3 ms·

As something of a counterpoint, a literal 4-hour assignment isn't that bad--especially as an alternative to a day of interviews. On a relative scale that might

As something of a counterpoint, a literal 4-hour assignment isn't that bad--especially as an alternative to a day of interviews. On a relative scale that might be true. In absolute terms you've already lost a high proportion of good senior people who might otherwise have been interested either way. Most good developers I know would just walk on seeing a 4-hour assignment that was actually a 4-hour assignment. Some would accept a full day of interviews if the employer had a reputation for being a good place to work and offered exceptional compensation but plenty wouldn't and I doubt any would for an employer that wasn't very top tier. Risk/reward and all that.

ghaff 4y ago
To be honest, at some point if someone wants to work at Google and can get a job at Google--especially if the name and/or the salary is what they really care about--it's probably in the best interest of a lot of companies to just move on.
- Silhouette 4y ago
  I'm sure that's true but another point I was trying to make there was that IME even top tier companies exclude a significant proportion of good developers by having excessive hiring processes. The kind of applicant who could get hired by those companies doesn't have to put up with those processes and at least here in the UK the pay at even top tier companies with annoying hiring processes isn't so much better than everyone else that it's worth the sacrifice.
  - ghaff 4y ago
    In the US, there's probably a pretty significant delta between top SV big tech salaries and a lot of the rest. Of course, those companies probably exclude a lot of competent developers and other companies can offer other opportunities besides just salary that big tech can't (more interesting projects, less of a hiring gauntlet, smaller scale, etc.) But if someone is willing to and can get through the hiring gauntlet--and really cares about the comp--it's hard to compete.

ghaff 4y ago

To be honest, at some point if someone wants to work at Google and can get a job at Google--especially if the name and/or the salary is what they really care about--it's probably in the best interest of a lot of companies to just move on.

Silhouette 4y ago
I'm sure that's true but another point I was trying to make there was that IME even top tier companies exclude a significant proportion of good developers by having excessive hiring processes. The kind of applicant who could get hired by those companies doesn't have to put up with those processes and at least here in the UK the pay at even top tier companies with annoying hiring processes isn't so much better than everyone else that it's worth the sacrifice.
- ghaff 4y ago
  In the US, there's probably a pretty significant delta between top SV big tech salaries and a lot of the rest. Of course, those companies probably exclude a lot of competent developers and other companies can offer other opportunities besides just salary that big tech can't (more interesting projects, less of a hiring gauntlet, smaller scale, etc.) But if someone is willing to and can get through the hiring gauntlet--and really cares about the comp--it's hard to compete.