3 ms·

This is painful to read. Not because of the poster's anxiety but because of his unwillingness to refuse these types of interviews completely. If you have a rea

This is painful to read. Not because of the poster's anxiety but because of his unwillingness to refuse these types of interviews completely. If you have a reasonable amount of experience and a track record of actually delivering working software that people use in the real world you don't need to subject yourself to this nonsense. Sure refusing these types of interviews means you won't be considered for certain jobs at certain companies but do you really want to work for a company that is so foolish as to run candidates through a series of standardized tests and ask them to do a bunch of tasks under a microscope that are completely unrelated to the job you'd be performing? A lot of the companies that employ these ridiculous interview tactics are staffed by people who have deluded themselves into believing that their lightly used web app requires elite programmers. There are plenty of good opportunities for half decent devs at companies not staffed by people who want you to spend 8 hours whiteboarding algorithms but won't take time out of their day to read your resume, review your code samples and ask you relevant questions about your experience.

anonymoushn 13y ago
What companies have you worked for that have no real-time problem solving or programming in the hiring process? Since you want people to not waste time, do their hiring processes also not include any take-home problems?
- DontWasteTime 13y ago
  Every single one. I have never worked for a company that treated an interview like the SATs. Maybe I was lucky earlier in my career but now that I have been in the industry long enough and have a big enough collection of work I can reference I am comfortable avoiding companies that basically make the assumption that every candidate is either incompetent or lying about their experience. I mean if you can't sit down with me and engage in a real dialog that establishes I know what I say I know that's on you, not me. I think take home tasks are fine so long as they don't require more than a few hours and are clearly relevant to the job. If you can't come up with a task that mirrors the type of thing I'm going to be doing on a daily basis and ask me to do something inane it tells me you're lazy or not focused on what's important.
UncleOxidant 13y ago
As the author, I feel like I have to actually defend the interviewers because they generally weren't as bad as you describe. It's not that they shouldn't ask questions or shouldn't even ask you to whiteboard an algorithm (though I think it would actually be better to give you a REPL and have you code with that), I think the issue is that some people (myself included) have developed certain phobias that make that sort of thing potentially difficult. It might be better to ask candidates to code something up prior to coming in and then go over the code together in the interview.
- DontWasteTime 13y ago
  "It might be better to ask candidates to code something up prior to coming in and then go over the code together in the interview." That is entirely reasonable and a lot of employers do this. So why bother with the ones who want you to demonstrate whiteboard chops that don't have any relevance to the daily work you'd be doing? Remember... the interview isn't just for the employer. It's your only opportunity to determine if you're interested in working for the company. If the interview is a one way street and doesn't give you the opportunity to learn anything meaningful about the work you're really going to be doing, how would you feel good about joining the company even if you ace their inane whiteboarding exercises?

anonymoushn 13y ago

What companies have you worked for that have no real-time problem solving or programming in the hiring process? Since you want people to not waste time, do their hiring processes also not include any take-home problems?

DontWasteTime 13y ago
Every single one. I have never worked for a company that treated an interview like the SATs. Maybe I was lucky earlier in my career but now that I have been in the industry long enough and have a big enough collection of work I can reference I am comfortable avoiding companies that basically make the assumption that every candidate is either incompetent or lying about their experience. I mean if you can't sit down with me and engage in a real dialog that establishes I know what I say I know that's on you, not me. I think take home tasks are fine so long as they don't require more than a few hours and are clearly relevant to the job. If you can't come up with a task that mirrors the type of thing I'm going to be doing on a daily basis and ask me to do something inane it tells me you're lazy or not focused on what's important.

UncleOxidant 13y ago

As the author, I feel like I have to actually defend the interviewers because they generally weren't as bad as you describe. It's not that they shouldn't ask questions or shouldn't even ask you to whiteboard an algorithm (though I think it would actually be better to give you a REPL and have you code with that), I think the issue is that some people (myself included) have developed certain phobias that make that sort of thing potentially difficult. It might be better to ask candidates to code something up prior to coming in and then go over the code together in the interview.

DontWasteTime 13y ago
"It might be better to ask candidates to code something up prior to coming in and then go over the code together in the interview." That is entirely reasonable and a lot of employers do this. So why bother with the ones who want you to demonstrate whiteboard chops that don't have any relevance to the daily work you'd be doing? Remember... the interview isn't just for the employer. It's your only opportunity to determine if you're interested in working for the company. If the interview is a one way street and doesn't give you the opportunity to learn anything meaningful about the work you're really going to be doing, how would you feel good about joining the company even if you ace their inane whiteboarding exercises?