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Explain a Topic At Multiple Levels - This is an excellent question. Communication is an underrated skill in most tech teams. They just complain that others "don

Explain a Topic At Multiple Levels - This is an excellent question. Communication is an underrated skill in most tech teams. They just complain that others "don't get it." The ability to understand others' points of view and interests and communicate with those in mind is important. Tell Me About a Project You Led - This is another good one. A good related question would be, "What leaders have you had in the past that you admired?" Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion - I don't like it. I support all three, even without the business bonuses. However, the jargon in that community is vast and quickly changing. There's also potential for unintentional landmines. Worse, no sane person on Earth today is going to walk into an interview and tell you they hate those things. Tell Me About a Disagreement - This is another good one. Conflict is present anywhere two or more people do anything. Conflict resolution is a big part of the workplace and how well you do in it. For leaders, you should also add followups on how they help mediate conflict. The Weakness Question - This question is famously poor. In a frictionless vacuum where no one is swayed by concretions, it seems like an excellent question. Everyone has weaknesses that they have to work on. It is the central mechanism of improvement. In practice, you are going to pull in unconscious biases that shouldn't but will effect your decision. Worse, you will lose strong candidates that will see you even asking this question as a red flag. I strongly recommend never asking any version of this question in an interview.

cobraetor 6y ago
Why would talking about DEI have potential for unintentional landmines?
- Smaug123 6y ago
  Well, for example, I got a twinge of nerves on reading the following "red flag": > Only focuses on a single group (e.g. women) to the exclusion of other forms of diversity That is, if you make the mistake of going in too much depth on one particular aspect, then this is a red flag. I could easily imagine myself doing this simply because I have a tendency to answer interview questions depth-first rather than breadth-first. I was also a bit terrified of "when I ask this question of an underrepresented candidate…". Some forms of group identity are outwardly visible; some are not. The author notes how sensitive this subject is, and then also predicates a fifth of the "discussion" section on the assumption that they can reliably make this judgement. And on this "red flag": > Indicates distrust of workplace inclusivity measures like codes of conduct, anti-harassment training, etc. There was a good while when I distrusted all corporate training, simply because the only forms of active corporate training I had been exposed to were these box-checking legal cover-your-arse arrangements. If you've only experienced that kind of training, then of course you have a generalised distrust of it. If you give me a list of criteria on which you are judging me, I will certainly be able to find ways in which I violate those criteria, no matter what the criteria are. (It's exactly the same problem as odd-one-out questions: there's always a way to make something the odd one out, so there's no right answer.) Hence the landmines: you can't know in advance which of those violations are actually meaningful to the interviewer.
frongpik 6y ago
DEI questions is a good way to select people that can lie with a straight face. Not disclosing your cards is a valuable skill for managers and to some line employees. Weak candidates bluntly speak their mind and tell more than you ask for. Average candidates conceal their true podition in a cringy way. Strong candidates can smooth talk on the plain speech level and crack impolite jokes in such a way that only few would understand.
- siquick 6y ago
  No wonder so many workplaces are full of politickers and toxicity if these are the kind of signals that are being looked for in interviews.
- Centigonal 6y ago
  Didn't know Robert Mercer browsed HN
- diebeforei485 6y ago
  Agreed; people should learn to play the game.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- wytemail 6y ago
  > Average candidates conceal their true podition in a cringy way. Ironic
- lr4444lr 6y ago
  I agree with you on the weaker / avg. responses this question, but you have no way of distinguishing a polished BSer you want from the sincere fanatic on these topics who will be absolutely toxic to your org.
- treis 6y ago
  Isn't that what all of these "Tell me about a time when..." questions select for? They're just a filter for people that can come up with a convincing lie on the spot. Or those that have prepared a set of lies for questions that the interviewer asked. For example on the disagreement question they have this as a red flag: >Resolution through avoidance Sorry, but this is how the world works. Maybe there's some idyllic companies out there full of reasonable people working through disagreements, but it's definitely not most. Most of them will punish you for openly disagreeing with them. Avoidance is an appropriate strategy in that situation.
LordHumungous 6y ago
"Tell me about an experience mentoring someone." would probably get better responses. Ask about DEI directly and people will just recite the woke handbook, whether they believe it or not.
ochronus 6y ago
I wholeheartedly agree! The DEI question is especially tricky - the topic itself, of course, but more about the way the question is asked. Similarly to the 'weakness' question, the biggest issue is that it's not situational. You can learn about the candidate's level of candor in different ways. Self-awareness and growth mindset are NOT tested with this question... I usually ask separate questions for those, and self-awareness itself is pretty obvious from other situational questions or follow-up discussions for those. E.g. for learning: "Let's talk about learning. What's the last new thing you've learnt? Why that and not something else? How to you choose what to learn next? What's your method of learning, what works best for you?" About communication: hell yeah it's underrated and when you hire bad communicators and don't coach them you won't know what hit you and your team. I'm writing a lot about this and tangential topics: https://ochronus.online/communication-for-software-engineers/ https://ochronus.online/communication-for-software-engineers... https://ochronus.online/active-listening-boosts-careers/ https://ochronus.online/active-listening-boosts-careers/ https://ochronus.online/how-to-stop-winning-arguments/ https://ochronus.online/how-to-stop-winning-arguments/ (sorry for the link-fest, but I do think these are interesting for this thread)
jdmichal 6y ago
> Worse, no sane person on Earth today is going to walk into an interview and tell you they hate those things. Same with any question having to do with testing. Sure, everyone tests! Why would I ever write code without tests! First day on the job: Do I really have to write a test for this?!
908B64B197 6y ago
> Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion - I don't like it. I support all three, even without the business bonuses. However, the jargon in that community is vast and quickly changing. There's also potential for unintentional landmines. Worse, no sane person on Earth today is going to walk into an interview and tell you they hate those things. It's not necessary about "target demographics". A non-"diverse" team (depending on your definition of "diverse") can still be extremely inclusive. Just look at how well they onboard new hires. The Weakness Question is a hard one because it'll be interpreted very differently in different cultures. Some will happily give you a list of areas they want to improve while others will consider answering the question an admission of failure (losing face).
dawg- 6y ago
On DEI - the purpose is exactly that. You want to see how well someone can navigate the landmines. Any thoughtful person probably: 1. Agrees in principle that DEI is important, and that cultural, racial, ethnic, linguistic, economic diversity makes organizations/communities/people better and 2. has some criticism or concerns about how DEI is typically implemented in practice. It takes a lot of tact to express #2 in a way that it won't get you or your company canceled. Especially in a tech company, with all the moral scrutiny the industry has come under lately, the private opinion of one employee can become a very public and embarrassing matter. For that reason, I think asking a DEI question in an interview is more to see "is this person going to be a liability for us or do they know how to talk about difficult topics without pissing anybody off?"

cobraetor 6y ago

Why would talking about DEI have potential for unintentional landmines?

Smaug123 6y ago
Well, for example, I got a twinge of nerves on reading the following "red flag": > Only focuses on a single group (e.g. women) to the exclusion of other forms of diversity That is, if you make the mistake of going in too much depth on one particular aspect, then this is a red flag. I could easily imagine myself doing this simply because I have a tendency to answer interview questions depth-first rather than breadth-first. I was also a bit terrified of "when I ask this question of an underrepresented candidate…". Some forms of group identity are outwardly visible; some are not. The author notes how sensitive this subject is, and then also predicates a fifth of the "discussion" section on the assumption that they can reliably make this judgement. And on this "red flag": > Indicates distrust of workplace inclusivity measures like codes of conduct, anti-harassment training, etc. There was a good while when I distrusted all corporate training, simply because the only forms of active corporate training I had been exposed to were these box-checking legal cover-your-arse arrangements. If you've only experienced that kind of training, then of course you have a generalised distrust of it. If you give me a list of criteria on which you are judging me, I will certainly be able to find ways in which I violate those criteria, no matter what the criteria are. (It's exactly the same problem as odd-one-out questions: there's always a way to make something the odd one out, so there's no right answer.) Hence the landmines: you can't know in advance which of those violations are actually meaningful to the interviewer.

frongpik 6y ago

DEI questions is a good way to select people that can lie with a straight face. Not disclosing your cards is a valuable skill for managers and to some line employees. Weak candidates bluntly speak their mind and tell more than you ask for. Average candidates conceal their true podition in a cringy way. Strong candidates can smooth talk on the plain speech level and crack impolite jokes in such a way that only few would understand.

siquick 6y ago
No wonder so many workplaces are full of politickers and toxicity if these are the kind of signals that are being looked for in interviews.
Centigonal 6y ago
Didn't know Robert Mercer browsed HN
diebeforei485 6y ago
Agreed; people should learn to play the game.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
wytemail 6y ago
> Average candidates conceal their true podition in a cringy way. Ironic
lr4444lr 6y ago
I agree with you on the weaker / avg. responses this question, but you have no way of distinguishing a polished BSer you want from the sincere fanatic on these topics who will be absolutely toxic to your org.
treis 6y ago
Isn't that what all of these "Tell me about a time when..." questions select for? They're just a filter for people that can come up with a convincing lie on the spot. Or those that have prepared a set of lies for questions that the interviewer asked. For example on the disagreement question they have this as a red flag: >Resolution through avoidance Sorry, but this is how the world works. Maybe there's some idyllic companies out there full of reasonable people working through disagreements, but it's definitely not most. Most of them will punish you for openly disagreeing with them. Avoidance is an appropriate strategy in that situation.

LordHumungous 6y ago

"Tell me about an experience mentoring someone." would probably get better responses. Ask about DEI directly and people will just recite the woke handbook, whether they believe it or not.

ochronus 6y ago

I wholeheartedly agree! The DEI question is especially tricky - the topic itself, of course, but more about the way the question is asked. Similarly to the 'weakness' question, the biggest issue is that it's not situational. You can learn about the candidate's level of candor in different ways. Self-awareness and growth mindset are NOT tested with this question... I usually ask separate questions for those, and self-awareness itself is pretty obvious from other situational questions or follow-up discussions for those. E.g. for learning: "Let's talk about learning. What's the last new thing you've learnt? Why that and not something else? How to you choose what to learn next? What's your method of learning, what works best for you?" About communication: hell yeah it's underrated and when you hire bad communicators and don't coach them you won't know what hit you and your team. I'm writing a lot about this and tangential topics: https://ochronus.online/communication-for-software-engineers/ https://ochronus.online/communication-for-software-engineers... https://ochronus.online/active-listening-boosts-careers/ https://ochronus.online/active-listening-boosts-careers/ https://ochronus.online/how-to-stop-winning-arguments/ https://ochronus.online/how-to-stop-winning-arguments/ (sorry for the link-fest, but I do think these are interesting for this thread)

jdmichal 6y ago

> Worse, no sane person on Earth today is going to walk into an interview and tell you they hate those things. Same with any question having to do with testing. Sure, everyone tests! Why would I ever write code without tests! First day on the job: Do I really have to write a test for this?!

908B64B197 6y ago

> Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion - I don't like it. I support all three, even without the business bonuses. However, the jargon in that community is vast and quickly changing. There's also potential for unintentional landmines. Worse, no sane person on Earth today is going to walk into an interview and tell you they hate those things. It's not necessary about "target demographics". A non-"diverse" team (depending on your definition of "diverse") can still be extremely inclusive. Just look at how well they onboard new hires. The Weakness Question is a hard one because it'll be interpreted very differently in different cultures. Some will happily give you a list of areas they want to improve while others will consider answering the question an admission of failure (losing face).

dawg- 6y ago

On DEI - the purpose is exactly that. You want to see how well someone can navigate the landmines. Any thoughtful person probably: 1. Agrees in principle that DEI is important, and that cultural, racial, ethnic, linguistic, economic diversity makes organizations/communities/people better and 2. has some criticism or concerns about how DEI is typically implemented in practice. It takes a lot of tact to express #2 in a way that it won't get you or your company canceled. Especially in a tech company, with all the moral scrutiny the industry has come under lately, the private opinion of one employee can become a very public and embarrassing matter. For that reason, I think asking a DEI question in an interview is more to see "is this person going to be a liability for us or do they know how to talk about difficult topics without pissing anybody off?"