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I'm going to say something potentially very stupid hoping someone will correct me: I don't understand why technical interviews exist in the general case. I mea

I'm going to say something potentially very stupid hoping someone will correct me: I don't understand why technical interviews exist in the general case. I mean, I understand why companies like AirBnB would like them to exist. What I don't understand is why engineers participate in them. I totally get selling yourself to the potential employer. Spending an hour on the phone talking through a technical problem. Having IRL conversations where you see if you "gel" with the team in a bunch of hard-to-quantify ways. But why would any engineer in today's market take two days to respond to asinine pet/trick questions that random engineers lob at them in order for a shot to spend additional time for people higher up the food chain to lob hypothetically less-asinine questions in a way that makes them directly comparable with the other 19 people jockeying for the spot? Do companies like AirBnB believe that there are top-tier people with nothing better to do? Or do they believe they have some perk that is different than the perks of every other startup currently hiring that would motivate top-tier people to create such time? Maybe my perception of market demand leads me to overestimate it. I get so many "please work for us" emails (from actual founders, even, let alone recruiters) that my inbox is out of control. I've gotten a job offer while writing this comment. I can't even reply at that scale. Perhaps one offer a month is lucky enough to receive an actual e-mailed decline; I never even consider doing a phone interview. Am I a precious snowflake, is my experience non-representative?

borski 14y ago
I don't write negative comments, but this was impossible to not respond to. Honestly, you sound less like you're precious and more like you're pretentious. While I'm very happy for you receiving job offers all the time (congratulations!), there are definitely reasons for an engineer to take an interview; in particular, falling in love with what a company stands for. The idea that all engineers are mercenaries ready to work for anyone and sell themselves to the highest bidder is an aged one, and one I had hoped was no longer true. If I fell in love with a company (as has happened in the past), I'd certainly be willing to jump through some hoops to "prove" myself to them - if that means going through an interview process so they can fall in love with me as much as I have with them, so be it. When I see a woman I like, I don't go up and tell her about all the other women that want to sleep with me. Instead, I flirt, I jump through some hoops, make her jump through some of mine, and ultimately establish a strong connection. Or not; that happens too. Same goes for finding work.
- atirip 14y ago
  You didn't read the story and the comment you responded, did you? Because your example with "woman I like" is not valid. There was no woman _you_ liked. There was woman who liked _you_ (recruiter e-mailed). And that _woman_ expressed desire to sleep with _you_. And after that, _you_ strongly advocated to start flirting and "jumping through some hoops" with that woman. May I ask why?
  - borski 14y ago
    I read both. There wasn't a woman who expressed desire to sleep with me. There was a woman who made eyes at me from across the bar. That's it. His immediate response was him walking over and starting the conversation. I don't know about you, but I'm not lucky enough that every time a woman makes eyes at me from across the room it is, by definition, in the context of "Let's go to my hotel room."
- noomerikal 14y ago
  How could you fall in love with a company without working for them? Isn't that synonymous with the high school scenario of falling in love with the girl that you never said hello to?
  - marcusf 14y ago
    You can love their product, and what they publicly stand for. Happened to me and didn't feel like high school.
  - borski 14y ago
    I love Stripe. I love their product so much, in fact, that if I didn't love my own company more (and significantly more), I'd try to work for them - I'd jump through any hoops. So yes, despite never having worked for Stripe, I can tell given everything I've read about their culture, using their product, etc. that we'd get along swell. It's a very similar culture to our company, in fact.
    - 14y ago
philwelch 14y ago
Maybe you just are that awesome. Developers are in higher demand than SRE's, which is one thing. But I think it's highly unusual to get a job offer without an interview process. Hiring is a big commitment and choosing the right people to hire is a tough problem; so is for choosing the right place to work at. I certainly think it's worth at least a couple days to make the right decision.
- learc83 14y ago
  >But I think it's highly unusual to get a job offer without an interview process. I don't really think it's the presence of an interview process that the OP is complaining about. Rather it's that the interview process can take 2+ full days. Do a phone interview, a 2-3 hour relevant work sample test and a 1-2 hour in person interview--then if you're still want more, pay me for a short project (that I can complete nights and weekends).
- davidw 14y ago
  Maybe his comment comes off as "I'm too cool", but there's something to what he's saying. After the Nth email from someone at Google, I got curious and said, sure, we can start the process. The first phone screening was like "Unix Trivia Time". I knew lots of things, but some others just weren't things that matter to me day to day, so while I know they're out there, I don't recall the specifics. Generally, I'd know what man page to go look up, or I might also considering a certain search engine to find information. The interviewer said that I wasn't supposed to do that. This went on for what I recall as an hour or two, and I did pass, and got invited to do some other interview. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I did not want to spend any more time doing stuff like that: they don't have offices anywhere near where I live, nor any offices for technical people in parts of Europe that I consider pleasant places to live, and I don't want to live in California either. And supposedly it's pretty difficult to land a job there anyway, so the odds would be to spend N evenings/hours doing more silly interviews just to get turned down, or even accepted and be faced with the prospect of moving somewhere I don't want to be. So I politely let them know that it had been decided that Google was not a good fit for my current employment needs, and that I wished them luck in their candidate search.
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
noomerikal 14y ago
With a LinkedIn profile that has at least three positions with experience in "startup" technologies, I believe your experience is very representative. Economically speaking, we all know there is a surplus of development-related positions (in key startup cities, i.e., sf, la, nyc, etc). What generates this ridiculous level of interview practice is the notion of "hacker-rockstar-ninja-beard" guy or gal and the inane belief in the existence of only two camps of engineering talent, 1.) hacker/rockstar/whatever and 2.) the rest being shit. Clearly, this isn't the case.

borski 14y ago

I don't write negative comments, but this was impossible to not respond to. Honestly, you sound less like you're precious and more like you're pretentious. While I'm very happy for you receiving job offers all the time (congratulations!), there are definitely reasons for an engineer to take an interview; in particular, falling in love with what a company stands for. The idea that all engineers are mercenaries ready to work for anyone and sell themselves to the highest bidder is an aged one, and one I had hoped was no longer true. If I fell in love with a company (as has happened in the past), I'd certainly be willing to jump through some hoops to "prove" myself to them - if that means going through an interview process so they can fall in love with me as much as I have with them, so be it. When I see a woman I like, I don't go up and tell her about all the other women that want to sleep with me. Instead, I flirt, I jump through some hoops, make her jump through some of mine, and ultimately establish a strong connection. Or not; that happens too. Same goes for finding work.

atirip 14y ago
You didn't read the story and the comment you responded, did you? Because your example with "woman I like" is not valid. There was no woman _you_ liked. There was woman who liked _you_ (recruiter e-mailed). And that _woman_ expressed desire to sleep with _you_. And after that, _you_ strongly advocated to start flirting and "jumping through some hoops" with that woman. May I ask why?
- borski 14y ago
  I read both. There wasn't a woman who expressed desire to sleep with me. There was a woman who made eyes at me from across the bar. That's it. His immediate response was him walking over and starting the conversation. I don't know about you, but I'm not lucky enough that every time a woman makes eyes at me from across the room it is, by definition, in the context of "Let's go to my hotel room."
noomerikal 14y ago
How could you fall in love with a company without working for them? Isn't that synonymous with the high school scenario of falling in love with the girl that you never said hello to?
- marcusf 14y ago
  You can love their product, and what they publicly stand for. Happened to me and didn't feel like high school.
- borski 14y ago
  I love Stripe. I love their product so much, in fact, that if I didn't love my own company more (and significantly more), I'd try to work for them - I'd jump through any hoops. So yes, despite never having worked for Stripe, I can tell given everything I've read about their culture, using their product, etc. that we'd get along swell. It's a very similar culture to our company, in fact.
  - 14y ago

philwelch 14y ago

Maybe you just are that awesome. Developers are in higher demand than SRE's, which is one thing. But I think it's highly unusual to get a job offer without an interview process. Hiring is a big commitment and choosing the right people to hire is a tough problem; so is for choosing the right place to work at. I certainly think it's worth at least a couple days to make the right decision.

learc83 14y ago
>But I think it's highly unusual to get a job offer without an interview process. I don't really think it's the presence of an interview process that the OP is complaining about. Rather it's that the interview process can take 2+ full days. Do a phone interview, a 2-3 hour relevant work sample test and a 1-2 hour in person interview--then if you're still want more, pay me for a short project (that I can complete nights and weekends).
davidw 14y ago
Maybe his comment comes off as "I'm too cool", but there's something to what he's saying. After the Nth email from someone at Google, I got curious and said, sure, we can start the process. The first phone screening was like "Unix Trivia Time". I knew lots of things, but some others just weren't things that matter to me day to day, so while I know they're out there, I don't recall the specifics. Generally, I'd know what man page to go look up, or I might also considering a certain search engine to find information. The interviewer said that I wasn't supposed to do that. This went on for what I recall as an hour or two, and I did pass, and got invited to do some other interview. But the more I thought about it, the more I realized I did not want to spend any more time doing stuff like that: they don't have offices anywhere near where I live, nor any offices for technical people in parts of Europe that I consider pleasant places to live, and I don't want to live in California either. And supposedly it's pretty difficult to land a job there anyway, so the odds would be to spend N evenings/hours doing more silly interviews just to get turned down, or even accepted and be faced with the prospect of moving somewhere I don't want to be. So I politely let them know that it had been decided that Google was not a good fit for my current employment needs, and that I wished them luck in their candidate search.

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

noomerikal 14y ago

With a LinkedIn profile that has at least three positions with experience in "startup" technologies, I believe your experience is very representative. Economically speaking, we all know there is a surplus of development-related positions (in key startup cities, i.e., sf, la, nyc, etc). What generates this ridiculous level of interview practice is the notion of "hacker-rockstar-ninja-beard" guy or gal and the inane belief in the existence of only two camps of engineering talent, 1.) hacker/rockstar/whatever and 2.) the rest being shit. Clearly, this isn't the case.