3 ms·

From what hear about some startups, the challenges are for the general candidate pipelines the company wants to weed out w/o fearing legal repercussions. The i

From what hear about some startups, the challenges are for the general candidate pipelines the company wants to weed out w/o fearing legal repercussions. The inside-track, friends, and frat candidates often get to skip right through the process or have copies of the problems/answers from insiders. (Illusion of merit.)

tedmiston 10y ago
I think this view is a little bit cynical. Hiring your friends which usually happens in the early stages is often more about having worked with them before or having them come in based on a recommendation / knowing they're a culture fit ahead of time etc. It's a way for small startups to spend less time on hiring, and increase their chances of getting talent that they couldn't necessarily attract on the broader market in the early stages.
- TuringNYC 10y ago
  I appreciate the feedback and you raise good points. However, i'm curious what purpose many of these exams serve...some guesses: - Because it is actually a good predictor of job success (does anyone think this is the case for anything but a handful of job roles?) - To be adding a hurdle to target those who really want the job (downside: it also adds a hurdle to top-notch gainfully employed people who dont have time to study for such exams) - Another is they just need something to reduce an otherwise overqualified pool of already qualified candidates (fair point, but at the risk of losing out candidates from concern one above.) - Legal risk mitigation -- add a quantitative measure to show a facade of merit and process. TBH, I have never been on the hiring side at a small firm, so I don't know. But I have seen several things: 1. People recruiting me to Amazon and practically giving me the exam questions (I declined mostly due to location) Same thing at two other firms (perhaps to get referral bonuses?) 2. An H1B process that is by-the-book correct yet entirely against the spirit of the program. 3. Tons of interviews, screenings, etc at big firms just to justify an already-decided inside candidate. This I witnessed firsthand and makes me really upset because of all the candidate time they waste and the false hope they give to people who were never in the running to being with.
theamk 10y ago
Why would startups need to do this? AFAIK, at least for small US companies, they can just hire anyone they want. They are not obliged to post the jobs or accept general resumes -- if they want to hire an insider, they just hire him, and no one outside would even be aware that there was a job offering. I have heard about larger companies / government agencies having these kinds of interviews due to internal procedures, but hopefully most startups have more sane setup.

tedmiston 10y ago

I think this view is a little bit cynical. Hiring your friends which usually happens in the early stages is often more about having worked with them before or having them come in based on a recommendation / knowing they're a culture fit ahead of time etc. It's a way for small startups to spend less time on hiring, and increase their chances of getting talent that they couldn't necessarily attract on the broader market in the early stages.

TuringNYC 10y ago
I appreciate the feedback and you raise good points. However, i'm curious what purpose many of these exams serve...some guesses: - Because it is actually a good predictor of job success (does anyone think this is the case for anything but a handful of job roles?) - To be adding a hurdle to target those who really want the job (downside: it also adds a hurdle to top-notch gainfully employed people who dont have time to study for such exams) - Another is they just need something to reduce an otherwise overqualified pool of already qualified candidates (fair point, but at the risk of losing out candidates from concern one above.) - Legal risk mitigation -- add a quantitative measure to show a facade of merit and process. TBH, I have never been on the hiring side at a small firm, so I don't know. But I have seen several things: 1. People recruiting me to Amazon and practically giving me the exam questions (I declined mostly due to location) Same thing at two other firms (perhaps to get referral bonuses?) 2. An H1B process that is by-the-book correct yet entirely against the spirit of the program. 3. Tons of interviews, screenings, etc at big firms just to justify an already-decided inside candidate. This I witnessed firsthand and makes me really upset because of all the candidate time they waste and the false hope they give to people who were never in the running to being with.

theamk 10y ago

Why would startups need to do this? AFAIK, at least for small US companies, they can just hire anyone they want. They are not obliged to post the jobs or accept general resumes -- if they want to hire an insider, they just hire him, and no one outside would even be aware that there was a job offering. I have heard about larger companies / government agencies having these kinds of interviews due to internal procedures, but hopefully most startups have more sane setup.