn't blow through it in five minutes. 3. Has a smooth ramp between those points. 4. Doesn't rely on too much domain-specific knowledge so that a candidate who happens to have a random gap in their background that leaves them totally hosed. 5. Is concrete enough that the interviewer can capture that feedback in a way that the hiring committee can easily understand. 6. Isn't well-known outside of Google as stock interview question so that candidates can game us by just learning the answer. 7. Isn't asked by any of the other interviewers the candidates sees. 8. Can be explained and worked through in about twenty minutes. In case it isn't obvious, it is really really hard to find good questions that pass that gauntlet. Questions do tend to skew towards smaller-scale algorithm coding questions because I think those tend to survive that gauntlet better than most other questions. > unusually good at algorithm puzzles Interviewers are trained to not ask "puzzle" or "trick" questions. Not only are trick questions a shitty experience for the candidate, they are a shitty experience for the interviewer too. My job in an interview is to get as much data as I can about a candidate in order to provide information to the hiring committee. If I ask you a trick question, I get about one bit—in the binary sense—of data from you: did you find the trick or not? I don't think you have to be unusually good at algorithms. I basically read some Wikipedia articles and spent a few hours in the hotel cramming Algorithms in a Nutshell, and I managed to squeak through. That time was incredibly well-spent. Since then, I have relied on that algorithm knowledge way more than I expected too, and have since spent more time learning algorithms and data structures because I can clearly see it's made me a better programmer. > on whiteboards, That part is hard. We allow candidates to use a laptop too, if they prefer, or both. My experience is that candidates who use the whiteboard, at least for the earlier "design" parts of the question tend to do better than the ones that go straight to typing. We need to learn how you think, and putting a screen in front of people tends to make them clam up. If all I see is the code you write and you don't explain your thinking behind it, I don't get much data. > under time pressure. That part is really hard too. The reality is that interviewers and candidates have a limited amount of time they can put into this process. Keep in mind that most candidates are currently employed and don't want their job to know they are interviewing. Many of them travel to interview. There are only so many hours.
ehsankia 10y ago
What I don't understand is that this person hasn't even had a Google interview... They literally say "I won't accept an interview at Google because: 1. I had a bad interview at Amazon (???) 2. I read a story on HN about someone having a bad interview at Google I'm sorry but that's an awful excuse. As you mention, Google works at an insane scale, and as foolproof as you try to make a process, there will always be a very small chance that it'll fail. Doesn't mean the whole process is bad. And there's the whole bias that you'll only hear from horror stories and never from success stories.
- Someone1234 10y ago
  > They literally say You cannot claim that someone "literally" says something then make up a fictionalised quote that mischaracterized what they're saying. None of that "quote" appears in the article. Therefore the term literally and the quotation marks are at best misleading.
jcadam 10y ago
I got part way through one interview process with Google -- never again. I'll stick to buying lotto tickets, the odds of 'winning' are about the same and the payout is higher. Not to mention lotto isn't quite the tremendous time-suck that playing the Google interview game is (I mean, sometimes you get stuck waiting in line behind the old lady buying $500 worth of scratch tickets so you can buy your one powerball ticket, but still...)
- dlp211 10y ago
  There is no proof that joining Google is a lottery ticket(ie: whether you get in is luck). I have interviewed at Google, Amazon, Msft all multiple times and have passed every single one of their interviews multiple times(ie: I've never failed). If you want to attribute it to luck, then luck is when preparation meets opportunity.
  - toephu2 10y ago
    You think preparation alone can get you in the Big4? Obviously you are very smart if you passed every single one of their interviews multiple times. Hard work alone won't get you there. Just curious, so where do you work now?
    - dlp211 10y ago
      I do think that hard work and preparation can land you a job at these companies. I went from doing a manual labor job and never making over $33k/yr, to busting my hump 4 years in University to land these jobs. I also recognize that interviewing is its own skill that needs to be worked at, and simply doing LeetCode questions or reading Intro to Algorithms by CLRS isn't everything. I can honestly say that I have never had all the interviews go my way during a loop. I have been given problems where I could only find the naive solution. I have been in an interview where I made it through the first teaser question to be completely stumped by the second question. And I have made really ridiculous coding mistakes like increment the string variable instead of the index variable. But I also manage to never beat myself up about these mistakes, always talk about what I'm thinking during the interview, listen and try to apply the hints that the interviewer gives me, and have pleasantries with the other person during the interview. I dress well, always with a fresh haircut and clean shaved face, wear deodorant and take a shower the morning of an interview, and walk with good posture, because I do think that these things matter. I do also believe in the interviewer anti-loop (see Steve Yegge's blog[1]), but I also think that it doesn't really matter unless you really want to work for a specific one of these large tech companies. I currently work at Microsoft and just finished interviewing with a couple of the other large tech companies and have pending offers from them. I don't know, maybe I am smart, but when I see people like Andrei Alexandrescu or Mark Russinovich speak, or watch a video of Grace Hopper explain how she demo'd nanoseconds to military generals, I feel like an idiot compared to those people. I personally think you obviously have to have problem solving skills, but also gumption and a can-do attitude goes a long way. [1] http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-google.html http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-goog...
coldcode 10y ago
I am not a standardized programmer, so I have no interest in Google's standardized interview. I tell their recruiters I am not interested as I doubt you would hire me anyway given I don't fit your standardized system. When you design your system for some specific person type, that's all you will get.
- fixermark 10y ago
  Yep. Your path into the company (were you interested in joining it) is: 1) Found your own company to do a specific thing 2) Prove out you can do the thing and do it well, and furthermore have the thing be valuable enough that it would be worth acquiring but not valuable enough that it can operate as an independent company that covers its own costs 3) Google decides that what you're doing needs to be part of their portfolio and they buy your company and staff.

by 40acres 10y ago

overcast 10y ago

The problem here is that he wasn't pursuing it, they were pursuing him. Maybe the issue lies in the actual recruitment process, and not the stupid interview questions.

metaphorm 10y ago

the problem with the way Google interviews is that, despite it being heavily standardized, it is not sensitive to non-algorithmic skills and talents that interviewees have. It will _only_ pass candidates who are unusually good at algorithm puzzles, on whiteboards, under time pressure.

codazoda 10y ago
This seems to be the type of employee Google is looking for, in which case, it works great.
- pmontra 10y ago
  Maybe it's not what they are looking for. Maybe it's only the easiest test, like looking for the keys under the lamp post. It could also be that this way of hiring people turned the company into a specific direction, more attention to the sw and less to the customers.
  - lallysingh 10y ago
    Or visa-versa, that the company always cared more about the sw than the customers, and the hiring methodology reflects that.
  - maverick_iceman 10y ago
    It seems to be working fine for them.
    - Apocryphon 10y ago
      Is it?
      - maverick_iceman 10y ago
        https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=goog https://www.google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&ion=1&e...
Adverblessly 10y ago
When I was interviewed for a job at Google I was told there would be 5 different interviews measuring 5 different things: Pure Algo (which I view as "let's see that your CS grades were earned and not bought") Pure Coding (let's see if you have a reasonable coding style and design and are proficient with at least one language) Algo & Coding (a bit of both that makes sure you can solve a simple problem and code it [i.e. work entirely through a problem]) Software Design (so more on your skill in designing code - finding the right abstractions and interfaces etc.) Systems Design (your ability to design complete, large scale systems at a very high level) And this is more or less what I got, which seemed fair and logical to me. I agree that it is not tailored to the interviewee's individual skills (for example, your special training in cyber security is unlikely to give you an extra edge), but it makes sense for "good overall software engineer", and if you aren't also a good overall software engineer in addition to your special training in cyber security, then you are probably not what Google is trying to find. Also, it does look at your skills in coding and design which are both non-algorithmic. Now whether or not this experience is shared with other interviewees, or matches what you are looking for is something else :X
munificent 10y ago
> it is not sensitive to non-algorithmic skills and talents that interviewees have. I work at Google and do interviews (though I don't enjoy them). We do ask questions around domain expertise, software design, etc. It's not all just coding and algorithms. A good question: 1. Has a low enough floor that a poor candidate can still make some progress and not feel like they are doing poorly and get stressed out. 2. Has a high enough ceiling that a strong candidate doesn't blow through it in five minutes. 3. Has a smooth ramp between those points. 4. Doesn't rely on too much domain-specific knowledge so that a candidate who happens to have a random gap in their background that leaves them totally hosed. 5. Is concrete enough that the interviewer can capture that feedback in a way that the hiring committee can easily understand. 6. Isn't well-known outside of Google as stock interview question so that candidates can game us by just learning the answer. 7. Isn't asked by any of the other interviewers the candidates sees. 8. Can be explained and worked through in about twenty minutes. In case it isn't obvious, it is really really hard to find good questions that pass that gauntlet. Questions do tend to skew towards smaller-scale algorithm coding questions because I think those tend to survive that gauntlet better than most other questions. > unusually good at algorithm puzzles Interviewers are trained to not ask "puzzle" or "trick" questions. Not only are trick questions a shitty experience for the candidate, they are a shitty experience for the interviewer too. My job in an interview is to get as much data as I can about a candidate in order to provide information to the hiring committee. If I ask you a trick question, I get about one bit—in the binary sense—of data from you: did you find the trick or not? I don't think you have to be unusually good at algorithms. I basically read some Wikipedia articles and spent a few hours in the hotel cramming Algorithms in a Nutshell, and I managed to squeak through. That time was incredibly well-spent. Since then, I have relied on that algorithm knowledge way more than I expected too, and have since spent more time learning algorithms and data structures because I can clearly see it's made me a better programmer. > on whiteboards, That part is hard. We allow candidates to use a laptop too, if they prefer, or both. My experience is that candidates who use the whiteboard, at least for the earlier "design" parts of the question tend to do better than the ones that go straight to typing. We need to learn how you think, and putting a screen in front of people tends to make them clam up. If all I see is the code you write and you don't explain your thinking behind it, I don't get much data. > under time pressure. That part is really hard too. The reality is that interviewers and candidates have a limited amount of time they can put into this process. Keep in mind that most candidates are currently employed and don't want their job to know they are interviewing. Many of them travel to interview. There are only so many hours.

ehsankia 10y ago

What I don't understand is that this person hasn't even had a Google interview... They literally say "I won't accept an interview at Google because: 1. I had a bad interview at Amazon (???) 2. I read a story on HN about someone having a bad interview at Google I'm sorry but that's an awful excuse. As you mention, Google works at an insane scale, and as foolproof as you try to make a process, there will always be a very small chance that it'll fail. Doesn't mean the whole process is bad. And there's the whole bias that you'll only hear from horror stories and never from success stories.

Someone1234 10y ago
> They literally say You cannot claim that someone "literally" says something then make up a fictionalised quote that mischaracterized what they're saying. None of that "quote" appears in the article. Therefore the term literally and the quotation marks are at best misleading.

jcadam 10y ago

I got part way through one interview process with Google -- never again. I'll stick to buying lotto tickets, the odds of 'winning' are about the same and the payout is higher. Not to mention lotto isn't quite the tremendous time-suck that playing the Google interview game is (I mean, sometimes you get stuck waiting in line behind the old lady buying $500 worth of scratch tickets so you can buy your one powerball ticket, but still...)

dlp211 10y ago
There is no proof that joining Google is a lottery ticket(ie: whether you get in is luck). I have interviewed at Google, Amazon, Msft all multiple times and have passed every single one of their interviews multiple times(ie: I've never failed). If you want to attribute it to luck, then luck is when preparation meets opportunity.
- toephu2 10y ago
  You think preparation alone can get you in the Big4? Obviously you are very smart if you passed every single one of their interviews multiple times. Hard work alone won't get you there. Just curious, so where do you work now?
  - dlp211 10y ago
    I do think that hard work and preparation can land you a job at these companies. I went from doing a manual labor job and never making over $33k/yr, to busting my hump 4 years in University to land these jobs. I also recognize that interviewing is its own skill that needs to be worked at, and simply doing LeetCode questions or reading Intro to Algorithms by CLRS isn't everything. I can honestly say that I have never had all the interviews go my way during a loop. I have been given problems where I could only find the naive solution. I have been in an interview where I made it through the first teaser question to be completely stumped by the second question. And I have made really ridiculous coding mistakes like increment the string variable instead of the index variable. But I also manage to never beat myself up about these mistakes, always talk about what I'm thinking during the interview, listen and try to apply the hints that the interviewer gives me, and have pleasantries with the other person during the interview. I dress well, always with a fresh haircut and clean shaved face, wear deodorant and take a shower the morning of an interview, and walk with good posture, because I do think that these things matter. I do also believe in the interviewer anti-loop (see Steve Yegge's blog[1]), but I also think that it doesn't really matter unless you really want to work for a specific one of these large tech companies. I currently work at Microsoft and just finished interviewing with a couple of the other large tech companies and have pending offers from them. I don't know, maybe I am smart, but when I see people like Andrei Alexandrescu or Mark Russinovich speak, or watch a video of Grace Hopper explain how she demo'd nanoseconds to military generals, I feel like an idiot compared to those people. I personally think you obviously have to have problem solving skills, but also gumption and a can-do attitude goes a long way. [1] http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-google.html http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-goog...

coldcode 10y ago

I am not a standardized programmer, so I have no interest in Google's standardized interview. I tell their recruiters I am not interested as I doubt you would hire me anyway given I don't fit your standardized system. When you design your system for some specific person type, that's all you will get.

fixermark 10y ago
Yep. Your path into the company (were you interested in joining it) is: 1) Found your own company to do a specific thing 2) Prove out you can do the thing and do it well, and furthermore have the thing be valuable enough that it would be worth acquiring but not valuable enough that it can operate as an independent company that covers its own costs 3) Google decides that what you're doing needs to be part of their portfolio and they buy your company and staff.