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"Not looking for a solution. Looking for the thought process." This is the part I can't understand. When the person is on the job, the opposite is in effect. I
by freework 14y ago
"Not looking for a solution. Looking for the thought process."
This is the part I can't understand. When the person is on the job, the opposite is in effect. If you tell the candidate to solve a hard problem, you don't wan them to just spit out their thought process, do you? No, you want them to solve the problem. Why the opposite for interviews?
- suresk 14y agoIf I'm an employer and you are working for me, I am asking you to solve a problem because there is some value in the result. If I'm interviewing you, chances are, the result has no intrinsic value - I already (hopefully) know it. What I want to know is "Can you solve other similarly difficult problems?" In this context, being able to come up with a solution to the problem isn't as useful in answering that as knowing how you solved it.
- rizzom5000 14y agoProbably because you have, at best, a few hours in an interview to determine whether or not someone can solve the hard problems. Many hard problems take more than a few hours to solve, so the interview process serves as a gauge of how likely a candidate can do this on the job; of course after other vetting methods were applied.