3 ms·
I don't understand why we collectively treat interview questions as this big gotcha trade secret we have to spring on interviewees in real time. It feels like a
by shalmanese 5y ago
I don't understand why we collectively treat interview questions as this big gotcha trade secret we have to spring on interviewees in real time. It feels like a masochistic hazing ritual.
I've taken to pre-emailing the general structure of questions I expect to ask ~48 hours before the interview and I've found that a) the interviewees are enormously thankful (which helps with closing candidates) and b) the quality of signal I get is much higher.
- wobbly_bush 5y agoWhat exactly do you mean by the general structure of questions? How much details do you send out before the interview?
- lhorie 5y agoI think there are two answers: the bad answer is that people think of interviews as school finals, with all the same connotations about potential for cheating, cramming, memorization-without-retention, etc. The good answer (IMHO) is that the format allows the interviewer to evaluate how a candidate deals with prioritizing conflicts of interest (i.e. the desire to write clean code vs desire to just get something out due time constraints pressure). It also opens up opportunities to explore refactoring, whereas a primed candidate might just bang out "perfect" code the first time around, and not leave much room for evaluating their iterative process.