6 ms·

I've been doing more giving than taking of interviews in the last years and think almost all the problems are on the interviewer side, but yeah, it's useful to

by Jach 7y ago

I've been doing more giving than taking of interviews in the last years and think almost all the problems are on the interviewer side, but yeah, it's useful to speak to the candidate faced with this. My own perspective is somewhat different, and is really meant for these context-light scenarios, real scenarios will have a lot more context that will help both sides of the table do better at accomplishing their respective purposes. Anyway given that mind reading is impossible, and that you want the job, what to do? The answer is.. you have to guess based on the context you do have available. There's not really a good general solution here, and you might guess in a way that really screws you up. It's easy for the interviewer to tell if the candidate is attempting a "just feed me what I want to hear" strategy, if the candidate has guessed wrong about what I actually want to hear, and now the candidate appears deceitful, a double-whammy. If they have guessed right, though, it's much harder for the interviewer to pick up on it -- which is why for hiring programmers at least it's common (even if rife with its own pitfalls) to do more objective things like asking for a demonstration of basic coding capabilities, because sometimes some people who must really want the job and have Masters degrees and can talk somebody's ear off in a confident enough way to get this far still somehow can't seem to program when asked, the primary activity we need them to do. Life's not about maximizing the chances of getting a particular job, though. I like ethical policies of being maximally honest, even if you shoot yourself in the foot by revealing you're a bit crazy about homoiconicity or whatever... And generally speaking it's not a terrible guess to assume the interviewer just wants an honest answer primarily even if secondarily the content of the answer isn't what they were hoping for. It's also easy to execute on that guess, since it's usually easy to come off as honest if you're being honest. If the interviewer asks a question that does seem job related (like this accessibility example), honesty is also helpful in that even if your honest answer differs from the interviewer's expected answer, and you don't get hired like you wanted, you might have dodged a bullet by at least surfacing that the difference in opinion or expectations was apparently a big deal there before actually taking the job. Wasteful interviews are wasteful, but it's even more wasteful to take a job, start going through onboarding, and only then you and/or the employer beginning to realize things probably won't work out. Though if the interviewer asks a loaded question, i.e. one which is well known to be a topic of contention in the industry, it's worth re-evaluating your guess and to respond accordingly. I wouldn't suggest ever outright lying, but the honest, direct answer might not be your friend and as with any adversarial conversation (interviews are not casual chats at a meetup with industry peers, even if they can sometimes feel structurally similar) giving too much information can be detrimental. Example, the interviewer might toss out "So, tabs or spaces?" Maybe you honestly believe spaces, and maybe you also honestly believe this is something worth flaming about and are ready to go at it if the interviewer dares claim for tabs. You might reveal the basic answer of "Spaces", I wouldn't advise revealing the latter information. Here's an opportunity to guess the intent though, maybe the interviewer just wants to see if you'll try to be funny about the answer rather than answer directly. Ideally the interviewer would guide the interview so that whatever their intention is will be clear. > "there are no right or wrong answers in this interview." It's good to tell the candidates something about what your expectations are, that's my whole point! Though I might rework this one a bit. Some personalities would be instantly alarmed by such a phrase... For myself, I'd ignore it and proceed as normal, though part of me would want to ask "So you've already decided on yes/no? Want to regain the hour?"

blankaccount 7y ago
> "Anyway given that mind reading is impossible, and that you want the job, what to do?" > "Example, the interviewer might toss out "So, tabs or spaces?" ...and maybe you also honestly believe this is something worth flaming about ... I wouldn't advise revealing the latter information. Here's an opportunity to guess the intent though." To me, this reads as "if you want the job then you [should/are entitled to] misrepresent yourself to bypass the filtering mechanism". If that's the case, then your whole reply reads as a complaint about how hard it is to cheat when anti-cheating tactics are in place. Am I misunderstanding?
- speedplane 7y ago
  >> the interviewer might toss out "So, tabs or spaces?" ... maybe you also honestly believe this is something worth flaming about ... I wouldn't advise revealing the latter information. > this reads as "if you want the job then you [should/are entitled to] misrepresent yourself to bypass the filtering mechanism". I don't think so... it's more like, if you have a deeply held viewpoint, can you effectively work with others who have different viewpoints? If you can strike a compromise or convince them to change, that's the best. If you can bury your differences, that's not ideal but at least workable. Given the spaces/tabs example, if you are sincerely passionate about using spaces instead of tabs, and you're able to convince a tab-user to switch to spaces without upsetting them, that's the best, demonstrating leadership. Almost as good, is if you can explain how much you like spaces but have happily worked together with tab users (tabbers?). Finally, if you say you like spaces but you're happy to keep silent about it (or if you don't mention it at all), that's not as good as the others, but probably fine too. Any company that values innovation should encourage differing viewpoints to be raised, but not to the point that it becomes a distraction and hinders overall productivity.
  - blankaccount 7y ago
    If one of your strongly held beliefs is "spaces over tabs" and you think that belief is information that has sway in the interview AND you take the advice to not reveal the information, then how are you not misrepresenting yourself? You're answering like a person who doesn't hold strong beliefs to a question designed to identify strong beliefs, knowing that you are a person who holds those strong beliefs. Is that not misrepresentation to bypass the filtering mechanism? We might be talking about slightly different things - if you have a strong belief then I agree you should try sell it, and doing so would demonstrate leadership qualities.

by Jach 7y ago

blankaccount 7y ago

> "Anyway given that mind reading is impossible, and that you want the job, what to do?" > "Example, the interviewer might toss out "So, tabs or spaces?" ...and maybe you also honestly believe this is something worth flaming about ... I wouldn't advise revealing the latter information. Here's an opportunity to guess the intent though." To me, this reads as "if you want the job then you [should/are entitled to] misrepresent yourself to bypass the filtering mechanism". If that's the case, then your whole reply reads as a complaint about how hard it is to cheat when anti-cheating tactics are in place. Am I misunderstanding?

speedplane 7y ago
>> the interviewer might toss out "So, tabs or spaces?" ... maybe you also honestly believe this is something worth flaming about ... I wouldn't advise revealing the latter information. > this reads as "if you want the job then you [should/are entitled to] misrepresent yourself to bypass the filtering mechanism". I don't think so... it's more like, if you have a deeply held viewpoint, can you effectively work with others who have different viewpoints? If you can strike a compromise or convince them to change, that's the best. If you can bury your differences, that's not ideal but at least workable. Given the spaces/tabs example, if you are sincerely passionate about using spaces instead of tabs, and you're able to convince a tab-user to switch to spaces without upsetting them, that's the best, demonstrating leadership. Almost as good, is if you can explain how much you like spaces but have happily worked together with tab users (tabbers?). Finally, if you say you like spaces but you're happy to keep silent about it (or if you don't mention it at all), that's not as good as the others, but probably fine too. Any company that values innovation should encourage differing viewpoints to be raised, but not to the point that it becomes a distraction and hinders overall productivity.
- blankaccount 7y ago
  If one of your strongly held beliefs is "spaces over tabs" and you think that belief is information that has sway in the interview AND you take the advice to not reveal the information, then how are you not misrepresenting yourself? You're answering like a person who doesn't hold strong beliefs to a question designed to identify strong beliefs, knowing that you are a person who holds those strong beliefs. Is that not misrepresentation to bypass the filtering mechanism? We might be talking about slightly different things - if you have a strong belief then I agree you should try sell it, and doing so would demonstrate leadership qualities.