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> Leetcode is systematically favoring candidates who have months of free time to memorize arbitrary logic puzzles Finding people who are willing to spend month

> Leetcode is systematically favoring candidates who have months of free time to memorize arbitrary logic puzzles Finding people who are willing to spend months in order to get the job is one of the biggest reasons companies use leetcode.

oblio 5y ago
Well, he did say: > ego-driven hazing ritual :-)
- tiredofU2 5y ago
- samstave 5y ago
  The worst "Biggest Swingin' Dick on Campus" ego-fest I have ever experienced was working at the F in FAANG... -- Such a den of.... you can fill in the rest... I know someone who was literally fired for being "too social" -- and all they did was participate in the stupid parties that were had like "Build you're departments happy hour bar, here is $400 for alcohol to stock it up!!"
  - garbagecoder 5y ago
    I had a few FAANG+M people join my (reserve) unit in the army doing cyber and 6-shop stuff who thought they were hot shit. Some actually were, but the mentality was universal regardless of ability.
  - dymk 5y ago
    I look back fondly on the internal wiki pages documenting all the available "bar space" in the Facebook Seattle office.
- colinmhayes 5y ago
  Finding hard workers isn't easy. Leetcode is not a bad way to do it. It's not a great way, but it works and more importantly it scales well to the organization level.
Salgat 5y ago
I just wish companies that didn't have the applicant pool of a FAANG company understood this. Leetcode for your average dev company is a great way to lose a massive portion of the qualified talent pool. I can guarantee almost every SaaS developer never touches dynamic programming beyond simple memoization, yet its tested so much. You might as well test a French Cuisine Chef on how well his Chinese cooking is.
- endymi0n 5y ago
  > You might as well test a French Cuisine Chef on how well his Chinese cooking is. A way more apt comparison would be evaluating him on his knive sharpening skills.
  - ksdale 5y ago
    As someone who knows nothing about being a professional chef, it surprises me to discover that a professional chef wouldn't be very comfortable sharpening knives!
  - jonny_eh 5y ago
    And if they couldn't sharpen a knife? Would you still trust them to cook a 5 course dinner?
    - jedberg 5y ago
      Sure. Just like I trust race car drivers to drive even though they don't know how to fix the car. As long as they understand the basics of how the car parts interact, they'll be just fine driving it.
      - deleted 5y ago
        [deleted]
      - OJFord 5y ago
        But in practice, a good one probably won't let anyone else sharpen their knives, nevermind be unable to do it. It'd be a bit like 'someone else has set up a software development environment for you, now write some code' I suppose.
__MatrixMan__ 5y ago
I've never used Leetcode, but it keeps coming up here. I've been interviewer a lot lately and I keep trying to find ways to filter out the candidates that care more about interview prep than solving real problems. Is this a nonstandard perspective?
- aspaceman 5y ago
  I think it's pretty common at small to mid sized companies + startups. Your more "trendy" companies and your F500 companies do the type of Leetcode interview you hear everyone on HN complain about. It typically looks like a 15 minute phone interview with HR, followed by a lengthy Leetcode/ take home exam (that's auto graded, no humans), a computer form where you input your school, GPA, and courses taken (seriously). All of this info gets turned into a number and then HR takes a sample of the top X and hands it to the hiring manager: "Here are the 'viable' candidates". The hiring manager then has to (basically) interview the candidate themselves. Ensure they actually have the skills for the position, determine their interest in the role, etc. So this is probably what you're doing right now. Just imagine someone filtered a bunch of your resumes first. Take with a grain of salt, but I have heard of some folks explicitly getting permission to do hiring outside of HR at said large companies. The kids they get out of undergrad and through HR's Leetcode process are apparently complete garbage. Don't understand C, pointers, memory, or Linux at all. Don't even know what files are.
  - autokad 5y ago
    to get around to the algorithmic portion of the interview process (filling out your GPA and hoping for a recruiter call), try reaching out to the recruiters directly. they only go to that pool when their existing leads runs dry, and they'd often love the opportunity to add some self motivated candidates. How I got my job is I searched linkedIn for <company name> + recruiter and just added all of them. That alone generated lots of recruiter calls. This was 2018, not sure if things have changed
  - vanusa 5y ago
    Don't even know what files are Which is of course exactly what these companies should expect if their idea of candidate "preparation" consists of sitting in front of a webform and being asked to type in functions, one after another. Like a rat in a cage.
robotburrito 5y ago
I agree, but for many people a six figure job writing code is life changing. So they are willing to study for it.
kamaal 5y ago
These candidates aren't exactly spending their lives to get hired at your place because they think you are special. They just don't take their day jobs seriously enough and spend most of their time on LC, when you hire them, they leave in a few months because that is what they are good at.

oblio 5y ago

Well, he did say: > ego-driven hazing ritual :-)

tiredofU2 5y ago
samstave 5y ago
The worst "Biggest Swingin' Dick on Campus" ego-fest I have ever experienced was working at the F in FAANG... -- Such a den of.... you can fill in the rest... I know someone who was literally fired for being "too social" -- and all they did was participate in the stupid parties that were had like "Build you're departments happy hour bar, here is $400 for alcohol to stock it up!!"
- garbagecoder 5y ago
  I had a few FAANG+M people join my (reserve) unit in the army doing cyber and 6-shop stuff who thought they were hot shit. Some actually were, but the mentality was universal regardless of ability.
- dymk 5y ago
  I look back fondly on the internal wiki pages documenting all the available "bar space" in the Facebook Seattle office.
colinmhayes 5y ago
Finding hard workers isn't easy. Leetcode is not a bad way to do it. It's not a great way, but it works and more importantly it scales well to the organization level.

Salgat 5y ago

I just wish companies that didn't have the applicant pool of a FAANG company understood this. Leetcode for your average dev company is a great way to lose a massive portion of the qualified talent pool. I can guarantee almost every SaaS developer never touches dynamic programming beyond simple memoization, yet its tested so much. You might as well test a French Cuisine Chef on how well his Chinese cooking is.

endymi0n 5y ago
> You might as well test a French Cuisine Chef on how well his Chinese cooking is. A way more apt comparison would be evaluating him on his knive sharpening skills.
- ksdale 5y ago
  As someone who knows nothing about being a professional chef, it surprises me to discover that a professional chef wouldn't be very comfortable sharpening knives!
- jonny_eh 5y ago
  And if they couldn't sharpen a knife? Would you still trust them to cook a 5 course dinner?
  - jedberg 5y ago
    Sure. Just like I trust race car drivers to drive even though they don't know how to fix the car. As long as they understand the basics of how the car parts interact, they'll be just fine driving it.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - OJFord 5y ago
      But in practice, a good one probably won't let anyone else sharpen their knives, nevermind be unable to do it. It'd be a bit like 'someone else has set up a software development environment for you, now write some code' I suppose.

__MatrixMan__ 5y ago

I've never used Leetcode, but it keeps coming up here. I've been interviewer a lot lately and I keep trying to find ways to filter out the candidates that care more about interview prep than solving real problems. Is this a nonstandard perspective?

aspaceman 5y ago
I think it's pretty common at small to mid sized companies + startups. Your more "trendy" companies and your F500 companies do the type of Leetcode interview you hear everyone on HN complain about. It typically looks like a 15 minute phone interview with HR, followed by a lengthy Leetcode/ take home exam (that's auto graded, no humans), a computer form where you input your school, GPA, and courses taken (seriously). All of this info gets turned into a number and then HR takes a sample of the top X and hands it to the hiring manager: "Here are the 'viable' candidates". The hiring manager then has to (basically) interview the candidate themselves. Ensure they actually have the skills for the position, determine their interest in the role, etc. So this is probably what you're doing right now. Just imagine someone filtered a bunch of your resumes first. Take with a grain of salt, but I have heard of some folks explicitly getting permission to do hiring outside of HR at said large companies. The kids they get out of undergrad and through HR's Leetcode process are apparently complete garbage. Don't understand C, pointers, memory, or Linux at all. Don't even know what files are.
- autokad 5y ago
  to get around to the algorithmic portion of the interview process (filling out your GPA and hoping for a recruiter call), try reaching out to the recruiters directly. they only go to that pool when their existing leads runs dry, and they'd often love the opportunity to add some self motivated candidates. How I got my job is I searched linkedIn for <company name> + recruiter and just added all of them. That alone generated lots of recruiter calls. This was 2018, not sure if things have changed
- vanusa 5y ago
  Don't even know what files are Which is of course exactly what these companies should expect if their idea of candidate "preparation" consists of sitting in front of a webform and being asked to type in functions, one after another. Like a rat in a cage.

robotburrito 5y ago

I agree, but for many people a six figure job writing code is life changing. So they are willing to study for it.

kamaal 5y ago

These candidates aren't exactly spending their lives to get hired at your place because they think you are special. They just don't take their day jobs seriously enough and spend most of their time on LC, when you hire them, they leave in a few months because that is what they are good at.