4 ms·

She's spot on. I consider myself a competent developer (6 years experience, "big fish in a small pond"), and I don't really interview often. I've interviewed

She's spot on. I consider myself a competent developer (6 years experience, "big fish in a small pond"), and I don't really interview often. I've interviewed at Google twice, the first time doing 2 phone interviews and a round of on-site interviews, and the second time not making it past the phone interview. I have prepared well for the interviews every time. I understand the algorithms, the data structures, and can program them on my own time no problem. But the second I'm in an interview setting, I lock up and can't think. I stumble across stupid thoughts (How many bits are in a byte? Oh yea, 8. But what about the 0th bit? What to do?!) and just work myself into a corner. All the while trying to seek approval from the interviewer. After about 2 minutes, I become a wreck and am hopeless. I also don't consider myself non-social, and deal with coworkers very well. I still don't understand what it is about the technical interview setting that makes me act like this.

Tycho 14y ago
I think people feel comfortable in settings where they draw on a concrete body of knowledge (like most normal job interviews). With programming though, everything is logic, being able to dynamically model rules and patterns in your head is everything. You build these models in your head, using your programming talent, but they are like volatile memory, and you always need to reconstruct them. So when you go into an interview, you have little concrete knowledge to lean on, so off the bat you lack confidence and get worked up because you don't realise why this should be.
incision 14y ago
For what it's worth... I'm no rockstar, but I can honestly claim to be pretty comfortable in technical interviews. I chalk that comfort up to two main things. 1) A mentality that says something like... "I'm good, I'm solid. Fuck this guy." The point isn't the specific words, or expressing this outwardly, it's about getting into a mental state of calm confidence, pushing out the anxiety and concerning yourself only with the moment. 2) Talking with and being challenged by smart people on a regular basis. Ideally people who are smarter and/or more knowledgeable than yourself. I expect being the big fish in a small pond generally works against this.
- aiurtourist 14y ago
  This is my secret to interviewing and speaking as well. On the inside I repeat, "Fuck this guy" or "I could beat the shit out of everyone in this audience" even though I don't truthfully want to cause harm to anybody. It helps surpress the deer-in-highlights fear resulting from being in the spotlight.
- nostrademons 14y ago
  I don't usually think of it as "Fuck this guy", but rather, "I can help this company." There's a lot implicit in that statement - that I want to help this company, that this company can be helped, etc. But fundamentally, it's that I am offering more to my employer than they are offering to me. If they choose not to take me, that is their loss. Actually, that seems to be a good mentality to build confidence in general. I've heard (I haven't managed it yet) that the secret to getting girls is to think of offering them the chance to be with you - you aren't trying to "get" the girl, but rather offering your companionship and emotional investment to a suitable girl who's willing to take it. The secret to networking is to offer favors to people in need of them. The secret to negotiation is to offer something of value to the other side and ask for something that they value less in return.
  - Evbn 14y ago
    Bingo. Treat the interviewer like an intelligent student in a class you are teaching => win.
eduardordm 14y ago
This kind of "skill" elitism will not help google create products that people want to use. They do not live in the same reality as their average user. The consistent failure of most of it's products in the past few years was caused - in part - by the complete lack of understanding people in general.
- Evbn 14y ago
  The average is nowhere near qualified to build the product they use, though, so that's not the problem. Focusing on CS algorithms more than HCI, maybe.
  - eduardordm 14y ago
    Valid point. But my opinion is that you cannot have your whole staff made of the same "category" of people. I guess diversity is not only about race, color or religion, is about people that come from all kinds of backgrounds, I'm "sure" that there isn't one single black guy without a degree that used to live in the bronx there. Maybe they are making products they want to use, not people in general. Intelligence is just a social fitting, really.

Tycho 14y ago

I think people feel comfortable in settings where they draw on a concrete body of knowledge (like most normal job interviews). With programming though, everything is logic, being able to dynamically model rules and patterns in your head is everything. You build these models in your head, using your programming talent, but they are like volatile memory, and you always need to reconstruct them. So when you go into an interview, you have little concrete knowledge to lean on, so off the bat you lack confidence and get worked up because you don't realise why this should be.

incision 14y ago

For what it's worth... I'm no rockstar, but I can honestly claim to be pretty comfortable in technical interviews. I chalk that comfort up to two main things. 1) A mentality that says something like... "I'm good, I'm solid. Fuck this guy." The point isn't the specific words, or expressing this outwardly, it's about getting into a mental state of calm confidence, pushing out the anxiety and concerning yourself only with the moment. 2) Talking with and being challenged by smart people on a regular basis. Ideally people who are smarter and/or more knowledgeable than yourself. I expect being the big fish in a small pond generally works against this.

aiurtourist 14y ago
This is my secret to interviewing and speaking as well. On the inside I repeat, "Fuck this guy" or "I could beat the shit out of everyone in this audience" even though I don't truthfully want to cause harm to anybody. It helps surpress the deer-in-highlights fear resulting from being in the spotlight.
nostrademons 14y ago
I don't usually think of it as "Fuck this guy", but rather, "I can help this company." There's a lot implicit in that statement - that I want to help this company, that this company can be helped, etc. But fundamentally, it's that I am offering more to my employer than they are offering to me. If they choose not to take me, that is their loss. Actually, that seems to be a good mentality to build confidence in general. I've heard (I haven't managed it yet) that the secret to getting girls is to think of offering them the chance to be with you - you aren't trying to "get" the girl, but rather offering your companionship and emotional investment to a suitable girl who's willing to take it. The secret to networking is to offer favors to people in need of them. The secret to negotiation is to offer something of value to the other side and ask for something that they value less in return.
- Evbn 14y ago
  Bingo. Treat the interviewer like an intelligent student in a class you are teaching => win.

eduardordm 14y ago

This kind of "skill" elitism will not help google create products that people want to use. They do not live in the same reality as their average user. The consistent failure of most of it's products in the past few years was caused - in part - by the complete lack of understanding people in general.

Evbn 14y ago
The average is nowhere near qualified to build the product they use, though, so that's not the problem. Focusing on CS algorithms more than HCI, maybe.
- eduardordm 14y ago
  Valid point. But my opinion is that you cannot have your whole staff made of the same "category" of people. I guess diversity is not only about race, color or religion, is about people that come from all kinds of backgrounds, I'm "sure" that there isn't one single black guy without a degree that used to live in the bronx there. Maybe they are making products they want to use, not people in general. Intelligence is just a social fitting, really.