7 ms·

Mirrors my experience. The job listing promised mountains and that it will take few hours and they’ll take time in their feedback,etc. except i just got a gen

Mirrors my experience. The job listing promised mountains and that it will take few hours and they’ll take time in their feedback,etc. except i just got a generic reply that “we’re not satisfied with the solution”. For something that took ~10 hours, i was at the least expecting a vague pointers on whys. I even sent an one pager explaining style decisions, caveats, etc. It was pretty insulting. And when asked for a follow up, got a more generic bs about how the evaluation criteria is honed from their years of experience and that is not something they share outside. One good thing that is it made me realise interviewing still sucks and i just stopped looking for jobs.

mrkurt 3y ago
I went and looked at your submission, and I am comfortable with how we handled it and the level of detail we gave you. Would you mind sending me an email so I can hear a bit more? It sounds like we might've implied something we didn't mean to. These should not take 10 hours, unless you're learning Rails from scratch or something (some people do this). We've tried different ways of saying "don't spend more than 2 hours on this unless you really want to" and it doesn't always come through.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- b20000 3y ago
  shouldn’t take more than x hours - if i had a dime for every time i heard that…
  - mrkurt 3y ago
    If it takes more than 2 hours, there's a pretty good chance it's the wrong job for the person doing the challenge.
    - solarmist 3y ago
      And for every company that means it there are five others want to find people that will sink massive amounts of time into these so they can do the same once they start.
    - Shaanie 3y ago
      Presumably you can't tell if the applicant spent 2h or 6h, and in practice the 6h solution is probably going to look much better. So sure, in theory you may be right, but in practice I bet you select for people who spent (much) more than 2 hours.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
- avinoth 3y ago
  The "detail"I received is the same generic reply you've shared in the other thread. I don't know what fly's internal processes are, but I suspect the reviewer had to have submitted some bit of internal feedback on each submissions on why they're okaying it or not. A filtered version of it or even a separate candidate specific feedback would be just enough. I've been at the hiring side of the table for many years and every time we share a handcrafted feedback to interviewees that we have passed on, we always heard back good things. They know we respected their time (and them), even if they don't agree with the particular feedback. This feedback is not meant for them to get "better" or something. My point is, it could even be 2 hours the candidate spends, the least they deserve is knowing that it was actually looked at.
  - mrkurt 3y ago
    No that's not how ours works. We have, basically, 20 checkboxes for "things that are good about this work". These range from "strong user focus" to "logic to prevent <some problem we've previously had with billing>". The submissions that we continue with check a bunch of boxes. The submissions that we pass on don't. The problem is, we're not hiring people to build to a spec. We want to assess your decisions and ability to go from a basic problem to a first implementation. If we shared the rubric with folks, they'd focus entirely on trying to check the boxes and I don't think we'd get an accurate assessment. Your point about valuing peoples' time is important, though. We have not yet found the right balance for everyone.
    - sosodev 3y ago
      Submissions are supposed to predict and handle issues that you guys have had in production? That doesn't seem very reasonable for a 2 hour task. I wonder if your hiring process is skewed by the perfectionists who spend tens of hours of their submissions. Arguably that's the type of thing you guys would want to select for but it's not at all fair for those who timebox themselves to 2 hours or whatever.
      - mrkurt 3y ago
        We're actually selecting for experience. One way submissions demonstrate experience is if they account for the big issues that come up in real life. I don't think you can spend more hours and get these criteria.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]

mrkurt 3y ago

I went and looked at your submission, and I am comfortable with how we handled it and the level of detail we gave you. Would you mind sending me an email so I can hear a bit more? It sounds like we might've implied something we didn't mean to. These should not take 10 hours, unless you're learning Rails from scratch or something (some people do this). We've tried different ways of saying "don't spend more than 2 hours on this unless you really want to" and it doesn't always come through.

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
b20000 3y ago
shouldn’t take more than x hours - if i had a dime for every time i heard that…
- mrkurt 3y ago
  If it takes more than 2 hours, there's a pretty good chance it's the wrong job for the person doing the challenge.
  - solarmist 3y ago
    And for every company that means it there are five others want to find people that will sink massive amounts of time into these so they can do the same once they start.
  - Shaanie 3y ago
    Presumably you can't tell if the applicant spent 2h or 6h, and in practice the 6h solution is probably going to look much better. So sure, in theory you may be right, but in practice I bet you select for people who spent (much) more than 2 hours.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
avinoth 3y ago
The "detail"I received is the same generic reply you've shared in the other thread. I don't know what fly's internal processes are, but I suspect the reviewer had to have submitted some bit of internal feedback on each submissions on why they're okaying it or not. A filtered version of it or even a separate candidate specific feedback would be just enough. I've been at the hiring side of the table for many years and every time we share a handcrafted feedback to interviewees that we have passed on, we always heard back good things. They know we respected their time (and them), even if they don't agree with the particular feedback. This feedback is not meant for them to get "better" or something. My point is, it could even be 2 hours the candidate spends, the least they deserve is knowing that it was actually looked at.
- mrkurt 3y ago
  No that's not how ours works. We have, basically, 20 checkboxes for "things that are good about this work". These range from "strong user focus" to "logic to prevent <some problem we've previously had with billing>". The submissions that we continue with check a bunch of boxes. The submissions that we pass on don't. The problem is, we're not hiring people to build to a spec. We want to assess your decisions and ability to go from a basic problem to a first implementation. If we shared the rubric with folks, they'd focus entirely on trying to check the boxes and I don't think we'd get an accurate assessment. Your point about valuing peoples' time is important, though. We have not yet found the right balance for everyone.
  - sosodev 3y ago
    Submissions are supposed to predict and handle issues that you guys have had in production? That doesn't seem very reasonable for a 2 hour task. I wonder if your hiring process is skewed by the perfectionists who spend tens of hours of their submissions. Arguably that's the type of thing you guys would want to select for but it's not at all fair for those who timebox themselves to 2 hours or whatever.
    - mrkurt 3y ago
      We're actually selecting for experience. One way submissions demonstrate experience is if they account for the big issues that come up in real life. I don't think you can spend more hours and get these criteria.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]