4 ms·

I got rejected from a job recently and I strongly suspect it was because I went on a rant about how awful scum was against my better judgement. Something I've

by kypro 3y ago

I got rejected from a job recently and I strongly suspect it was because I went on a rant about how awful scum was against my better judgement. Something I've noticed in the last 3-5 years is that it's become more and more common for companies to quiz candidates on their scrum knowledge during interviews. They don't care what you think of scrum (though they may phase their questions like this) they simply want to know you know how to scrum because they scrum. And like in most places you can assume that although "scrum is flexible" it's also religiously followed in practise. Anyway, this company wanted to know what I liked and disliked about scrum and my initial answer was kinda similar to this post – that I liked the idea of it but have never seen it work well in practise. Obviously this was a bad answer because it meant for the next 10 minutes of the interview they were asking me to expand and were trying to understand if I was a bad culture fit. Which to be fair I probably was. But the truth is everywhere I've worked spirt ceremonies are universally hated and typically viewed as a waste of time (especially spirt reviews). Planning rarely adds much value and since estimates are often wrong you either need to be overly conservative with your estimation (rendering it useless), or you're forced to cut corners to deliver stuff on time. And even if you do estimation perfectly ACs always change and extra tickets are always brought into the spirt because "it's essential". Standup is never 15 minutes – it's 10 minutes per team member who likes to hear their own voice, and 30 seconds to those who don't and who just want to get on with their work. Don't even get me started on the team building games... I have seen companies implement it better than others though. The place I work at the moment does it surprisingly well. We do standups which are mostly mandatory, but everything else is optional for the vast majority of the team.

eikenberry 3y ago
> I went on a rant I think that sums up why you got rejected. Over the years I've found anything negative said during an interview process works against you. I really noticed this when I had a job I hated and some of that kept creeping into my interviews with me saying something about it (varied from rant to a few comments) and I was interviewing for a few months... I noticed this and consciously edited it out and had 2 offers in the next couple weeks. I've noticed it more subtly after that and have sense tried to make sure I stay 100% positive in my interviews.
- schwoll 3y ago
  This is an apt observation. Anything negative. Even if true. Even if it doesn't reflect on you. They want someone socially aware enough that they can say negative things without saying anything negative. There's a nuance. "I understand where they're coming from. There's definitely situations where that is preferred", translates to "I disagree totally but it's their prerogative so I'm not going to worry myself too much with that decision." It shows experience with people and ability to read between the lines.
- kypro 3y ago
  You're right. I had already got bad vibes from the interview by this point and started acting up a bit. I was initially really interested in the company and made it clear early on that I really liked what they were doing and how I thought I could add value, but they started shooting me down assuring me the role I was applying for wasn't that interesting and that I'd mostly be a code monkey (obviously not in those exact words). By the time they started asking about my agile experience and what I thought of scum I figured I didn't have much to lose being honest with them. It would have been in neither of our interest for me to pretend I might have been a good fit. But yeah, generally I'll try to be mostly positive while finding something minor to be constructively critical about. I think that tends to strike the right balance between showing you can think for yourself without coming across as the type of person who will cause problems. Sounds like you've noticed the same thing.

by kypro 3y ago

eikenberry 3y ago

> I went on a rant I think that sums up why you got rejected. Over the years I've found anything negative said during an interview process works against you. I really noticed this when I had a job I hated and some of that kept creeping into my interviews with me saying something about it (varied from rant to a few comments) and I was interviewing for a few months... I noticed this and consciously edited it out and had 2 offers in the next couple weeks. I've noticed it more subtly after that and have sense tried to make sure I stay 100% positive in my interviews.

schwoll 3y ago
This is an apt observation. Anything negative. Even if true. Even if it doesn't reflect on you. They want someone socially aware enough that they can say negative things without saying anything negative. There's a nuance. "I understand where they're coming from. There's definitely situations where that is preferred", translates to "I disagree totally but it's their prerogative so I'm not going to worry myself too much with that decision." It shows experience with people and ability to read between the lines.
kypro 3y ago
You're right. I had already got bad vibes from the interview by this point and started acting up a bit. I was initially really interested in the company and made it clear early on that I really liked what they were doing and how I thought I could add value, but they started shooting me down assuring me the role I was applying for wasn't that interesting and that I'd mostly be a code monkey (obviously not in those exact words). By the time they started asking about my agile experience and what I thought of scum I figured I didn't have much to lose being honest with them. It would have been in neither of our interest for me to pretend I might have been a good fit. But yeah, generally I'll try to be mostly positive while finding something minor to be constructively critical about. I think that tends to strike the right balance between showing you can think for yourself without coming across as the type of person who will cause problems. Sounds like you've noticed the same thing.