5 ms·

One thing to realize is that interviews are a two-way street. Do you think you want to work with the interviewers? Do you like the interview process? If the int

One thing to realize is that interviews are a two-way street. Do you think you want to work with the interviewers? Do you like the interview process? If the interview process is poor, what other kind of hiring decisions is the company making? Are you going to want to work with the people they end up hiring? You learn a bit about the company during the interview, and if that bit is bad, then move on. If they ask shitty leetcode questions and the interviewers are hostile or hung up on unimportant details - move on to another company.

Apocryphon 4y ago
The problem is when a significant number of companies all cargo cult the same process- that way you can’t even write them off as a one-off bad place.
- vorpalhex 4y ago
  You can still write off cargo-culting companies who cargo-cult bad processes off. I give you permission.
  - bryanrasmussen 4y ago
    Every company cargo-cults or should we say - follows best practices or industry wide processes - in something. No company has thought through every little bit of their system and processes because no company has the time to be completely original, just like no human idea only has ideas that they thought up themselves instead of borrowing a bunch of ideas from school, books, and overheard conversation because they sound right.
    - vorpalhex 4y ago
      It is better to not know and explore than adopt a bad process because you overheard it in a coffee shop. It's ok to not have an answer.
      - Tronno 4y ago
        You have personally used at least one tool, language, or framework without reading its code or understanding it beyond a surface level. You've done this because some text on some website claims it gets the job done. And you probably do this every day (e.g. your OS, your phone, your microwave). People cargo cult because there isn't enough time to exhaustively research every topic from scratch. Civilization exists because we blindly trust whatever methods seem to work, and then iterate on them.
        vorpalhex 4y ago
        I'm going to put the definition of cargo culting here since we seem to have lost it: > Cargo cult programming can also refer to the practice of applying a design pattern or coding style blindly without understanding the reasons behind that design principle. Some examples are adding unnecessary comments to self-explanatory code, overzealous adherence to the conventions of a programming paradigm, or adding deletion code for objects that garbage collection automatically collects. Installing an app from the store is not cargo culting. Playing with a new framework is not cargo culting. Trying a new order at the donut shop is not cargo culting.
        bryanrasmussen 4y ago
        several points, I agree installing an app is not cargo culting, however following the same interview process as many other companies do is not 'cargo cult programming' while I would agree it is cargo culting of a sort. the problem really is that results for interview process does not seem to reliably add up to anything, there are no reasons behind any interview methodology in the traditional cargo culting sense because there is no interview methodology really founded on reason, it's mumbo jumbo all the way down. But back to my original point some posts up, everybody has at some point taken something on faith as a best practice that works without understanding why. Some examples where cargo cult programming are concerned are adding unnecessary comments to self-explanatory code - but how about also one I've had requesting the removal of explanatory comments from code because the code should explain itself (comment was something like, have done it this way instead of what might seem like the more reasonable way ..example code.. because of a bug in Safari that means X happens, etc. etc, if you want to removal or change to better method please check that Safari works now and this place actually wanted it removed because they preferred not to have comments in code!) Or how about this one which I am old enough to have done: putting your script tags in the head of the document because this was a best practice (before async and defer attributes, I'm talking 1999-2000 here) Hell many of the best practices around CSS usage have depending on the year been the exact opposite of some other earlier best practice. And many frontend developers do it because they don't have the time or evidently the inclination to really learn CSS. Hey, many best practices regarding CSS at various times are based around the fact that frontend developers don't want to learn to use it. Now you might say those are not really examples of cargo culting, but I think they are somewhat close - if you are using a naming convention to avoid learning how something works then you don't really know why you are using the naming convention because the purpose of that convention is to keep you from that knowledge. anyway getting off track here, I just think that saying you are not going to work at a place that has cargo culted its interview process does not tell you anything about the overall quality of the place, because everyone has cargo culted something, just like many fine developers when setting up their React projects have said oh, everyone uses Webpack we'll do that as our build process - they know they need a build, but why Webpack? They don't really know (me neither, every time I've ever encountered Webpack I've always ended up wondering why!? Generally the answer is because that's what the tutorials had, everyone used it, they didn't give any thought, but now we're stuck with it)
- Jensson 4y ago
  A simple test: Do they hire like Google but manage their programmers like a sweatshop (ie Scrum)? Then they are just cargo culting. Companies like Google at least gives its engineers a lot of responsibility and freedom you'd never get in an Agile shop.
  - amitport 4y ago
    a) plenty of agile shops give you more freedom than Google does. Following Agile methodology really doesn't mean what you think it means; and b) please don't casually "ie sweatshops" when talking about something that is clearly not that.
    - Jensson 4y ago
      Do your developers have to work in 2 week sprints and forced to work on tasks split into sub 1-day part so they never have any real autonomy? Then you aren't giving your developers more freedom than Google. And if you aren't working like that then you aren't doing Scrum. Google gives even junior developers multi month projects to own, manage and complete. No Scrum shop gives developers that level of autonomy, not even to senior developers. So to me the time I've spent working on Scrum projects feels like a sweatshop compared to how I could plan and structure development at Google. At Google I am free to collaborate with stakeholders, build prototypes and get feedback etc, as I see fit to complete the project. Or not do it when I don't feel it is needed, the important part isn't how I run the project but that I run it well. If you don't give your developers that level of autonomy then I'm not sure why you'd care much about developer competence at all. (I quit Google a few years ago though due to how the company was changing, but I'll never join a Scrum development team again)
      - amitport 4y ago
        "And if you aren't working like that then you aren't doing Scrum" I kindly disagree. You seem to have worked at a very stressfull place. In my experience that has nothing to do with it being "true scrum TM" or not. In any case, happy for you that you got out.
- quacker 4y ago
  Do they cargo cult the same process? I do see similarities in the interview process, so maybe that's somewhat true, but in my experience there's a ton of variety. Different companies have different formats, different questions, focus on different aspects of my responses, and I'm sure make hiring decisions wildly differently. Some places have phone screens, and some don't. One company gave an easy leetcode problem as part of the phone screen, while in another case, one person actually spoke characters over the phone to me ("LinkedList", "left angle bracket", "String", "right angle bracket"). Some give take home questions. Some do a code review interview. Some dig into my resume during an interview, and some don't. Some companies had multiple interview sessions where I was asked the same question about my resume in each session by different people (wasting time). And so on. So in general, I can and have passed over companies based on their hiring process.
  - bradlys 4y ago
    I’ve interviewed at hundreds of places all within SV - I can say quite confidently that they’re almost all the same. There are some minor variations but they’re almost all completely forgettable by the end of the day. If they have something truly novel - it’s usually very off putting and requires intense amounts of unpaid labor… which you can’t take with you to other interviews. The variations you’re talking about are quite minute. Whether someone asks you about your resume or asks you about your most technically challenging project is all relatively mundane stuff.

Apocryphon 4y ago

The problem is when a significant number of companies all cargo cult the same process- that way you can’t even write them off as a one-off bad place.

vorpalhex 4y ago
You can still write off cargo-culting companies who cargo-cult bad processes off. I give you permission.
- bryanrasmussen 4y ago
  Every company cargo-cults or should we say - follows best practices or industry wide processes - in something. No company has thought through every little bit of their system and processes because no company has the time to be completely original, just like no human idea only has ideas that they thought up themselves instead of borrowing a bunch of ideas from school, books, and overheard conversation because they sound right.
  - vorpalhex 4y ago
    It is better to not know and explore than adopt a bad process because you overheard it in a coffee shop. It's ok to not have an answer.
    - Tronno 4y ago
      You have personally used at least one tool, language, or framework without reading its code or understanding it beyond a surface level. You've done this because some text on some website claims it gets the job done. And you probably do this every day (e.g. your OS, your phone, your microwave). People cargo cult because there isn't enough time to exhaustively research every topic from scratch. Civilization exists because we blindly trust whatever methods seem to work, and then iterate on them.
      - vorpalhex 4y ago
        I'm going to put the definition of cargo culting here since we seem to have lost it: > Cargo cult programming can also refer to the practice of applying a design pattern or coding style blindly without understanding the reasons behind that design principle. Some examples are adding unnecessary comments to self-explanatory code, overzealous adherence to the conventions of a programming paradigm, or adding deletion code for objects that garbage collection automatically collects. Installing an app from the store is not cargo culting. Playing with a new framework is not cargo culting. Trying a new order at the donut shop is not cargo culting.
        bryanrasmussen 4y ago
        several points, I agree installing an app is not cargo culting, however following the same interview process as many other companies do is not 'cargo cult programming' while I would agree it is cargo culting of a sort. the problem really is that results for interview process does not seem to reliably add up to anything, there are no reasons behind any interview methodology in the traditional cargo culting sense because there is no interview methodology really founded on reason, it's mumbo jumbo all the way down. But back to my original point some posts up, everybody has at some point taken something on faith as a best practice that works without understanding why. Some examples where cargo cult programming are concerned are adding unnecessary comments to self-explanatory code - but how about also one I've had requesting the removal of explanatory comments from code because the code should explain itself (comment was something like, have done it this way instead of what might seem like the more reasonable way ..example code.. because of a bug in Safari that means X happens, etc. etc, if you want to removal or change to better method please check that Safari works now and this place actually wanted it removed because they preferred not to have comments in code!) Or how about this one which I am old enough to have done: putting your script tags in the head of the document because this was a best practice (before async and defer attributes, I'm talking 1999-2000 here) Hell many of the best practices around CSS usage have depending on the year been the exact opposite of some other earlier best practice. And many frontend developers do it because they don't have the time or evidently the inclination to really learn CSS. Hey, many best practices regarding CSS at various times are based around the fact that frontend developers don't want to learn to use it. Now you might say those are not really examples of cargo culting, but I think they are somewhat close - if you are using a naming convention to avoid learning how something works then you don't really know why you are using the naming convention because the purpose of that convention is to keep you from that knowledge. anyway getting off track here, I just think that saying you are not going to work at a place that has cargo culted its interview process does not tell you anything about the overall quality of the place, because everyone has cargo culted something, just like many fine developers when setting up their React projects have said oh, everyone uses Webpack we'll do that as our build process - they know they need a build, but why Webpack? They don't really know (me neither, every time I've ever encountered Webpack I've always ended up wondering why!? Generally the answer is because that's what the tutorials had, everyone used it, they didn't give any thought, but now we're stuck with it)
Jensson 4y ago
A simple test: Do they hire like Google but manage their programmers like a sweatshop (ie Scrum)? Then they are just cargo culting. Companies like Google at least gives its engineers a lot of responsibility and freedom you'd never get in an Agile shop.
- amitport 4y ago
  a) plenty of agile shops give you more freedom than Google does. Following Agile methodology really doesn't mean what you think it means; and b) please don't casually "ie sweatshops" when talking about something that is clearly not that.
  - Jensson 4y ago
    Do your developers have to work in 2 week sprints and forced to work on tasks split into sub 1-day part so they never have any real autonomy? Then you aren't giving your developers more freedom than Google. And if you aren't working like that then you aren't doing Scrum. Google gives even junior developers multi month projects to own, manage and complete. No Scrum shop gives developers that level of autonomy, not even to senior developers. So to me the time I've spent working on Scrum projects feels like a sweatshop compared to how I could plan and structure development at Google. At Google I am free to collaborate with stakeholders, build prototypes and get feedback etc, as I see fit to complete the project. Or not do it when I don't feel it is needed, the important part isn't how I run the project but that I run it well. If you don't give your developers that level of autonomy then I'm not sure why you'd care much about developer competence at all. (I quit Google a few years ago though due to how the company was changing, but I'll never join a Scrum development team again)
    - amitport 4y ago
      "And if you aren't working like that then you aren't doing Scrum" I kindly disagree. You seem to have worked at a very stressfull place. In my experience that has nothing to do with it being "true scrum TM" or not. In any case, happy for you that you got out.
quacker 4y ago
Do they cargo cult the same process? I do see similarities in the interview process, so maybe that's somewhat true, but in my experience there's a ton of variety. Different companies have different formats, different questions, focus on different aspects of my responses, and I'm sure make hiring decisions wildly differently. Some places have phone screens, and some don't. One company gave an easy leetcode problem as part of the phone screen, while in another case, one person actually spoke characters over the phone to me ("LinkedList", "left angle bracket", "String", "right angle bracket"). Some give take home questions. Some do a code review interview. Some dig into my resume during an interview, and some don't. Some companies had multiple interview sessions where I was asked the same question about my resume in each session by different people (wasting time). And so on. So in general, I can and have passed over companies based on their hiring process.
- bradlys 4y ago
  I’ve interviewed at hundreds of places all within SV - I can say quite confidently that they’re almost all the same. There are some minor variations but they’re almost all completely forgettable by the end of the day. If they have something truly novel - it’s usually very off putting and requires intense amounts of unpaid labor… which you can’t take with you to other interviews. The variations you’re talking about are quite minute. Whether someone asks you about your resume or asks you about your most technically challenging project is all relatively mundane stuff.