3 ms·
The exact problem is most people that have been in the industry for a while know these type of tests do not reflect the diversity of skills people have in the i
by kls 7y ago
The exact problem is most people that have been in the industry for a while know these type of tests do not reflect the diversity of skills people have in the industry and the chances that the test questions are going to reflect stuff you do every day is marginal at best. In the end we know up front they are a waste of time.
Further they never, build these "test" platforms to reflect how we actually do development. I took one of these tests about a month ago just for shits and giggles and I hit the first questions and they where along the lines of what does this code do. My first reaction was, hmm I don't know where is my compiler and debugger that I can set breakpoints, because if I come upon code I have never seen that is literally the first thing I do, step thru it and break it down piece by piece so I can logically map it in my mind. Now granted they where small snippets of code, but the point is, that's not the way I analyze code, I never just look at code and map it out in my mind, I step thru it, add comments and build mentally digestible maps of code. Further just to make sure this test in no way reflects anything near reality the test is timed and counts down on you, no one has ever counted down on my while I am developing like a bomb is going to explode.
And that's the point none of these interview test comes close to reflecting how developers actually do development. probably the closest I came to one that did was for a contracting group who sent me a React project with a single bug, it was completely set up, you just fired it up, started stepping thru it and fixed the bug, you then checked it in, and resolved the ticket assigned to you. It took about 5 minutes, it was literally just a sniff test to see if you could run a project, find and fix a bug. It was the first one I have seen where I thought well that was a well designed test to just see if you pass the sniff test.
- inimino 7y agoIncidentally, there is no one true way we do development. For example, I never use a debugger, and if someone asked me to work in the way you do I would be at a loss. This is why any "one size fits all" process is always going to fail for someone. Do you want to work on a team where everyone has exactly the same strengths and weaknesses, or would you rather have coworkers with skillsets that differ from your own?