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> ” I'm not fast at reasoning about code, and I often make trivial mistakes just trying to get a "first draft" of a program out. If I get behind or the intervie
by soneca 5y ago
> ” I'm not fast at reasoning about code, and I often make trivial mistakes just trying to get a "first draft" of a program out. If I get behind or the interviewer starts interrupting to ask about the bad code I'm writing I get very stressed and have trouble both listening to the interviewer and trying to address the issues with the code.”
That’s exactly what happens to me. The thing is, I am not as fast or experienced as the author. I don’t do well on those Triplebyte quizzes because they put data structures and algorithm question among even in the frontend quiz. And also ask trick questions that I usually run the code to see what happens, not spend 3 minutes imagining what the outcome would be. I much prefer take-home tasks even if I take 4 to 5 hours when instructions said I should take two.
So, I am just terrible at technical assessments in general. And I don’t have that solid CS knowledge that some positions require or people think is the minimum necessary for me to be called “engineer. I don’t care. I am happy being called a “developer”.
The challenge is: how do I find a job post that would hire for what I am good at?
I am good at shipping things. I am good at communicating with non-engineers in general. I am good at scoping, understanding the problem that people want to solve with code and proposing the fastest way to get there. I am good at creating simple code that it’s easy to understand and do what’s needed to be done with good performance. I am good at writing tests that make sense. I am good at focusing and organizing my time to deliver working code in the agreed deadline. I am good of delivering good work with autonomy. I am good at working as a team. I am quick to learn new tech. I am quick to understand legacy code and to improve it.
Despite my poor technical interview skills, I was never fired for poor technical skills. On the contrary, I was always complimented for what I ship, how quickly I learn and contribute when dealing with new tech/codebase, and how I quickly improve upon feedback.
So, how do I find a job whose hiring process value those, not the former?
I am considering not even trying if the process has a mandatory live-code step or leet code.
- michaelrpeskin 5y agoIt’s hard to find those places because they’re usually small companies outside the valley without name recognition. I work for one of those places and am the lead technical interviewer (no “a” lead, “the” lead, that’s how small we are). We do have a very easy take home code challenge that’s very related to the kind of work we do. But we only specify the language to use because that’s what 99% of our code is written in. We don’t care anything else about structure of the project and you do it on your own time (it’s really only an hour or two of work - or at least it should be) I’m not sure of the rate of people returning the challenge to us (I hear that it’s a bit less than 50%). I interview all of the folks who return code. And pass about 2/3 of those on to the full day interview. (No-pass is usually code that doesn’t compile or gets the wrong answer on the test case that we provide - we give them the correct answer for the test case, so they know what they’re aiming for). And we hire a pretty high percentage of the folks who do the full day. Granted, we’re in a bit of a niche field and we don’t have big-tech name recognition so we don’t have the volume of applicants that other places have to deal with. I always try to be respectful in the interview and we only talk big picture stuff. There are no quizzes or gotcha questions, we talk about the code and just have a conversation. I hope that everyone who leaves my interview feels respected and like their time wasn’t wasted. Sometimes I include one of my junior engineers on the technical interview so they get experience with it. Usually they start off peppering questions and trying to be smart, but I just set a good example and they calm down quickly and realize it’s about a conversation and seeing if the candidate would like the kind of work we do. I can’t think of any bad hire we’ve make in my years of doing it this way.
- soneca 5y agoThat looks like a great process! That’s what I imagine makes sense for the company too (not just from me, as candidate).
- codeyperson 5y agoI’d hire you.