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As a candidate, be very careful asking interviewers ‘why’ the company does something in a particular way. ‘Why?’ Is an aggressive question. When you hit your

As a candidate, be very careful asking interviewers ‘why’ the company does something in a particular way. ‘Why?’ Is an aggressive question. When you hit your interviewer with a ‘why?’ Question, you put them on the defensive. They have to justify that their company isn’t dumb, that there are good reasons for doing it that way, that there even is a rational reason why - when they may not know the reasons, they personally might even disagree, and the fact is there may not be a good reason. And while you might think ‘I really want to know that sort of thing if I’m going to be working there’, the downside is that to get that answer, you have leave your interviewer with a bad taste in their mouth - ‘that candidate seemed to be judging us for how we picked our front-end stack, and I felt slightly embarrassed defending that we still use angular even though I personally have been fighting a running battle to move to a new stack for a year now’ And honestly, those are definitely not red flags right there. If your requirements for joining a tech org are that you expect them to have made all the same decisions you would have made if you were in their shoes, without error, then a) your bar might be a little high and b) what the hell do they need you for, they’ve already got a team that can do everything you could bring to the table.

Swizec 7y ago
Why questions are great because they show you think about things beyond just the surface code typist level. You can go one step further and engage in proper discussion and offer suggestions and things they can try to improve whatever situation they’re in that leads you to ask a Why question. Show that you bring solutions to the table, not just a pair of hands. And if you fear why is too aggressive, use “how come” instead. Always try to leave your interviewer feeling “Wow I really want that guy to come solve my problems” and “Fuck that was a good suggestion I wanna try that”
vageli 7y ago
> As a candidate, be very careful asking interviewers ‘why’ the company does something in a particular way. > ‘Why?’ Is an aggressive question. I agree that "why" can be interpreted negatively but there are definitely more disarming ways to probe. I personally would say (and have asked) something like, "Can you tell me more about the process or framework used to aid in decision making about technologies introduced in the organization and how it played out in your decision to use X?"
alxlaz 7y ago
> what the hell do they need you for, they’ve already got a team that can do everything you could bring to the table. If that's the case, then why are they conducting an interview in the first place? I guess an argument can be made that it's counterproductive to ask "aggressive" questions if you want to be hired. But then again, candidates will likely be asked "why" they did something dozens of times in a whiteboard interview. If someone can't take 10% of the pressure they expose their candidates to, maybe they shouldn't be doing interviews in the first place. As far as I'm concerned, I'm happy to answer any "why" question that I'm in a position to answer, and I always have, whenever a candidate has asked me one. I'm wary about taking the mere act of asking a question as a good sign (or a bad one) in the age of "Cracking to Coding Interview" and whatnot but it's the kind of question that leads to useful discussion. Sure, we weren't right about a lot of choices we made, and sometimes, in hindsight, they were flat out indefensible, and we had to deal with the consequences. That's part of software development everywhere. If they ask that because their bar is too high and they don't want to join a team that makes more than N wrong choices a year, fine, it's their bar, they get to set it wherever they like. If they ask that just because they think questioning accepted practice is a good idea, that's actually great. Lots of companies end up making one bad mistake after another just because no one stops to ask why. And lots of narcissistic team leads and managers don't want that kind of attitude on their teams -- if that leads to not being hired, that's a bullet dodged, not a wasted opportunity. On the other hand a question like this is a great opportunity to show them that we're good at both leveraging our assets and at owning up to our mistakes. That's definitely a quality I'd be looking for in a prospective team. Edit: oh yeah, maybe some more general context is appropriate here. One thing that took me a while to learn is that not every interview you don't ace is a failure. I don't mean that in some personal development hoodoo way, like the way to success is riddled with failures or whatever. I mean, literally, that there are interviews which you don't ace, and that's a good thing, because if you'd aced it, you would have hated working there, or it would have been really bad for your career, or both. It's one thing if you don't get hired because you lack the knowledge and skills -- okay, you can work on that and try again later. But if you get passed because you asked the wrong question (and that question wasn't offensive or anything, obviously), or because you did not know that specific thing that a lead dev is really proud about knowing, that's a blessing in disguise.
davidhyde 7y ago
Totally agree. The author did not even approach the possibility that their questions would count against them in an interview. You have to tread very carefully with these kinds of questions. It can be a great opportunity to share mutual pain point experiences with the interviewer which enhances your perceived experience. You don’t want to come off as the guy whose going to rock the boat never having been in it in the first place. At most, I want to gauge the potential for change rather than the tech stack status quo.
wongarsu 7y ago
If that interviewer really is fighting to move away from a bad technology choice, your question should have positioned you as a potential ally in that fight. If asking reasonable questions (while showing understanding) makes people defensive and leaves a bad taste then that's definitely a red flag.
codingdave 7y ago
I hear your concerns - and you are correct that phrasing of such questions can set the tone of the conversation. But I don't want to work in an organization that cannot have hard conversations about how they got to their status quo. If probing into their history is painful enough to them that it turns me off as a candidate, I'm fine with that. The best teams I've worked with had zero problems answering "Why", no matter if the answers were great or, "Yeah, that choice didn't turn out so well, and we need to improve." The worst teams I've been on were ones with defensive leadership. I do agree with you 100% that answers that don't match personal preferences aren't red flags - everyone can learn from each other and expand their perspectives by working on new things with new people. Even so, a tech leader who freaks out over being questioned is a red flag.
- jameshart 7y ago
  I didn’t say asking a ‘why’ question will freak people out. I’m just saying it is a suboptimal way of getting the information you want because it will affect the person you ask in an emotional way.

Swizec 7y ago

Why questions are great because they show you think about things beyond just the surface code typist level. You can go one step further and engage in proper discussion and offer suggestions and things they can try to improve whatever situation they’re in that leads you to ask a Why question. Show that you bring solutions to the table, not just a pair of hands. And if you fear why is too aggressive, use “how come” instead. Always try to leave your interviewer feeling “Wow I really want that guy to come solve my problems” and “Fuck that was a good suggestion I wanna try that”

vageli 7y ago

> As a candidate, be very careful asking interviewers ‘why’ the company does something in a particular way. > ‘Why?’ Is an aggressive question. I agree that "why" can be interpreted negatively but there are definitely more disarming ways to probe. I personally would say (and have asked) something like, "Can you tell me more about the process or framework used to aid in decision making about technologies introduced in the organization and how it played out in your decision to use X?"

alxlaz 7y ago

> what the hell do they need you for, they’ve already got a team that can do everything you could bring to the table. If that's the case, then why are they conducting an interview in the first place? I guess an argument can be made that it's counterproductive to ask "aggressive" questions if you want to be hired. But then again, candidates will likely be asked "why" they did something dozens of times in a whiteboard interview. If someone can't take 10% of the pressure they expose their candidates to, maybe they shouldn't be doing interviews in the first place. As far as I'm concerned, I'm happy to answer any "why" question that I'm in a position to answer, and I always have, whenever a candidate has asked me one. I'm wary about taking the mere act of asking a question as a good sign (or a bad one) in the age of "Cracking to Coding Interview" and whatnot but it's the kind of question that leads to useful discussion. Sure, we weren't right about a lot of choices we made, and sometimes, in hindsight, they were flat out indefensible, and we had to deal with the consequences. That's part of software development everywhere. If they ask that because their bar is too high and they don't want to join a team that makes more than N wrong choices a year, fine, it's their bar, they get to set it wherever they like. If they ask that just because they think questioning accepted practice is a good idea, that's actually great. Lots of companies end up making one bad mistake after another just because no one stops to ask why. And lots of narcissistic team leads and managers don't want that kind of attitude on their teams -- if that leads to not being hired, that's a bullet dodged, not a wasted opportunity. On the other hand a question like this is a great opportunity to show them that we're good at both leveraging our assets and at owning up to our mistakes. That's definitely a quality I'd be looking for in a prospective team. Edit: oh yeah, maybe some more general context is appropriate here. One thing that took me a while to learn is that not every interview you don't ace is a failure. I don't mean that in some personal development hoodoo way, like the way to success is riddled with failures or whatever. I mean, literally, that there are interviews which you don't ace, and that's a good thing, because if you'd aced it, you would have hated working there, or it would have been really bad for your career, or both. It's one thing if you don't get hired because you lack the knowledge and skills -- okay, you can work on that and try again later. But if you get passed because you asked the wrong question (and that question wasn't offensive or anything, obviously), or because you did not know that specific thing that a lead dev is really proud about knowing, that's a blessing in disguise.

davidhyde 7y ago

Totally agree. The author did not even approach the possibility that their questions would count against them in an interview. You have to tread very carefully with these kinds of questions. It can be a great opportunity to share mutual pain point experiences with the interviewer which enhances your perceived experience. You don’t want to come off as the guy whose going to rock the boat never having been in it in the first place. At most, I want to gauge the potential for change rather than the tech stack status quo.

wongarsu 7y ago

If that interviewer really is fighting to move away from a bad technology choice, your question should have positioned you as a potential ally in that fight. If asking reasonable questions (while showing understanding) makes people defensive and leaves a bad taste then that's definitely a red flag.

codingdave 7y ago

I hear your concerns - and you are correct that phrasing of such questions can set the tone of the conversation. But I don't want to work in an organization that cannot have hard conversations about how they got to their status quo. If probing into their history is painful enough to them that it turns me off as a candidate, I'm fine with that. The best teams I've worked with had zero problems answering "Why", no matter if the answers were great or, "Yeah, that choice didn't turn out so well, and we need to improve." The worst teams I've been on were ones with defensive leadership. I do agree with you 100% that answers that don't match personal preferences aren't red flags - everyone can learn from each other and expand their perspectives by working on new things with new people. Even so, a tech leader who freaks out over being questioned is a red flag.

jameshart 7y ago
I didn’t say asking a ‘why’ question will freak people out. I’m just saying it is a suboptimal way of getting the information you want because it will affect the person you ask in an emotional way.