6 ms·

Anecdotally, as someone with three kids I'd much rather do a take-home 4 hour assignment than the usual round of interviews since I can work the former into my

Anecdotally, as someone with three kids I'd much rather do a take-home 4 hour assignment than the usual round of interviews since I can work the former into my schedule however I like.

ubercore 4y ago
I recently did a 6 hour take-home, but was given an expectation of around 2 weeks to accomplish it, with flexibility for more if I needed it. I thought it was pretty fair compared to a never-ending round of tech interviews.
- yieldcrv 4y ago
  My experience with that is: 0) time doing the project is tracked, sometimes via the expectation that you commit to the git repository from start to finish. dinging you for "points" for going over the time allotment and that the other candidates are: 1) doing way extra things that took way more than 6 hours 2) are not doing those extra things from scratch because they've been playing this game for a while and that 3) the company still has inaccurate ideas of what a candidate should be expected to present in the 6 hours 4) is judging you on completely random things that they did not mention. "you didn't use this design pattern" "we don't like MVVP anymore, we're back on MVP. here's this other acronym." waste of time
  - tharkun__ 4y ago
    Totally agree that this will be something lots of places might do/expect. I will definitely work against that and judge them by it. E.g. say they want me to commit to a Github project they provide or I am supposed to set up and commit to. I will use whatever time I am allotted and at the end, when I'm done and expected to hand it in, I will make one git commit that shows I committed everything exactly 1 second after I was supposed to start, then push that to the provided repo. Yes, start, not finish. Meaning "time travel". Maybe even commit as "Linus Torvalds" or something like that. If they ask about this it's a great conversation starter either way. My experience is that if the talk does come to this either they have no idea how this could even happen and I can explain or judge them based on their reactions or we both have a laugh about their companies policies around this. They see I know my git and I know they're like most companies: actually pretty OK teams and hiring managers with generally crappy HR practices.
  - toomanybeersies 4y ago
    > sometimes via the expectation that you commit to the git repository from start to finish Just rewrite your git history and fudge the commit timestamps. It's not even dishonest, it's just demonstrating your experience with Git. Of course, that doesn't work if they expect you to push to Github/lab as you go.
  - ubercore 4y ago
    That's too bad, in this case I had a particularly good experience. I handed in a tarball, not a repo, so they didn't track time. No idea what other candidates did, but I got specific and positive feedback on the code submitted. The task was pretty carefully thought out and presented to not lean too heavily on specific patterns or techniques. All of your experiences do sound particularly frustrating, I wouldn't be too excited with them either!
PragmaticPulp 4y ago
Agreed. Take-homes we’re greatly preferred by our candidates with families because they could be done on a weekend or in their spare time. I’m also a parent of small kids with a busy schedule. Despite the packed schedule and demands of raising kids, it would be a huge exaggeration to suggest that I couldn’t find 4 hours of time to do a take-home if given a week of time (as is common). The parent commenter might have been operating under the assumption that take home challenges must be done same-day, which kind of defeats the purpose of a take-home. If you’re demanding 4 hours of same day time, might as well bring them in for a 4-hour on site interview. Strangely, few people complain about a half-day on-site but it’s literally the same time commitment. If you really have no other options and you literally cannot find a spare hour of time in any way, take a half day of PTO and complete the interview just as you would for a normal on-site.
- yieldcrv 4y ago
  Alright, and if you are actively interviewing and trying to get offers lined up at the same time? while also continuing to study some system design concepts and algorithm brainteasers? Its not a one 4 hour take home project. Its the fifth one.
  - bredren 4y ago
    Also, is this a good week or a bad week for the kids. Cause if someone is sick or teething, well it’s not the same as any other week.
- unnamed38388 4y ago
gedy 4y ago
Same here, this is way easier to manage when I work on this vs on site or video tech interviews. Especially with companies who expect you to "prepare" for programming quizzes with long leetcode grinding ala FAANG companies..

Anecdotally, as someone with three kids I'd much rather do a take-home 4 hour assignment than the usual round of interviews since I can work the former into my schedule however I like.

ubercore 4y ago

I recently did a 6 hour take-home, but was given an expectation of around 2 weeks to accomplish it, with flexibility for more if I needed it. I thought it was pretty fair compared to a never-ending round of tech interviews.

yieldcrv 4y ago
My experience with that is: 0) time doing the project is tracked, sometimes via the expectation that you commit to the git repository from start to finish. dinging you for "points" for going over the time allotment and that the other candidates are: 1) doing way extra things that took way more than 6 hours 2) are not doing those extra things from scratch because they've been playing this game for a while and that 3) the company still has inaccurate ideas of what a candidate should be expected to present in the 6 hours 4) is judging you on completely random things that they did not mention. "you didn't use this design pattern" "we don't like MVVP anymore, we're back on MVP. here's this other acronym." waste of time
- tharkun__ 4y ago
  Totally agree that this will be something lots of places might do/expect. I will definitely work against that and judge them by it. E.g. say they want me to commit to a Github project they provide or I am supposed to set up and commit to. I will use whatever time I am allotted and at the end, when I'm done and expected to hand it in, I will make one git commit that shows I committed everything exactly 1 second after I was supposed to start, then push that to the provided repo. Yes, start, not finish. Meaning "time travel". Maybe even commit as "Linus Torvalds" or something like that. If they ask about this it's a great conversation starter either way. My experience is that if the talk does come to this either they have no idea how this could even happen and I can explain or judge them based on their reactions or we both have a laugh about their companies policies around this. They see I know my git and I know they're like most companies: actually pretty OK teams and hiring managers with generally crappy HR practices.
- toomanybeersies 4y ago
  > sometimes via the expectation that you commit to the git repository from start to finish Just rewrite your git history and fudge the commit timestamps. It's not even dishonest, it's just demonstrating your experience with Git. Of course, that doesn't work if they expect you to push to Github/lab as you go.
- ubercore 4y ago
  That's too bad, in this case I had a particularly good experience. I handed in a tarball, not a repo, so they didn't track time. No idea what other candidates did, but I got specific and positive feedback on the code submitted. The task was pretty carefully thought out and presented to not lean too heavily on specific patterns or techniques. All of your experiences do sound particularly frustrating, I wouldn't be too excited with them either!

PragmaticPulp 4y ago

Agreed. Take-homes we’re greatly preferred by our candidates with families because they could be done on a weekend or in their spare time. I’m also a parent of small kids with a busy schedule. Despite the packed schedule and demands of raising kids, it would be a huge exaggeration to suggest that I couldn’t find 4 hours of time to do a take-home if given a week of time (as is common). The parent commenter might have been operating under the assumption that take home challenges must be done same-day, which kind of defeats the purpose of a take-home. If you’re demanding 4 hours of same day time, might as well bring them in for a 4-hour on site interview. Strangely, few people complain about a half-day on-site but it’s literally the same time commitment. If you really have no other options and you literally cannot find a spare hour of time in any way, take a half day of PTO and complete the interview just as you would for a normal on-site.

yieldcrv 4y ago
Alright, and if you are actively interviewing and trying to get offers lined up at the same time? while also continuing to study some system design concepts and algorithm brainteasers? Its not a one 4 hour take home project. Its the fifth one.
- bredren 4y ago
  Also, is this a good week or a bad week for the kids. Cause if someone is sick or teething, well it’s not the same as any other week.
unnamed38388 4y ago

gedy 4y ago

Same here, this is way easier to manage when I work on this vs on site or video tech interviews. Especially with companies who expect you to "prepare" for programming quizzes with long leetcode grinding ala FAANG companies..