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You wouldn't be a good fit for Google. With their algorithmic interviews that require college-grad level of studying, they filter for people that are ready to f

You wouldn't be a good fit for Google. With their algorithmic interviews that require college-grad level of studying, they filter for people that are ready to follow orders without complaining. That's who they want to hire at the end of the day: some coders that don't get too critical about their job and do what they are asked to do, even if it is repetitive, stupid and doesn't really make sense (such as re-studying algorithms implementation details for two weeks before an interview when it can be looked up super-easily online).

drblast 8y ago
I was a naval officer in a prior life, and my current manager loves that I get the job done, whatever it is, without complaint. I'm pretty much the opposite of what you think, so if my desire to study for the algorithm interview is your litmus test for that, kinda proves my point. Not everyone that would be good for Google has a burning desire to work for Google. Google might want to consider that.
- warp_factor 8y ago
  To make it clear, I absolutely hate coding interviews that makes candidate lose so much time restudying. I think having some critical-thinking is absolutely needed and way too many engineers lack some (especially those swallowed into FANGs) What I described on my previous post is a credible explanation that my group of engineer friends came up with on why all the FANG companies pursue those heavy memorization algorithmic interviews.
  - toasterlovin 8y ago
    To my mind, the more likely explanation is that they would simply get too many false positives if they didn't use the algorithm stuff to filter potential hires. You lose a lot of potentially good hires that way, but the pool you're left with are all of a certain intelligence level. Whereas, if you don't use the algorithm stuff to filter, it's really hard to figure out who is even intelligent enough to do the job.
    - vmasto 8y ago
      I'm not following, how does memorizing algorithms correlate with intelligence and skill in the engineering discipline of the job?
      - fucking_tragedy 8y ago
        There's a correlation between the belief that memorizing algorithms correlates with intelligence and the application of algorithm questions in interviews.
      - taurath 8y ago
        Not so much intelligence but applied diligence on top of intelligence is my sense. If you want what they’re offering and don’t want to jump through their hoops for it then they don’t want you. For those that ball at the hoop jumping as being beneath them, there’s probably additional characteristics that comes with that that they’re trying to filter out.
      - toasterlovin 8y ago
        Given that many job applicants apparently can't write a Fizz-Buzz implementation, I'd say that being able to implement an algorithm is probably a reasonable way to cull the herd by a hefty margin. https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/
        x3n0ph3n3 8y ago
        It's made me angry how many people I've interviewed who can't manage Fizz Buzz with only 2 conditions or at all.
        rhizome 8y ago
        I'm kind of angry that I've never been asked to do it.
        devocracy 8y ago
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - bitL 8y ago
    > my group of engineer friends came up with on why all the FANG companies pursue those heavy memorization algorithmic interviews I think the most likely explanation is that "elite" of CS grads usually do competitions like ACM ICPC and olympiads, which are full of problems like those watered-down interview questions. As there is no real authority on what makes a developer good, but there was a measurable outcome of those programming competitions, leading to high status and pride displayed by winners/participants, it was simply taken from there and dumbed down to fit into interviews. Some top colleges even have special prep courses for those competitions and comparing to them FANG interviews are super trivial.
stellarays 8y ago
I think the original point of these interviews was to see how much the candidate actually learned or retained out of university. What happened was that the interview questions inevitably got leaked and accumulated (this is the result of a post-highly-super-indexed and centralized internet) and it became a race to the bottom for candidates. Imho the test may have worked in year 1-4 of google but it no longer flies since college kids spend an eternity studying them at home. It’s like the SATs all over again for these kids. I still think these tests are generally good for testing how good somebody is. If you somehow got through cs without knowing how to 3 color a map vaguely (not talking perfect answer here, just vaguely correct intuitive explanation) even if after 15 years of work, something isn’t right. These sorts of questions definitely will weed out your local web-dev baddy or even dev-bootcamp baddy, which Silicon Valley is starting to be flooded with now.
ex_amazon_sde 8y ago
> With their algorithmic interviews that require college-grad level of studying, they filter for people that are ready to follow orders without complaining. Spot on. Certain companies ask silly question and to perform tedious exercises and, in the debrief, investigate if the candidate complained. (disclaimer: I worked for Amazon and never seen this pattern in the company)
oneepic 8y ago
[citation needed]
sfw1k 8y ago
some coders that don't get too critical about their job Couldn't be farther from the truth. As someone who works there I've noticed this general trend of animosity towards Google, it seems to be fueled by the fact that people feel a sort of inferiority complex when they don't clear an interview or they feel they wouldn't be able to crack it if they ever gave it a shot, this leads to an overcompensation of attitude in the other direction, a sort of "sour grapes" narrative where there is an effort to downplay the prospects of working at Google or ridicule the people working there like you did just now.
- scarface74 8y ago
  I have no idea whether I could study hard enough to work at Google. What I do know is that I don’t like large companies and I have no desire to move to the west coast.
  - mooreds 8y ago
    > What I do know is that I don’t like large companies I think this is a key thing to learn about oneself. Very large companies often have a lot of cachet and can provide opportunities that small companies cannot (scale is scale, after all). But small companies (not even start-ups, just companies with < 100 employees) can provide a different kind of opportunities: * Interaction with different parts of the business * Opportunity to wear multiple hats * Less likely to be in the Bay area * Nowhere to hide incompetence Of course this isn't every small company, but I have worked in a few that were like this.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      It is all of that and while after 20+ years developing professionally and developing as a hobbyist since middle school, I’ve never felt burnt out from continuously learning. But,I was burned out by big company politics and bureaucracy after only three when I was worked at a large Fortune 10 (non tech) company.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
Nitramp 8y ago
> they filter for people that are ready to follow orders without complaining. Well, if that was the goal, boy did we ever fail to deliver on that one ;-)
saiya-jin 8y ago
You just described practically any corporate job, ie in banking (which especially are tuned to 11 due to massive bureaucracy, over-processing and very high pyramidal management structures)

drblast 8y ago

I was a naval officer in a prior life, and my current manager loves that I get the job done, whatever it is, without complaint. I'm pretty much the opposite of what you think, so if my desire to study for the algorithm interview is your litmus test for that, kinda proves my point. Not everyone that would be good for Google has a burning desire to work for Google. Google might want to consider that.

warp_factor 8y ago
To make it clear, I absolutely hate coding interviews that makes candidate lose so much time restudying. I think having some critical-thinking is absolutely needed and way too many engineers lack some (especially those swallowed into FANGs) What I described on my previous post is a credible explanation that my group of engineer friends came up with on why all the FANG companies pursue those heavy memorization algorithmic interviews.
- toasterlovin 8y ago
  To my mind, the more likely explanation is that they would simply get too many false positives if they didn't use the algorithm stuff to filter potential hires. You lose a lot of potentially good hires that way, but the pool you're left with are all of a certain intelligence level. Whereas, if you don't use the algorithm stuff to filter, it's really hard to figure out who is even intelligent enough to do the job.
  - vmasto 8y ago
    I'm not following, how does memorizing algorithms correlate with intelligence and skill in the engineering discipline of the job?
    - fucking_tragedy 8y ago
      There's a correlation between the belief that memorizing algorithms correlates with intelligence and the application of algorithm questions in interviews.
    - taurath 8y ago
      Not so much intelligence but applied diligence on top of intelligence is my sense. If you want what they’re offering and don’t want to jump through their hoops for it then they don’t want you. For those that ball at the hoop jumping as being beneath them, there’s probably additional characteristics that comes with that that they’re trying to filter out.
    - toasterlovin 8y ago
      Given that many job applicants apparently can't write a Fizz-Buzz implementation, I'd say that being able to implement an algorithm is probably a reasonable way to cull the herd by a hefty margin. https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/ https://blog.codinghorror.com/why-cant-programmers-program/
      - x3n0ph3n3 8y ago
        It's made me angry how many people I've interviewed who can't manage Fizz Buzz with only 2 conditions or at all.
        rhizome 8y ago
        I'm kind of angry that I've never been asked to do it.
        devocracy 8y ago
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- bitL 8y ago
  > my group of engineer friends came up with on why all the FANG companies pursue those heavy memorization algorithmic interviews I think the most likely explanation is that "elite" of CS grads usually do competitions like ACM ICPC and olympiads, which are full of problems like those watered-down interview questions. As there is no real authority on what makes a developer good, but there was a measurable outcome of those programming competitions, leading to high status and pride displayed by winners/participants, it was simply taken from there and dumbed down to fit into interviews. Some top colleges even have special prep courses for those competitions and comparing to them FANG interviews are super trivial.

stellarays 8y ago

I think the original point of these interviews was to see how much the candidate actually learned or retained out of university. What happened was that the interview questions inevitably got leaked and accumulated (this is the result of a post-highly-super-indexed and centralized internet) and it became a race to the bottom for candidates. Imho the test may have worked in year 1-4 of google but it no longer flies since college kids spend an eternity studying them at home. It’s like the SATs all over again for these kids. I still think these tests are generally good for testing how good somebody is. If you somehow got through cs without knowing how to 3 color a map vaguely (not talking perfect answer here, just vaguely correct intuitive explanation) even if after 15 years of work, something isn’t right. These sorts of questions definitely will weed out your local web-dev baddy or even dev-bootcamp baddy, which Silicon Valley is starting to be flooded with now.

ex_amazon_sde 8y ago

> With their algorithmic interviews that require college-grad level of studying, they filter for people that are ready to follow orders without complaining. Spot on. Certain companies ask silly question and to perform tedious exercises and, in the debrief, investigate if the candidate complained. (disclaimer: I worked for Amazon and never seen this pattern in the company)

oneepic 8y ago

[citation needed]

sfw1k 8y ago

some coders that don't get too critical about their job Couldn't be farther from the truth. As someone who works there I've noticed this general trend of animosity towards Google, it seems to be fueled by the fact that people feel a sort of inferiority complex when they don't clear an interview or they feel they wouldn't be able to crack it if they ever gave it a shot, this leads to an overcompensation of attitude in the other direction, a sort of "sour grapes" narrative where there is an effort to downplay the prospects of working at Google or ridicule the people working there like you did just now.

scarface74 8y ago
I have no idea whether I could study hard enough to work at Google. What I do know is that I don’t like large companies and I have no desire to move to the west coast.
- mooreds 8y ago
  > What I do know is that I don’t like large companies I think this is a key thing to learn about oneself. Very large companies often have a lot of cachet and can provide opportunities that small companies cannot (scale is scale, after all). But small companies (not even start-ups, just companies with < 100 employees) can provide a different kind of opportunities: * Interaction with different parts of the business * Opportunity to wear multiple hats * Less likely to be in the Bay area * Nowhere to hide incompetence Of course this isn't every small company, but I have worked in a few that were like this.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    It is all of that and while after 20+ years developing professionally and developing as a hobbyist since middle school, I’ve never felt burnt out from continuously learning. But,I was burned out by big company politics and bureaucracy after only three when I was worked at a large Fortune 10 (non tech) company.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]

Nitramp 8y ago

> they filter for people that are ready to follow orders without complaining. Well, if that was the goal, boy did we ever fail to deliver on that one ;-)

saiya-jin 8y ago

You just described practically any corporate job, ie in banking (which especially are tuned to 11 due to massive bureaucracy, over-processing and very high pyramidal management structures)