I've noticed that for some interviewers, praise during the interview is inversely correlated with the rating they give (I did a lot of pair interviews, which ha

I've noticed that for some interviewers, praise during the interview is inversely correlated with the rating they give (I did a lot of pair interviews, which have similar tradeoffs to pair programming). Good candidates breeze through the main topic, get through some follow ups, and then we let them ask questions. Bad candidates have trouble with the material, so you might have to cut them off early to transition to their questions and some praise makes that feel smoother.