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Conventional technical interview (DSA, whiteboard architecture). Then 1-2 day paid work trial. Interestingly…no one has said no to the trial. It turns out th

Conventional technical interview (DSA, whiteboard architecture). Then 1-2 day paid work trial. Interestingly…no one has said no to the trial. It turns out that people want to derisk their decision just as much, if not more.

jdlshore 7d ago
Were the people you were interviewing already unemployed? Work trials are harder when people are already employed. There can be legal issues as well as scheduling ones.
- mathgeek 7d ago
  This will always be the problem with trials. Anyone with a job, often underemployed between software roles these days, will be excluded. Still, it does benefit the hiring company, just not the applicant in these situations.
  - bayarearefugee 7d ago
    > Still, it does benefit the hiring company Not sure it benefits the hiring company when they are artificially reducing the pool of applicants to only people who don't already have jobs. Not that there's shame in not having a job, especially in today's market (shit happens, I'm sure lots of very qualified people are currently looking), but there are solid statistical reasons why social proof of already being employed is seen as a positive.
    - mathgeek 6d ago
      Net benefits perhaps. It absolutely lets the hiring company get more information by increasing the amount of time spent by the candidate before a commitment occurs.
- paulddraper 6d ago
  If you’re doing traditional on-site interviews, you’re already asking for multiple days (unless they live nearby). It can be a challenge sometimes, but not as often as you might think. I’m sure there are heavy-handed employment contracts that prohibit side work, but hasn’t been a problem in practice.
broken-kebab 6d ago
How do you deal with onboarding, both technically, and legally if your eval period is 1-2 days? I mean unless you are a one-man team, and can just give all permissions yourself, and ignore legalities, it sounds way too short
- scaredreally 6d ago
  I assume the paid work is issued via a private repo and not full access?
- paulddraper 6d ago
  Same as for other contractors. Yes, there is friction, but if you do it enough, it gets reasonably small.
zubinajmera 5d ago
[flagged]

jdlshore 7d ago

Were the people you were interviewing already unemployed? Work trials are harder when people are already employed. There can be legal issues as well as scheduling ones.

mathgeek 7d ago
This will always be the problem with trials. Anyone with a job, often underemployed between software roles these days, will be excluded. Still, it does benefit the hiring company, just not the applicant in these situations.
- bayarearefugee 7d ago
  > Still, it does benefit the hiring company Not sure it benefits the hiring company when they are artificially reducing the pool of applicants to only people who don't already have jobs. Not that there's shame in not having a job, especially in today's market (shit happens, I'm sure lots of very qualified people are currently looking), but there are solid statistical reasons why social proof of already being employed is seen as a positive.
  - mathgeek 6d ago
    Net benefits perhaps. It absolutely lets the hiring company get more information by increasing the amount of time spent by the candidate before a commitment occurs.
paulddraper 6d ago
If you’re doing traditional on-site interviews, you’re already asking for multiple days (unless they live nearby). It can be a challenge sometimes, but not as often as you might think. I’m sure there are heavy-handed employment contracts that prohibit side work, but hasn’t been a problem in practice.

broken-kebab 6d ago

How do you deal with onboarding, both technically, and legally if your eval period is 1-2 days? I mean unless you are a one-man team, and can just give all permissions yourself, and ignore legalities, it sounds way too short

scaredreally 6d ago
I assume the paid work is issued via a private repo and not full access?
paulddraper 6d ago
Same as for other contractors. Yes, there is friction, but if you do it enough, it gets reasonably small.

zubinajmera 5d ago

[flagged]