7 ms·

Does communication matter in technical interviews? Here's the data

75 points by leeny 4y ago

hunglee2 4y ago
so long as we are passing requirements from one person to another, communication will remain a priority skill for coding. The only circumstances where I can see communication becoming a secondary skill is a) solo coder or b) repeat process / build
turtledove 4y ago
I cannot overstate how important communication actually is. A huge bulk of what engineers do is communicate. Design docs, white boarding, tech talks, gathering requirements, challenging leadership, organizing a team, code reviews, peer feedback... Nearly everything engineers do requires communications skills. Being able to connect with and clearly communicate to your interviewer will absolutely increase your chances.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- EdwardDiego 4y ago
  Definitely agree. I've found interviewing via video call is absolutely terrible compared to in person. So damn hard to describe architecture without a whiteboard. And humans just seem to communicate better when you're in the same space.
- mronetwo 4y ago
  Yeah that's something I have been thinking about a lot lately. Mainly because I notice how big part of this job is asking people to clarify what they mean. Explaining ideas clearly is extremely difficult. The ability to write in a logical, concise manner is incredibly important and quite rare... which is frustrating.
drewcoo 4y ago
So what does communication mean in this context? And is that a shared meaning among all participants? Unless it's clearly defined I don't see how anyone can measure it in a meaningful way. This seems to be treating communication as some kind of qualitative abstract. "On a scale of 1 to 4 stars, how much did your spouse love you last Wednesday?" That tells me more about the esteem of the respondent than it does about the state of the person we're trying to evaluate.
loup-vaillant 4y ago
I wonder how terrible the 4-code 4-solve 2-communicate people actually were at communicating. They were able to communicate their code and solutions to the interviewer after all. There's a great chance that the people who really are poor communicators were rated lower at least on the solve scale. Looks like as usual, "more research is needed".
TedDoesntTalk 4y ago
> Does communication matter in technical interviews? Who thinks up such a question? It’s like asking, “Is the sun hot” and then writing a blog post investigating the obvious.
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  But if you ask *how hot is the sun* someome has to actually study this
mellavora 4y ago
I broke the rules and read the article before commenting. The article concludes > The bottom line: it is far less damaging to score 1 rating point lower on Communicate, and it is much more beneficial to score 1 rating point higher on Code and/or on Solve. Talk is indeed cheap, and indeed, coding and problem solving is what you need to show in a coding interview. which is the opposite of what the two current HN responses predict.
- rvense 4y ago
  I can't disagree with the conclusion that coding skills are more predictive of interview success (although it surprises me), but I will say from my work experience that, after a certain point, I value communication skills much more than coding ability, and I would guess they are, in many places, more predictive of success on the job than raw technical ability.
  - zamfi 4y ago
    Well, these results definitely validate that. Once you're topped out in coding ability, better communication only helps! Or were you saying that at some point you stopped caring about coding ability and valued strong communication even in the absence of the ability to problem solve and write code?
    - rvense 4y ago
      I just mean that so long as someone's at a certain technical level, I'm more interested in their other skills, where communication would be one of the most important. For context, I'm in fairly mundane web app development, and technical issues (getting stuff to work at all, or perform well enough) have hardly ever been the main problem on my projects. The hardest part is almost always figuring out what to build.
    - geoffjentry 4y ago
      > Well, these results definitely validate that. Once you're topped out in coding ability, better communication only helps! I think it's close to this, but not quite as it's a sliding scale and not a step function. From a business perspective, there tends to be diminishing returns as one's coding skills improve. And that's the point where returns on communication skills tends to become more important. So more often than not the higher the level the more important communication skills become over coding skills. This is not saying a high level engineer can be all talk and no ability, but rather a great communicator/good coder might become more valuable than a good communicator/great coder. Apologies for all the hedging in the above. I'm trying to take into account that there are always exceptions to the above. Some positions need that absolute wizard. It's the exception to the rule, but it exists.
ochronus 4y ago
It'd be nice to elaborate what communication in this specific setting entails. From my experience: - being willing & able to "bring along" the interviewers, thinking out loud - being easy to follow (clear phrasing, logically chained etc.) - asking for help/input when needed Without defining what exactly 'communication' means it's impossible to measure. Even then, it's highly subjective - that doesn't make it less important though.
contrast 4y ago
This is an awful article. I would rate someone as having poor “solving” skills if they demonstrated this level of thinking. Most fundamentally, of course the data shows that “would hire” correlates to “appears to have the skill this interview is specifically intended to assess”. These are not independent variables, nor are they objective measures. Don’t waste your time analysing them as if they are. From a candidates point of view, the question is “what can I spend time on to improve my chances of getting the job I want”. I’ve never met anyone who’s preparation is analogous to the scenario presented, “I decided to convert a communications point into a coding point.” Developing complimentary skills is rarely a zero sum game. The data appears to show that unless you are top ranked on two different technical criteria, poor communication skills will prevent you from getting the job. Data-wise, we’re starting to see the impact of having a variable that isn’t almost perfectly correlated with the outcome. That’s less likely to mean “talk is cheap” than “there’s an easy opportunity to improve your performance; you’d be a fool to dismiss it”. I would also suggest that earning a high score for problem solving is going to benefit significantly from good communications skills. Asking good questions and explaining your process, whether or not you could code the solution, goes a long way. So sure, if you are extremely skilled on the technical side, and the company hires based solely on the technical interview, and that company is offering you the best of all the potential roles you could take, better communication skills aren’t necessarily valuable to you. For everyone else: career tip, of course you should be applying for jobs where your skills are relevant to the role, but also remember that general communication skills are valuable.
brunooliv 4y ago
"Talk is cheap, show me the code." Any engineer worth their salt will "naturally" communicate by asking questions, appear friendly, or even admit when they're stuck or don't know something. The problem is the reverse is probably as common, but, honestly, equally valuable: if you have a person who simply shows amazing tech skills, and talks when prompted to, I mean, will you reject this person in favour of a less stronger candidate just because that weaker candidate was more outgoing? I mean, in technical interviews you have to be technical and solve your stuff, that's it. FAANG system design interviews actually somehow require some clarifying questions to clear out ambiguous requirements or probe for missing data, but, I have seen and witnessed people immediately tabling X, Y and Z assumptions and go "assuming these....." and immediately craft a perfect solution - pass with flying colors. The rest will be gauged in behavioral interviews and in the final decision meeting to put forward an offer or not. But in technical interviews? Just solve the thing.
- jseban 4y ago
  > shows amazing tech skills, and talks when prompted to, I mean, will you reject this person in favour of a less stronger candidate just because that weaker candidate was more outgoing? If they are the opposite, they will not ask questions (but instead make assumptions) and refuse to admit when they're wrong. Yes I would absolutely reject such a person regardless of technical skills, I would even fire them. These people can have a very negative influence on the culture and turn it into a competition of ego instead of actually understanding and solving problems, which is also stopping everyone else on the team as well from actually solving problems, because this person will act as a huge blocker. Technical ability doesn't help you at all if you are insisting on solving the wrong problem. > But in technical interviews? Just solve the thing. Yes sure, but the issue is that there is no non-technical part.
  - nopeYouAreWrong 4y ago
    You must live in an all-white people world. ESL creates a lot of quiet people. Not everyone that is quiet is an egotistical toxic maniac.
Jenk 4y ago
Many posting responses here are missing that this topic is constrained to _technical interviews_. Not "does communication matter in general" nor even "does communication matter for a developer to be effective".
- BiteCode_dev 4y ago
  Also _remote_ technical interviews, which is an entire game entirely.
spicymaki 4y ago
This data might explain why technical documentation is so poor or non-existent. I give bonus points to good communicators, because good communicators are so rare.
lowken 4y ago
I reject candidates if I can’t understand them. They don’t have to speak perfect but if we can’t communicate then no thanks.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
BiteCode_dev 4y ago
There is nothing scientific about the setup, it implies bias front and center, the conclusion is completly flawed and the title doesn't even state the result correctly: Indeed, at best, this is not about how well a candidate does at interview depending on how good at communicating they are. This is about how companies rate canditates on communication depending on if pass their interview or not. You can't post a comment on HN without people obsessivelly asking proof about your opinion, numbers, studies, data... And this reach the frontpage. How ironic.
skwirl 4y ago
If I'm understanding this correctly, this is based largely on the results of mock interviews. The author says that interviewing.io "has hosted and collected feedback from over 100K technical interviews, split between mock interviews and real ones" but does not say how many (or if any) of the interviews these conclusions were based on were from mock interviews. My understanding is that interviewing.io is largely for mock interviewing, although some interviewers may funnel you in to their real hiring pipeline if they like your mock interview. I think mock interviews are great, but do we have any solid data on how well the "advance to next round" flag for a mock interview correlates to advancing to the next round in a real interview? If I'm conducting a real interview, I'm going to be thinking about what it would be like to work with this candidate on a daily basis (or at least have them somewhere in my organization). I would think I would be more concerned about communication skills in a real interview, even if it's unconscious. With a mock interview, I'm in no danger of working with this person. I can be focused completely on their technical solution without thinking at all about what it would be like to work with this person day to day.
- BiteCode_dev 4y ago
  Not to mention remote interviews, and with a result solely based on the company rating about perceived communication performances. This has pretty much the equivalent scientific value of a twitter poll.
  - zamfi 4y ago
    Sure, if a Twitter poll were part of your hiring decision.
    - BiteCode_dev 4y ago
      Not even that, since it's just a feedback about how people perceived communication. But we know the brain is terrible at assessing its own decision process. The hiring party could very well have not like the person, or be attracked sexually to the person, and felt that it was all about communication. Post decision star rating is junk science.
ebiester 4y ago
I think the article is illuminating. When I was actively interviewing, I found that I struggled in code interviews precisely because I was trying to be engaging, but it interfered with how I was actually solving the problem. I think I would have done better if I had taken the advice to communicate less during the code review and explain after I solve.

75 points by leeny 4y ago

so long as we are passing requirements from one person to another, communication will remain a priority skill for coding. The only circumstances where I can see communication becoming a secondary skill is a) solo coder or b) repeat process / build

turtledove 4y ago

I cannot overstate how important communication actually is. A huge bulk of what engineers do is communicate. Design docs, white boarding, tech talks, gathering requirements, challenging leadership, organizing a team, code reviews, peer feedback... Nearly everything engineers do requires communications skills. Being able to connect with and clearly communicate to your interviewer will absolutely increase your chances.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
EdwardDiego 4y ago
Definitely agree. I've found interviewing via video call is absolutely terrible compared to in person. So damn hard to describe architecture without a whiteboard. And humans just seem to communicate better when you're in the same space.
mronetwo 4y ago
Yeah that's something I have been thinking about a lot lately. Mainly because I notice how big part of this job is asking people to clarify what they mean. Explaining ideas clearly is extremely difficult. The ability to write in a logical, concise manner is incredibly important and quite rare... which is frustrating.

drewcoo 4y ago

So what does communication mean in this context? And is that a shared meaning among all participants? Unless it's clearly defined I don't see how anyone can measure it in a meaningful way. This seems to be treating communication as some kind of qualitative abstract. "On a scale of 1 to 4 stars, how much did your spouse love you last Wednesday?" That tells me more about the esteem of the respondent than it does about the state of the person we're trying to evaluate.

loup-vaillant 4y ago

I wonder how terrible the 4-code 4-solve 2-communicate people actually were at communicating. They were able to communicate their code and solutions to the interviewer after all. There's a great chance that the people who really are poor communicators were rated lower at least on the solve scale. Looks like as usual, "more research is needed".

TedDoesntTalk 4y ago

> Does communication matter in technical interviews? Who thinks up such a question? It’s like asking, “Is the sun hot” and then writing a blog post investigating the obvious.

ClumsyPilot 4y ago
But if you ask *how hot is the sun* someome has to actually study this

mellavora 4y ago

I broke the rules and read the article before commenting. The article concludes > The bottom line: it is far less damaging to score 1 rating point lower on Communicate, and it is much more beneficial to score 1 rating point higher on Code and/or on Solve. Talk is indeed cheap, and indeed, coding and problem solving is what you need to show in a coding interview. which is the opposite of what the two current HN responses predict.

rvense 4y ago
I can't disagree with the conclusion that coding skills are more predictive of interview success (although it surprises me), but I will say from my work experience that, after a certain point, I value communication skills much more than coding ability, and I would guess they are, in many places, more predictive of success on the job than raw technical ability.
- zamfi 4y ago
  Well, these results definitely validate that. Once you're topped out in coding ability, better communication only helps! Or were you saying that at some point you stopped caring about coding ability and valued strong communication even in the absence of the ability to problem solve and write code?
  - rvense 4y ago
    I just mean that so long as someone's at a certain technical level, I'm more interested in their other skills, where communication would be one of the most important. For context, I'm in fairly mundane web app development, and technical issues (getting stuff to work at all, or perform well enough) have hardly ever been the main problem on my projects. The hardest part is almost always figuring out what to build.
  - geoffjentry 4y ago
    > Well, these results definitely validate that. Once you're topped out in coding ability, better communication only helps! I think it's close to this, but not quite as it's a sliding scale and not a step function. From a business perspective, there tends to be diminishing returns as one's coding skills improve. And that's the point where returns on communication skills tends to become more important. So more often than not the higher the level the more important communication skills become over coding skills. This is not saying a high level engineer can be all talk and no ability, but rather a great communicator/good coder might become more valuable than a good communicator/great coder. Apologies for all the hedging in the above. I'm trying to take into account that there are always exceptions to the above. Some positions need that absolute wizard. It's the exception to the rule, but it exists.

ochronus 4y ago

It'd be nice to elaborate what communication in this specific setting entails. From my experience: - being willing & able to "bring along" the interviewers, thinking out loud - being easy to follow (clear phrasing, logically chained etc.) - asking for help/input when needed Without defining what exactly 'communication' means it's impossible to measure. Even then, it's highly subjective - that doesn't make it less important though.

contrast 4y ago

This is an awful article. I would rate someone as having poor “solving” skills if they demonstrated this level of thinking. Most fundamentally, of course the data shows that “would hire” correlates to “appears to have the skill this interview is specifically intended to assess”. These are not independent variables, nor are they objective measures. Don’t waste your time analysing them as if they are. From a candidates point of view, the question is “what can I spend time on to improve my chances of getting the job I want”. I’ve never met anyone who’s preparation is analogous to the scenario presented, “I decided to convert a communications point into a coding point.” Developing complimentary skills is rarely a zero sum game. The data appears to show that unless you are top ranked on two different technical criteria, poor communication skills will prevent you from getting the job. Data-wise, we’re starting to see the impact of having a variable that isn’t almost perfectly correlated with the outcome. That’s less likely to mean “talk is cheap” than “there’s an easy opportunity to improve your performance; you’d be a fool to dismiss it”. I would also suggest that earning a high score for problem solving is going to benefit significantly from good communications skills. Asking good questions and explaining your process, whether or not you could code the solution, goes a long way. So sure, if you are extremely skilled on the technical side, and the company hires based solely on the technical interview, and that company is offering you the best of all the potential roles you could take, better communication skills aren’t necessarily valuable to you. For everyone else: career tip, of course you should be applying for jobs where your skills are relevant to the role, but also remember that general communication skills are valuable.

brunooliv 4y ago

"Talk is cheap, show me the code." Any engineer worth their salt will "naturally" communicate by asking questions, appear friendly, or even admit when they're stuck or don't know something. The problem is the reverse is probably as common, but, honestly, equally valuable: if you have a person who simply shows amazing tech skills, and talks when prompted to, I mean, will you reject this person in favour of a less stronger candidate just because that weaker candidate was more outgoing? I mean, in technical interviews you have to be technical and solve your stuff, that's it. FAANG system design interviews actually somehow require some clarifying questions to clear out ambiguous requirements or probe for missing data, but, I have seen and witnessed people immediately tabling X, Y and Z assumptions and go "assuming these....." and immediately craft a perfect solution - pass with flying colors. The rest will be gauged in behavioral interviews and in the final decision meeting to put forward an offer or not. But in technical interviews? Just solve the thing.

jseban 4y ago
> shows amazing tech skills, and talks when prompted to, I mean, will you reject this person in favour of a less stronger candidate just because that weaker candidate was more outgoing? If they are the opposite, they will not ask questions (but instead make assumptions) and refuse to admit when they're wrong. Yes I would absolutely reject such a person regardless of technical skills, I would even fire them. These people can have a very negative influence on the culture and turn it into a competition of ego instead of actually understanding and solving problems, which is also stopping everyone else on the team as well from actually solving problems, because this person will act as a huge blocker. Technical ability doesn't help you at all if you are insisting on solving the wrong problem. > But in technical interviews? Just solve the thing. Yes sure, but the issue is that there is no non-technical part.
- nopeYouAreWrong 4y ago
  You must live in an all-white people world. ESL creates a lot of quiet people. Not everyone that is quiet is an egotistical toxic maniac.

Jenk 4y ago

Many posting responses here are missing that this topic is constrained to _technical interviews_. Not "does communication matter in general" nor even "does communication matter for a developer to be effective".

BiteCode_dev 4y ago
Also _remote_ technical interviews, which is an entire game entirely.

spicymaki 4y ago

This data might explain why technical documentation is so poor or non-existent. I give bonus points to good communicators, because good communicators are so rare.

lowken 4y ago

I reject candidates if I can’t understand them. They don’t have to speak perfect but if we can’t communicate then no thanks.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

BiteCode_dev 4y ago

There is nothing scientific about the setup, it implies bias front and center, the conclusion is completly flawed and the title doesn't even state the result correctly: Indeed, at best, this is not about how well a candidate does at interview depending on how good at communicating they are. This is about how companies rate canditates on communication depending on if pass their interview or not. You can't post a comment on HN without people obsessivelly asking proof about your opinion, numbers, studies, data... And this reach the frontpage. How ironic.

skwirl 4y ago

If I'm understanding this correctly, this is based largely on the results of mock interviews. The author says that interviewing.io "has hosted and collected feedback from over 100K technical interviews, split between mock interviews and real ones" but does not say how many (or if any) of the interviews these conclusions were based on were from mock interviews. My understanding is that interviewing.io is largely for mock interviewing, although some interviewers may funnel you in to their real hiring pipeline if they like your mock interview. I think mock interviews are great, but do we have any solid data on how well the "advance to next round" flag for a mock interview correlates to advancing to the next round in a real interview? If I'm conducting a real interview, I'm going to be thinking about what it would be like to work with this candidate on a daily basis (or at least have them somewhere in my organization). I would think I would be more concerned about communication skills in a real interview, even if it's unconscious. With a mock interview, I'm in no danger of working with this person. I can be focused completely on their technical solution without thinking at all about what it would be like to work with this person day to day.

BiteCode_dev 4y ago
Not to mention remote interviews, and with a result solely based on the company rating about perceived communication performances. This has pretty much the equivalent scientific value of a twitter poll.
- zamfi 4y ago
  Sure, if a Twitter poll were part of your hiring decision.
  - BiteCode_dev 4y ago
    Not even that, since it's just a feedback about how people perceived communication. But we know the brain is terrible at assessing its own decision process. The hiring party could very well have not like the person, or be attracked sexually to the person, and felt that it was all about communication. Post decision star rating is junk science.

ebiester 4y ago

I think the article is illuminating. When I was actively interviewing, I found that I struggled in code interviews precisely because I was trying to be engaging, but it interfered with how I was actually solving the problem. I think I would have done better if I had taken the advice to communicate less during the code review and explain after I solve.