4 ms·

This approach screens out people who have the potential to accomplish but haven't yet - I would never try to interview people like this for a development role,

by Bahamut 11y ago

This approach screens out people who have the potential to accomplish but haven't yet - I would never try to interview people like this for a development role, since past experience doesn't necessarily tell me if they can do what is needed well.

ChrisLTD 11y ago
Shouldn't people at least have school or personal projects they can discuss?
- sarciszewski 11y ago
  Not always, no. Aptitude !== Experience
derf_ 11y ago
I don't think the point is to make them tell you what awesome things they have already accomplished. Maybe they've accomplished nothing. But they've probably got some experience on their resume, or you wouldn't be talking to them. Maybe that's only class projects, but that's enough. The point is to get them to talk about something they have spent hundreds of hours thinking about. Something on which they are the experts. They should be able to go into detail and tell you what they found interesting. Both of those things are very informative.
rdtsc 11y ago
It depends. If they are already mid through their programming career and they haven't accomplished anything yet, you might want dig in and find out why.
MCRed 11y ago
I don't think there is such a thing as someone who has the potential but hasn't done it. You should always have some projects you did, even in school, to talk about. If you haven't done any projects then your education is not complete. Someone who tells you how they solved a bunch of problems in a language and context that is different from the one you're interviewing them for -- is exactly the kind of person you want to hire. The problems are always different. If you can't make that conceptual leap (from how they solved problem in a different context to how they would in your context), I don't think you should be interviewing people, honestly. I'm not meaning to be rude, but this is the problem that HR people and "recruiters" have.
- atom-morgan 11y ago
  > I don't think there is such a thing as someone who has the potential but hasn't done it. I had an intern once. No coding experience but very eager to learn. That company went under but he's now working full-time as a developer - even transitioned into devops. That's my example of someone who showed great potential but hadn't done it yet. He realized as graduation was approaching that he wanted to do something else and went for it.
  - Bahamut 11y ago
    To add to this, I have not ever taken a programming class - after 1 1/2 years in software engineering, I became a senior engineer. Previous experience didn't really say much about me except that I took on increasingly difficult problems & roles. I knew everything that was thrown at me though. Smart people aren't quick to judge largely on the past - they take the baseline that they are looking for, set out to gather evidence for and against it, and assess on whether the criteria is met based on a wholesome picture - the past should be a couple of data points amongst many.
    - majormajor 11y ago
      It's unclear if you'd taken on programming projects; if so, it sounds like you would've been able to discuss them in detail. Even with a class project, if someone was interested enough in the class that they can tell you months later "oh, yeah, this project was interesting, we did it with method x because we'd already studied methods y and z and they weren't as well suited for reasons a, b, and c"—even if those reasons were straight from the lectures—then they're already well ahead of most university candidates I've talked to. Most people mostly forget stuff beyond "oh, yeah, we did it this way cause the textbook said to." Similarly for "what else might you do with that?" type questions. Now, if you haven't taken any classes, and haven't done any software projects for other stuff, yeah, you wouldn't have anything to talk about. But figuring out if someone who's never touched code before is going to be able to do it well is an extremely hard problem -- that person isn't going to make it past any other interview method I've encountered, either. How would you approach that candidate?

by Bahamut 11y ago

ChrisLTD 11y ago

Shouldn't people at least have school or personal projects they can discuss?

sarciszewski 11y ago
Not always, no. Aptitude !== Experience

derf_ 11y ago

I don't think the point is to make them tell you what awesome things they have already accomplished. Maybe they've accomplished nothing. But they've probably got some experience on their resume, or you wouldn't be talking to them. Maybe that's only class projects, but that's enough. The point is to get them to talk about something they have spent hundreds of hours thinking about. Something on which they are the experts. They should be able to go into detail and tell you what they found interesting. Both of those things are very informative.

rdtsc 11y ago

It depends. If they are already mid through their programming career and they haven't accomplished anything yet, you might want dig in and find out why.

MCRed 11y ago

I don't think there is such a thing as someone who has the potential but hasn't done it. You should always have some projects you did, even in school, to talk about. If you haven't done any projects then your education is not complete. Someone who tells you how they solved a bunch of problems in a language and context that is different from the one you're interviewing them for -- is exactly the kind of person you want to hire. The problems are always different. If you can't make that conceptual leap (from how they solved problem in a different context to how they would in your context), I don't think you should be interviewing people, honestly. I'm not meaning to be rude, but this is the problem that HR people and "recruiters" have.

atom-morgan 11y ago
> I don't think there is such a thing as someone who has the potential but hasn't done it. I had an intern once. No coding experience but very eager to learn. That company went under but he's now working full-time as a developer - even transitioned into devops. That's my example of someone who showed great potential but hadn't done it yet. He realized as graduation was approaching that he wanted to do something else and went for it.
- Bahamut 11y ago
  To add to this, I have not ever taken a programming class - after 1 1/2 years in software engineering, I became a senior engineer. Previous experience didn't really say much about me except that I took on increasingly difficult problems & roles. I knew everything that was thrown at me though. Smart people aren't quick to judge largely on the past - they take the baseline that they are looking for, set out to gather evidence for and against it, and assess on whether the criteria is met based on a wholesome picture - the past should be a couple of data points amongst many.
  - majormajor 11y ago
    It's unclear if you'd taken on programming projects; if so, it sounds like you would've been able to discuss them in detail. Even with a class project, if someone was interested enough in the class that they can tell you months later "oh, yeah, this project was interesting, we did it with method x because we'd already studied methods y and z and they weren't as well suited for reasons a, b, and c"—even if those reasons were straight from the lectures—then they're already well ahead of most university candidates I've talked to. Most people mostly forget stuff beyond "oh, yeah, we did it this way cause the textbook said to." Similarly for "what else might you do with that?" type questions. Now, if you haven't taken any classes, and haven't done any software projects for other stuff, yeah, you wouldn't have anything to talk about. But figuring out if someone who's never touched code before is going to be able to do it well is an extremely hard problem -- that person isn't going to make it past any other interview method I've encountered, either. How would you approach that candidate?