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>The technical interviewing scheme is not great, but I haven't seen another system that works. I would argue that pair programming or take home projects do a f

>The technical interviewing scheme is not great, but I haven't seen another system that works. I would argue that pair programming or take home projects do a far better job than the standard Whiteboard Algo interviews. In fact I don't think it's even close but SV engineers have been captured by this Whiteboard Interview Stockholm Syndrome/Hazing and continue to perpetuate the insane idea that there is no better way.

mav3rick 8y ago
Many people on HN also complain about "I don't have time for pair programming, take home". They don't like interviews. People just expect to be paid top dollar on their word.
- idontpost 8y ago
  > People just expect to be paid top dollar on their word. And their education, previous employment, etc. No one makes a neuro-surgeon perform a surgery before hiring them.
  - jedberg 8y ago
    > No one makes a neuro-surgeon perform a surgery before hiring them. True, but I also know that a neurosurgeon graduated from an accredited school, did an internship at an accredited hospital, and then passed a standardized licensing exam. If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. When I was doing hiring, I would see resumes of people with 10+ years of experience who couldn't write a simple loop in their favorite language. If you've been coding for 10 years, you should be able to write a simple loop. That's the problem we're solving for here.
    - idontpost 8y ago
      > If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. I think we will, eventually. Other fields of engineering already do, of course. Software is new and not that many people have been killed by bad software (unlike bad buildings), but I think we'll get there.
    - xur17 8y ago
      > If you've been coding for 10 years, you should be able to write a simple loop. That's the problem we're solving for here. That's the problem some interviews solve for. FAANG interviews take it to another level.
      - hello_moto 8y ago
        When everybody can solve a simple loop, a base bar, then the bar has to be raised. The bar is being raised all the time as much as it is painful and hard for me to see/experience this :(.
    - vonmoltke 8y ago
      > If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. We have that for "real" engineers. Doesn't stop many of them from being atrocious at their job. Doesn't stop doctors either, for that matter.
    - fma 8y ago
      An engineer that did 4 years of college at an accredited engineering school isn't enough? What you are asking for, is a surgeon to retake the boards every time they change hospitals. Or a licensed professional engineer to retake the PE exam everytime they change jobs. The algorithms asked in interviews are rarely implemented in a job. All they prove is how much you studied and the author of the article proves that. What our industry is missing, IMHO is required certification and training. Doctors and nurses have yearly training and related exams to keep their certification. That's why a hospital can hire staff based on a license...Not becsuse the items you mentioned. But our industry would never go that route, which is a longer rant. Also if peope who can't write for loops are passing your phone screen... You might want to update your phone screen.
      - anticensor 8y ago
        > Or a licensed professional engineer to retake the PE exam everytime they change jobs. Yes, just as you retake your driving exams every five years, you should retake your engineering exams (unless you are an accredited engineering instructor, in which case the license becomes permanent) every ten years.
        vonmoltke 8y ago
        > just as you retake your driving exams every five years Uhh... I haven't taken a driving test in 17 years (and two states ago, to boot).
    - dragonwriter 8y ago
      > True, but I also know that a neurosurgeon graduated from an accredited school, did an internship at an accredited hospital, and then passed a standardized licensing exam. ...and meets ongoing continuing education requirements. > If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. We do have that for professional engineers. We don't have it for people working in software whose job titles have become (but largely weren't for similar roles a few decades ago) "engineer".
      - deleted 8y ago
        [deleted]
      - vonmoltke 8y ago
        > ...and meets ongoing continuing education requirements. Which are a joke. Attending conferences and weekend workshops take care of this.
        dragonwriter 8y ago
        > Which are a joke Sure, professional licensing provides fairly weak guarantees, but it's more than exist in software, hence FizzBuzz.
    - nvarsj 8y ago
      > When I was doing hiring, I would see resumes of people with 10+ years of experience who couldn't write a simple loop in their favorite language. If you've been coding for 10 years, you should be able to write a simple loop. That's the problem we're solving for here. While I agree with this, the FAANG interviews take it too far. Simple fizzbuzz is enough to weed out these completely incompetent engineers. If they pass that, accomplishments and experience are going to be a much better indicator of engineering ability imo.
  - saagarjha 8y ago
    > And their education, previous employment, etc. Unfortunately, this seems to be poorly correlated with whether people can actually code.
  - monort 8y ago
    Actually it seems like motor skills are a part of neuro-surgeon evaluation - https://www.bmj.com/content/355/bmj.i5976 https://www.bmj.com/content/355/bmj.i5976 There is also an experimental virtual surgery simulator for objective evaluation - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26153114 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26153114
- vonmoltke 8y ago
  > Many people on HN also complain about "I don't have time for pair programming How does one not have time for pair programming? It's the exact same time commitment, from both the interviewer and interviewee, as a whiteboarding session. It's just a different format for the interview.
- yowlingcat 8y ago
  This is probably the only part I'll give you as far as your comments on this thread, but even this is inane and you're projecting. First of all, the problems with take home tests are the time commitment, which I can understand with the caveat that you do a lengthy pair programming exercise in person. I haven't heard that many complaints about pair programming, but I'm sure I exist so I'll give you that. I don't think it's the case that people don't like interviews. I think you're making a strawman. I'm not going to go and say that you're part of the cycle of SV engineer being hazed, reproducing it and exhibiting a sunken cost fallacy/bias towards the way you've done it, but it's possible. I don't think this is the ideal way to interview. What's more, I've been seeing actual improvement on the state of the art in this area. Platforms like Karat et al (not sure if Karat is the best in this area but I did have a good experience with a company that used them and interviewed me well) are actually incentivized to minimize false positives and negatives rather than just one. You might be surprised at how much better a good technical interviewer can be than an average strong engineer.
  - mav3rick 8y ago
    Please provide a rebuttal on the comments individually if you care to disagree. This comment was just alluding that any technique is ever good enough for HN. People just want word of mouth and their resumes to be enough. That doesn't work when resumes lie.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
jogjayr 8y ago
> I would argue that pair programming Google allows you to write code on a Chromebook instead of a whiteboard (don't know if it's for everyone or some people). Is that pair programming? Or do you mean actually working with your preferred IDE/text editor, terminal, browser to look stuff up?
- donaldknuth123 8y ago
  Pair programming is what it sounds like, two people coding a solution to a problem with each other and no artificial restrictions. In interviews I've seen it used in the interviewer is typically "driving" the IDE and the interviewee is dictating the logic.

mav3rick 8y ago

Many people on HN also complain about "I don't have time for pair programming, take home". They don't like interviews. People just expect to be paid top dollar on their word.

idontpost 8y ago
> People just expect to be paid top dollar on their word. And their education, previous employment, etc. No one makes a neuro-surgeon perform a surgery before hiring them.
- jedberg 8y ago
  > No one makes a neuro-surgeon perform a surgery before hiring them. True, but I also know that a neurosurgeon graduated from an accredited school, did an internship at an accredited hospital, and then passed a standardized licensing exam. If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. When I was doing hiring, I would see resumes of people with 10+ years of experience who couldn't write a simple loop in their favorite language. If you've been coding for 10 years, you should be able to write a simple loop. That's the problem we're solving for here.
  - idontpost 8y ago
    > If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. I think we will, eventually. Other fields of engineering already do, of course. Software is new and not that many people have been killed by bad software (unlike bad buildings), but I think we'll get there.
  - xur17 8y ago
    > If you've been coding for 10 years, you should be able to write a simple loop. That's the problem we're solving for here. That's the problem some interviews solve for. FAANG interviews take it to another level.
    - hello_moto 8y ago
      When everybody can solve a simple loop, a base bar, then the bar has to be raised. The bar is being raised all the time as much as it is painful and hard for me to see/experience this :(.
  - vonmoltke 8y ago
    > If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. We have that for "real" engineers. Doesn't stop many of them from being atrocious at their job. Doesn't stop doctors either, for that matter.
  - fma 8y ago
    An engineer that did 4 years of college at an accredited engineering school isn't enough? What you are asking for, is a surgeon to retake the boards every time they change hospitals. Or a licensed professional engineer to retake the PE exam everytime they change jobs. The algorithms asked in interviews are rarely implemented in a job. All they prove is how much you studied and the author of the article proves that. What our industry is missing, IMHO is required certification and training. Doctors and nurses have yearly training and related exams to keep their certification. That's why a hospital can hire staff based on a license...Not becsuse the items you mentioned. But our industry would never go that route, which is a longer rant. Also if peope who can't write for loops are passing your phone screen... You might want to update your phone screen.
    - anticensor 8y ago
      > Or a licensed professional engineer to retake the PE exam everytime they change jobs. Yes, just as you retake your driving exams every five years, you should retake your engineering exams (unless you are an accredited engineering instructor, in which case the license becomes permanent) every ten years.
      - vonmoltke 8y ago
        > just as you retake your driving exams every five years Uhh... I haven't taken a driving test in 17 years (and two states ago, to boot).
  - dragonwriter 8y ago
    > True, but I also know that a neurosurgeon graduated from an accredited school, did an internship at an accredited hospital, and then passed a standardized licensing exam. ...and meets ongoing continuing education requirements. > If we had that for engineers we wouldn't need to test their skills either. We do have that for professional engineers. We don't have it for people working in software whose job titles have become (but largely weren't for similar roles a few decades ago) "engineer".
    - deleted 8y ago
      [deleted]
    - vonmoltke 8y ago
      > ...and meets ongoing continuing education requirements. Which are a joke. Attending conferences and weekend workshops take care of this.
      - dragonwriter 8y ago
        > Which are a joke Sure, professional licensing provides fairly weak guarantees, but it's more than exist in software, hence FizzBuzz.
  - nvarsj 8y ago
    > When I was doing hiring, I would see resumes of people with 10+ years of experience who couldn't write a simple loop in their favorite language. If you've been coding for 10 years, you should be able to write a simple loop. That's the problem we're solving for here. While I agree with this, the FAANG interviews take it too far. Simple fizzbuzz is enough to weed out these completely incompetent engineers. If they pass that, accomplishments and experience are going to be a much better indicator of engineering ability imo.
- saagarjha 8y ago
  > And their education, previous employment, etc. Unfortunately, this seems to be poorly correlated with whether people can actually code.
- monort 8y ago
  Actually it seems like motor skills are a part of neuro-surgeon evaluation - https://www.bmj.com/content/355/bmj.i5976 https://www.bmj.com/content/355/bmj.i5976 There is also an experimental virtual surgery simulator for objective evaluation - https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26153114 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26153114
vonmoltke 8y ago
> Many people on HN also complain about "I don't have time for pair programming How does one not have time for pair programming? It's the exact same time commitment, from both the interviewer and interviewee, as a whiteboarding session. It's just a different format for the interview.
yowlingcat 8y ago
This is probably the only part I'll give you as far as your comments on this thread, but even this is inane and you're projecting. First of all, the problems with take home tests are the time commitment, which I can understand with the caveat that you do a lengthy pair programming exercise in person. I haven't heard that many complaints about pair programming, but I'm sure I exist so I'll give you that. I don't think it's the case that people don't like interviews. I think you're making a strawman. I'm not going to go and say that you're part of the cycle of SV engineer being hazed, reproducing it and exhibiting a sunken cost fallacy/bias towards the way you've done it, but it's possible. I don't think this is the ideal way to interview. What's more, I've been seeing actual improvement on the state of the art in this area. Platforms like Karat et al (not sure if Karat is the best in this area but I did have a good experience with a company that used them and interviewed me well) are actually incentivized to minimize false positives and negatives rather than just one. You might be surprised at how much better a good technical interviewer can be than an average strong engineer.
- mav3rick 8y ago
  Please provide a rebuttal on the comments individually if you care to disagree. This comment was just alluding that any technique is ever good enough for HN. People just want word of mouth and their resumes to be enough. That doesn't work when resumes lie.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

jogjayr 8y ago

> I would argue that pair programming Google allows you to write code on a Chromebook instead of a whiteboard (don't know if it's for everyone or some people). Is that pair programming? Or do you mean actually working with your preferred IDE/text editor, terminal, browser to look stuff up?

donaldknuth123 8y ago
Pair programming is what it sounds like, two people coding a solution to a problem with each other and no artificial restrictions. In interviews I've seen it used in the interviewer is typically "driving" the IDE and the interviewee is dictating the logic.