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Spending a week working beside an engineer (or seeing how they complete a substantial project) almost certainly provides a better measure of their abilities tha

Spending a week working beside an engineer (or seeing how they complete a substantial project) almost certainly provides a better measure of their abilities than watching them solve interview problems for 1 hour Trial employment is expensive for the company. [...] Trial employment (and large take-home projects) are expensive for the candidate. I can't help but think there's way to mitigate that expense among several (dozen) companies. Triplebyte is already interviewing for other companies, why not set a low bar and hire everyone who passes it for a week? Charge your clients accordingly. If you have 25 clients hiring for overlapping skills, have them all pay to hire a person for a week. 40 hours of of labor / 25 clients = 1.6 hrs of labor per client, or about what it costs to do a single technical interview. Meanwhile, the interviewee gets to do a single, focused project for a week, but effectively interviews with 25 companies! I can get on Dice right now and find over 100 openings for python/java/golang/javascript/c++ engineers, certainly all of those companies would benefit from something like this. More power to Triplebyte if they can figure out how to take those projects and turn it into a client deliverable on top of defraying interview costs.

Kpourdeilami 9y ago
IMO, trial employment works because interviewer gets to spend a week with the candidate personally to get a feeling of how they approach and solve problems. Having Triplebyte do that without the interviewer being there to work with the interviewee on something, then it wouldn't be any different from an hour long interview
ammon 9y ago
That's an interesting idea! The hard part would be convincing companies to trust an external trial week fully (part of what's great about a trial week is the chance to actually see how an engineer will interact with your team / your problems). But I like the idea!
- padobson 9y ago
  It's true that a company would not be able to gain a "feel" for working with a candidate, but those feelings probably help contribute to noise as much allowing interviewers to ask their pet questions. Surely a company could objectively learn a great deal about a candidate by looking at a week's worth of git commits and evaluating the final product for correctness/maintainability/optimization. But still, taking TOO much of the humanity out of hiring ignores the fact that ultimately, a person has to work with other people, so you're right that it's not perfect.
fwefwwfe 9y ago
A trial week seems like it would only work for more desperate candidates, ones who are currently unemployed.
- kafkaesq 9y ago
  "unemployed" != "desperate"
  - seangrogg 9y ago
    Not for the first few weeks, usually. But given enough months the desperation is really just a quirk of the implementation.
- pacaro 9y ago
  It also doesn't work for people who want to interview speculatively. Looking at what else is around once in a while is a pretty decent due-diligence that you can apply to your career. You can even be honest about this with recruiters. "I'm not sure that I want to change jobs right now, but I'm open to persuasion." If trial weeks become commonplace, it starts looking like a form of structural lock-in.
  - supran 9y ago
    This is why I heavily push to talk to nearly everyone on teams at the prospective company that I might be a good fit for. I spend 3-4 hours talking to various people over the course of 3-4 weeks. If the company doesn't allow me to talk to their employees, then I pass them up.
angryasian 9y ago
If I'm already employed, it be weird to take a week off just to work for another company. Also ramp up time takes at least a day or two. This whole process seems troublesome for both the employee and employer
- padobson 9y ago
  When did you last switch jobs? I recently went through a round of employment where I quit my job at the beginning. Between updating my resume/social networks, brushing up on academic CS, finding leads, scheduling interviews and follow-up interviews and managing/negotiating offers, it was absolutely a full-time job. I can't imagine finding a new programming job while still working at the old job.
  - angryasian 9y ago
    Theres no way I would quit my current job before having another job lined up, if I didn't need to. I do agree that looking for a new opportunity is like a full time job, but when you are already employed the necessity is not as great. I can take my time over months rather than try to treat it like a 9 - 5.
  - ryandrake 9y ago
    That seems like an enormous risk. I've in the past spent upwards of 6+ months looking for work, and plenty more people have spent much longer. Given Bay Area expenses, if I quit my income, the first thing I'd have to do is temporarily move somewhere cheaper until I found something. Contrary to all the "shortage of engineers" stories, tech jobs do not, in fact, grow on trees.
  - vthallam 9y ago
    Doesn't work when you are on a visa, unfortunately. But even if you could, I still think you wouldn't need to quit before you interview, best case may be a couple of weeks off for preparing.
  - mattnewton 9y ago
    I think this is a crazy expectation. I last switched jobs while working at Apple last October. Having the BATNA of your current employment is crucial to the negotiation process and I can't imagine forgoing that- if you have no current income that's an insane bargaining handicap. Anyone with experience absolutely is not going to go for "quit your job, and maybe we'll give you a new one after a week, maybe it won't work out and you are boned"
ssivark 9y ago
> Meanwhile, the interviewee gets to do a single, focused project for a week, but effectively interviews with 25 companies! Isn't this basically what bootcamps are about? (at least from a job seeker's perspective) In practice, only those without jobs have the time to attend one... and if one isn't actively working in the field, then 2-3 weeks might be better than 1 week.
dexterdog 9y ago
So I pay for 1.6 hours of this candidate, but then if I want him I have to hope either nobody else wants him or that I am paying more than the others.
- sqeaky 9y ago
  Is that so different from normal interviews? At least this way you can't forget you are competing.

Kpourdeilami 9y ago

IMO, trial employment works because interviewer gets to spend a week with the candidate personally to get a feeling of how they approach and solve problems. Having Triplebyte do that without the interviewer being there to work with the interviewee on something, then it wouldn't be any different from an hour long interview

ammon 9y ago

That's an interesting idea! The hard part would be convincing companies to trust an external trial week fully (part of what's great about a trial week is the chance to actually see how an engineer will interact with your team / your problems). But I like the idea!

padobson 9y ago
It's true that a company would not be able to gain a "feel" for working with a candidate, but those feelings probably help contribute to noise as much allowing interviewers to ask their pet questions. Surely a company could objectively learn a great deal about a candidate by looking at a week's worth of git commits and evaluating the final product for correctness/maintainability/optimization. But still, taking TOO much of the humanity out of hiring ignores the fact that ultimately, a person has to work with other people, so you're right that it's not perfect.

fwefwwfe 9y ago

A trial week seems like it would only work for more desperate candidates, ones who are currently unemployed.

kafkaesq 9y ago
"unemployed" != "desperate"
- seangrogg 9y ago
  Not for the first few weeks, usually. But given enough months the desperation is really just a quirk of the implementation.
pacaro 9y ago
It also doesn't work for people who want to interview speculatively. Looking at what else is around once in a while is a pretty decent due-diligence that you can apply to your career. You can even be honest about this with recruiters. "I'm not sure that I want to change jobs right now, but I'm open to persuasion." If trial weeks become commonplace, it starts looking like a form of structural lock-in.
- supran 9y ago
  This is why I heavily push to talk to nearly everyone on teams at the prospective company that I might be a good fit for. I spend 3-4 hours talking to various people over the course of 3-4 weeks. If the company doesn't allow me to talk to their employees, then I pass them up.

angryasian 9y ago

If I'm already employed, it be weird to take a week off just to work for another company. Also ramp up time takes at least a day or two. This whole process seems troublesome for both the employee and employer

padobson 9y ago
When did you last switch jobs? I recently went through a round of employment where I quit my job at the beginning. Between updating my resume/social networks, brushing up on academic CS, finding leads, scheduling interviews and follow-up interviews and managing/negotiating offers, it was absolutely a full-time job. I can't imagine finding a new programming job while still working at the old job.
- angryasian 9y ago
  Theres no way I would quit my current job before having another job lined up, if I didn't need to. I do agree that looking for a new opportunity is like a full time job, but when you are already employed the necessity is not as great. I can take my time over months rather than try to treat it like a 9 - 5.
- ryandrake 9y ago
  That seems like an enormous risk. I've in the past spent upwards of 6+ months looking for work, and plenty more people have spent much longer. Given Bay Area expenses, if I quit my income, the first thing I'd have to do is temporarily move somewhere cheaper until I found something. Contrary to all the "shortage of engineers" stories, tech jobs do not, in fact, grow on trees.
- vthallam 9y ago
  Doesn't work when you are on a visa, unfortunately. But even if you could, I still think you wouldn't need to quit before you interview, best case may be a couple of weeks off for preparing.
- mattnewton 9y ago
  I think this is a crazy expectation. I last switched jobs while working at Apple last October. Having the BATNA of your current employment is crucial to the negotiation process and I can't imagine forgoing that- if you have no current income that's an insane bargaining handicap. Anyone with experience absolutely is not going to go for "quit your job, and maybe we'll give you a new one after a week, maybe it won't work out and you are boned"

ssivark 9y ago

> Meanwhile, the interviewee gets to do a single, focused project for a week, but effectively interviews with 25 companies! Isn't this basically what bootcamps are about? (at least from a job seeker's perspective) In practice, only those without jobs have the time to attend one... and if one isn't actively working in the field, then 2-3 weeks might be better than 1 week.

dexterdog 9y ago

So I pay for 1.6 hours of this candidate, but then if I want him I have to hope either nobody else wants him or that I am paying more than the others.

sqeaky 9y ago
Is that so different from normal interviews? At least this way you can't forget you are competing.