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ask deep technical questions and evaluate the response. I've had better success, by a wide margin, doing this, than any code challenges ever gave. I don't kno

ask deep technical questions and evaluate the response. I've had better success, by a wide margin, doing this, than any code challenges ever gave. I don't know why the industry is so averse to this, it really does work, and I know others who also swear by it. You can find the bullshitters pretty quickly even in this ChatGPT driven world

collingreen 1y ago
I think the pushback here is from the following: 1. Because it is so dynamic and subjective, it is very hard to systematize this kind of interview, which makes it very hard to work into a repeatable or scalable process. The need to compare incoming candidates is an unfortunate reality of the industry for many companies. 1b. It is basically impossible to control for bias and things like "was the interviewer having a good day". 2. This kind of interview overly rewards charismatic speakers -- this is partially ok, depending on the role, because being able to speak accurately and cogently about the work you're doing and are going to do is part of the job (especially for staff+ engineering). It isn't necessary for all jobs, however. 3. Many people aren't good at driving this kind of conversation for whatever reason. When it goes well it goes well but when this kind of conversation goes poorly it reflects badly on the company. 4. People Ops want more control then this gives them, across many dimensions.
akoboldfrying 1y ago
"Write some code to solve this tricky problem" seems like a deep technical question to me. Can you give some examples of what you have in mind?
- no_wizard 1y ago
  define "tricky problem". Given the nature of something being tricky, it could well be too heavily reliant on the 'trick'.
  - akoboldfrying 1y ago
    I had in mind the problem given in TFA, but I should have been explicit about that. I think it's probably too hard as an interview question, but also that it actually is a somewhat realistic problem that I'd expect a senior programmer to (eventually) puzzle out correctly. (As opposed to, say, the archetypal bad interview question, "How do you swap two integer values without using a temporary?", where many people happen to already know the trick, and if you don't, you're unlikely to figure it out on your own in the space of an interview.)
throwaway2037 1y ago
> deep technical questions Can you provide some examples?
- mrheosuper 1y ago
  not OP, but i was once asked from the HTTP layer down to PHY layer (a role for embedded system)

collingreen 1y ago

I think the pushback here is from the following: 1. Because it is so dynamic and subjective, it is very hard to systematize this kind of interview, which makes it very hard to work into a repeatable or scalable process. The need to compare incoming candidates is an unfortunate reality of the industry for many companies. 1b. It is basically impossible to control for bias and things like "was the interviewer having a good day". 2. This kind of interview overly rewards charismatic speakers -- this is partially ok, depending on the role, because being able to speak accurately and cogently about the work you're doing and are going to do is part of the job (especially for staff+ engineering). It isn't necessary for all jobs, however. 3. Many people aren't good at driving this kind of conversation for whatever reason. When it goes well it goes well but when this kind of conversation goes poorly it reflects badly on the company. 4. People Ops want more control then this gives them, across many dimensions.

akoboldfrying 1y ago

"Write some code to solve this tricky problem" seems like a deep technical question to me. Can you give some examples of what you have in mind?

no_wizard 1y ago
define "tricky problem". Given the nature of something being tricky, it could well be too heavily reliant on the 'trick'.
- akoboldfrying 1y ago
  I had in mind the problem given in TFA, but I should have been explicit about that. I think it's probably too hard as an interview question, but also that it actually is a somewhat realistic problem that I'd expect a senior programmer to (eventually) puzzle out correctly. (As opposed to, say, the archetypal bad interview question, "How do you swap two integer values without using a temporary?", where many people happen to already know the trick, and if you don't, you're unlikely to figure it out on your own in the space of an interview.)

throwaway2037 1y ago

> deep technical questions Can you provide some examples?

mrheosuper 1y ago
not OP, but i was once asked from the HTTP layer down to PHY layer (a role for embedded system)