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The problem you are describing is interview variance and hiring bias, not leetcode. This happens irrespective of interview style. Many companies have question

The problem you are describing is interview variance and hiring bias, not leetcode. This happens irrespective of interview style. Many companies have question banks that are specially designed to be fair/have some contextual relevance (ideally) to some "realistic" problem. Or at least, many of the companies I've interviewed at follow this model. I consider these coding questions to be "leetcode" style because at the end of the day they are an isolated coding problem, even though they may not be a problem from leetcode verbatim. Companies that execute on that style of interview well are generally fairly pleasant interviews, at least in my experience. Good companies/interviewers will gauge more than just the final code to determine a hire or no hire. And a large portion of companies also have hiring ratings on a scale to make it less binary.

kidintech 2y ago
Question banks that are too big: huge variance, and OP's point stands. Question banks that are too small: leaked on eastern forums immediately, candidates show up reading answers out to you (some of the guides include guidance on when to pretend to think, I am not kidding). The idealized version of "question banks" might work. The real one does not; you'd require employees constantly scouring forums in every language known to mankind, immediately removing anything that gets leaked. On top of that you'd probably require a competent committee overseeing all questions in the bank constantly and ensuring the lack of variance in difficulty. Source: I interviewed at and for Goog and Pltr.
- boshalfoshal 2y ago
  I agree with you, but I don't really see how this invalidates the style of interviews where you're presented with some timeboxed coding problem (of reasonably scaled difficulty) and are asked to solve it. There will be bad actors regardless of the interview style, thats why companies have multiple interview types/styles/rounds to sus out a candidate, as you probably know. If they BSed their way through a leetcode interview, then they probably won't make it past a behavioral interview where they have to go in depth on some past project. And if they BSed that as well as every other round, then hey maybe they are crafty enough to succeed at the actual job.
  - kidintech 2y ago
    > and are asked to solve it. I think this is where our different opinions come from, while we agree on the other aspects. In my personal experience, I have never felt that the hire/no-hire decision relied exclusively on my ability of solving the presented problem; I have passed interviews where I did not solve the LC-style problem optimally but I communicated clearly, picked up on hints, was aware of when I hit "walls" and provided working but less than ideal alternatives when I could not figure out the neat tricks. Reading through the thread it seems that my experience is not universal, and the majority here have had less pleasant interviews, so I understand where you are coming from.
    - bombela 2y ago
      I have had all possible experiences. Sometimes I feel like genius and ace some leetcode with an almost novel solution. Sometimes I missunderstand the question/scope and mud myself into the hole of despair. I have been rejected for one mediocre interview among many good ones. Or the other way around accepted even though I didn't perform well. Sometimes the interviewer works with me. Sometimes against me. Sometimes a war story impresseses positively, sometimes raises suspicions. At this point it feels like gambling. I have also ran almost 400 interviews on the other side over the years, and to me it seems quite clear when somebody cannot write code at all. I like to think I am not biased. But who knows.
    - johnnyanmac 2y ago
      >Reading through the thread it seems that my experience is not universal, and the majority here have had less pleasant interviews, so I understand where you are coming from. it changes immensely based on the job market. I've defintiely tanked some inerviews hard, stumbling on softball questions that shoulda been a bullet point. But I get pretty far or even gotten offers. The last 12-18 months though? I've had interviews that felt like a dream but got zero follow up to. Been ghosted after seemingly final rounds where I spent 5+ hours on technical tests. It's not even enough to "understand the problem and communicate steps". You gotta be flawless, and you still might be cut compared to 3 years ago where a "C" performance could still land multiple offers as long as your experience made up for the quiz questions.
- Rinzler89 2y ago
  > leaked on eastern forums immediately What exactly are "Eastern forums"? "Eastern" what? Europe? Asia? The world?
  - kidintech 2y ago
    The most common example would be 1point3acres. I'd prefer to not be more specific; I chose the word Eastern on purpose. For DEI committees reading this: I am both eastern european and asian, so I hope to be exempt from any scrutiny.
    - Rinzler89 2y ago
      So you wanted to say "Chinese forums" but couldn't say it out of fear?
      - kidintech 2y ago
        no. I wanted to say Eastern, as I have examples from both Asia and East Europe. I wished to not be more specific so as to not derail the discussion into "user kidintech implied that nation X has a tendency to cheat".
        Rinzler89 2y ago
        Out of curiosity, can you share some examples from eastern Europe? Where does one find such websites? Also, IMHO, blanket generalizations like "Asia" and "Eastern Europe" in such contexts can actually be more offensive than just mentioning the one country where the thing happens since you're basically painting with tar a whole sub-continent with dozens of different countries, just for the things happening in one country. What I mean is, if by Eastern Europe, you actually mean some dodgy Russian forums, I think a lot of Eastern Europeans from Bulgaria all the way to Poland and the Baltics might feel offended of being included since we are not the same.
        kidintech 2y ago
dinobones 2y ago
I take issue with it because Leetcode gives tech people a fake feel good, “yeah but at least it’s fair” illusion, when really it’s probably just as biased as any other hiring method. This is ironic considering these companies have forced mandatory DEI seminars (which I have no problem with btw), inclusive language, #EveryoneCanCode, and so on. But despite all this, you end up with teams and organizations that are 99% of the same X somehow. Replace X with race, school, even state from home country sometimes. You know there are websites where people share all the interview questions to these hard interviews / referrals exclusively in their language and behind a pay or rep wall? And there are Telegram groups where international students leaks the questions or do interviews in place for one another. It’s inevitable these types of issues arise when there’s so much at stake, ex: in just 5 years, a $200k TC advantage at a top company, becomes $1m or more with appreciation. I just really dislike the veneer of “fairness” when there are so many problems with the process, even beyond the questions that have nothing to do with the job.
- lupusreal 2y ago
  > This is ironic considering these companies have forced mandatory DEI seminars (which I have no problem with btw), inclusive language, #EveryoneCanCode, and so on. I really do wonder what those sanctimonious sermons are meant to accomplish. People who are already ideologically aligned with them won't learn anything new and may just resent it, while people who aren't aligned won't become aligned as a result of that "training". But you're talking about it as though you expect it to have a constructive impact, resulting in irony when it doesn't. I don't see the irony because I don't expect any benefit from those struggle sessions in the first place.
  - matheusmoreira 2y ago
    They're supposed to absolve the corporation and its leadership of responsibility and liability. By giving that training they get to claim they did all they could.
    - lupusreal 2y ago

kidintech 2y ago

Question banks that are too big: huge variance, and OP's point stands. Question banks that are too small: leaked on eastern forums immediately, candidates show up reading answers out to you (some of the guides include guidance on when to pretend to think, I am not kidding). The idealized version of "question banks" might work. The real one does not; you'd require employees constantly scouring forums in every language known to mankind, immediately removing anything that gets leaked. On top of that you'd probably require a competent committee overseeing all questions in the bank constantly and ensuring the lack of variance in difficulty. Source: I interviewed at and for Goog and Pltr.

boshalfoshal 2y ago
I agree with you, but I don't really see how this invalidates the style of interviews where you're presented with some timeboxed coding problem (of reasonably scaled difficulty) and are asked to solve it. There will be bad actors regardless of the interview style, thats why companies have multiple interview types/styles/rounds to sus out a candidate, as you probably know. If they BSed their way through a leetcode interview, then they probably won't make it past a behavioral interview where they have to go in depth on some past project. And if they BSed that as well as every other round, then hey maybe they are crafty enough to succeed at the actual job.
- kidintech 2y ago
  > and are asked to solve it. I think this is where our different opinions come from, while we agree on the other aspects. In my personal experience, I have never felt that the hire/no-hire decision relied exclusively on my ability of solving the presented problem; I have passed interviews where I did not solve the LC-style problem optimally but I communicated clearly, picked up on hints, was aware of when I hit "walls" and provided working but less than ideal alternatives when I could not figure out the neat tricks. Reading through the thread it seems that my experience is not universal, and the majority here have had less pleasant interviews, so I understand where you are coming from.
  - bombela 2y ago
    I have had all possible experiences. Sometimes I feel like genius and ace some leetcode with an almost novel solution. Sometimes I missunderstand the question/scope and mud myself into the hole of despair. I have been rejected for one mediocre interview among many good ones. Or the other way around accepted even though I didn't perform well. Sometimes the interviewer works with me. Sometimes against me. Sometimes a war story impresseses positively, sometimes raises suspicions. At this point it feels like gambling. I have also ran almost 400 interviews on the other side over the years, and to me it seems quite clear when somebody cannot write code at all. I like to think I am not biased. But who knows.
  - johnnyanmac 2y ago
    >Reading through the thread it seems that my experience is not universal, and the majority here have had less pleasant interviews, so I understand where you are coming from. it changes immensely based on the job market. I've defintiely tanked some inerviews hard, stumbling on softball questions that shoulda been a bullet point. But I get pretty far or even gotten offers. The last 12-18 months though? I've had interviews that felt like a dream but got zero follow up to. Been ghosted after seemingly final rounds where I spent 5+ hours on technical tests. It's not even enough to "understand the problem and communicate steps". You gotta be flawless, and you still might be cut compared to 3 years ago where a "C" performance could still land multiple offers as long as your experience made up for the quiz questions.
Rinzler89 2y ago
> leaked on eastern forums immediately What exactly are "Eastern forums"? "Eastern" what? Europe? Asia? The world?
- kidintech 2y ago
  The most common example would be 1point3acres. I'd prefer to not be more specific; I chose the word Eastern on purpose. For DEI committees reading this: I am both eastern european and asian, so I hope to be exempt from any scrutiny.
  - Rinzler89 2y ago
    So you wanted to say "Chinese forums" but couldn't say it out of fear?
    - kidintech 2y ago
      no. I wanted to say Eastern, as I have examples from both Asia and East Europe. I wished to not be more specific so as to not derail the discussion into "user kidintech implied that nation X has a tendency to cheat".
      - Rinzler89 2y ago
        Out of curiosity, can you share some examples from eastern Europe? Where does one find such websites? Also, IMHO, blanket generalizations like "Asia" and "Eastern Europe" in such contexts can actually be more offensive than just mentioning the one country where the thing happens since you're basically painting with tar a whole sub-continent with dozens of different countries, just for the things happening in one country. What I mean is, if by Eastern Europe, you actually mean some dodgy Russian forums, I think a lot of Eastern Europeans from Bulgaria all the way to Poland and the Baltics might feel offended of being included since we are not the same.
        kidintech 2y ago

dinobones 2y ago

I take issue with it because Leetcode gives tech people a fake feel good, “yeah but at least it’s fair” illusion, when really it’s probably just as biased as any other hiring method. This is ironic considering these companies have forced mandatory DEI seminars (which I have no problem with btw), inclusive language, #EveryoneCanCode, and so on. But despite all this, you end up with teams and organizations that are 99% of the same X somehow. Replace X with race, school, even state from home country sometimes. You know there are websites where people share all the interview questions to these hard interviews / referrals exclusively in their language and behind a pay or rep wall? And there are Telegram groups where international students leaks the questions or do interviews in place for one another. It’s inevitable these types of issues arise when there’s so much at stake, ex: in just 5 years, a $200k TC advantage at a top company, becomes $1m or more with appreciation. I just really dislike the veneer of “fairness” when there are so many problems with the process, even beyond the questions that have nothing to do with the job.

lupusreal 2y ago
> This is ironic considering these companies have forced mandatory DEI seminars (which I have no problem with btw), inclusive language, #EveryoneCanCode, and so on. I really do wonder what those sanctimonious sermons are meant to accomplish. People who are already ideologically aligned with them won't learn anything new and may just resent it, while people who aren't aligned won't become aligned as a result of that "training". But you're talking about it as though you expect it to have a constructive impact, resulting in irony when it doesn't. I don't see the irony because I don't expect any benefit from those struggle sessions in the first place.
- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  They're supposed to absolve the corporation and its leadership of responsibility and liability. By giving that training they get to claim they did all they could.
  - lupusreal 2y ago