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If companies actually tracked the exact questions that are asked and how they are asked, then bias would be easy to spot. People they want to hire get softball

If companies actually tracked the exact questions that are asked and how they are asked, then bias would be easy to spot. People they want to hire get softball binary tree or linked list questions. People they don't want to hire get disqualifier questions that are not in any textbook (and not in journals either) which definitely can't be white-boarded to their satisfaction in 40-45 minutes. I've gotten both. The latter I research afterwards to make sure that it's in none of the 30-40 textbooks I have or in any journals, ACM library, Dr Dobbs, etc. The worst are interviewers who refuse to accept a correct answer. "Oops, I didn't expect the person to have the answer so I better make it more complicated." It's so ridiculous that it's hard to believe people would sink that low. Until you've experienced it though, you won't believe. I think it suffices to say anything that deals with distribution of money, which employment does, is going to have lots of bullshit.

fnordfnordfnord 12y ago
That's just the interviewer's way of signalling "I'm a huge shithead, and you wouldn't like working for/with me anyway."
bcg1 12y ago
Couldn't agree more. These type of questions/interviews are a total waste of time, and probably poison to most development teams. I've been on more than one interview where I know that I've hit it out of the park, and I swear that the lead dev torpedoed my prospects out of fear that somebody might know enough to call him out on his BS. Even in the best of scenarios, I think that this type of questioning has little value. Unless it is the most basic of questions to determine if the candidate actually knows the languages that they've listed on their resumes, what value is there in testing if someone knows something can be easily looked up and/or researched in a relatively short period of time if it was really important for the task at hand? Please don't take my comments as minimizing the high level of detailed technical knowledge necessary for some tasks... but for most I would take a humble hacker who can quickly inhale new knowledge over the goofballs who end up doing these interviews, hands down.
mreiland 12y ago
I've never experienced that, although I once had someone give feedback that I didn't get hired because I didn't bring a notebook and a pen to take notes during the interview. I did bring a few extra copies of my resume, mind you. Just not a notebook. I actually laughed.

fnordfnordfnord 12y ago

That's just the interviewer's way of signalling "I'm a huge shithead, and you wouldn't like working for/with me anyway."

bcg1 12y ago

Couldn't agree more. These type of questions/interviews are a total waste of time, and probably poison to most development teams. I've been on more than one interview where I know that I've hit it out of the park, and I swear that the lead dev torpedoed my prospects out of fear that somebody might know enough to call him out on his BS. Even in the best of scenarios, I think that this type of questioning has little value. Unless it is the most basic of questions to determine if the candidate actually knows the languages that they've listed on their resumes, what value is there in testing if someone knows something can be easily looked up and/or researched in a relatively short period of time if it was really important for the task at hand? Please don't take my comments as minimizing the high level of detailed technical knowledge necessary for some tasks... but for most I would take a humble hacker who can quickly inhale new knowledge over the goofballs who end up doing these interviews, hands down.

mreiland 12y ago

I've never experienced that, although I once had someone give feedback that I didn't get hired because I didn't bring a notebook and a pen to take notes during the interview. I did bring a few extra copies of my resume, mind you. Just not a notebook. I actually laughed.