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Nessus posted:Sounds like they need to be more energetic and care more about their field or else they're deadweight slackers.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:05
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:In any case, while you have that impairment that prevents your brain from remembering what you were arguing about, I remember that the issue at hand here is expecting candidates to run a gauntlet of 1:1 interviews with multiple people. If judging quality is so incredibly impossible, what is it the fourth interviewer can catch that the first three didn't? The different interviewers/interviews test different skills. For SWE, it's more like algorithms/data structures + system design. For my role, it's some combination of algorithms/data structures + databases/data manipulation + math/stats + analysis of a particular data problem. So yeah, since the fourth interviewer is asking questions about a completely different topic than the first three, they are picking up different signals. You really are just guessing how all of this works, aren't you? Tiny Brontosaurus posted:That's not unique to tech. A comedy writer can't point at a late-night monologue and say "one of those jokes was mine." It is a challenge but gauntlet interviews are a poor tool for solving it. I'm getting annoyed at the smuggo up there who keeps sputtering about how it's The Only Way and telling me I must suck at my job because I know more than one way to tackle a problem. If there's one person here talking about The Only Way, it's probably the person who's making blanket statements about technical interviews being unreasonable for technical employees and 2+ hours being an unfathomably long amount of time to assess skills that have been cultivated for the last 10+ years, for jobs that routinely pay 200-500k a year. The particular irony of the situation is that you're basically doing here what every obnoxious tech 'disruptor' does when they go into a field that they have no domain knowledge of.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:05
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blah_blah posted:The different interviewers/interviews test different skills. For SWE, it's more like algorithms/data structures + system design. For my role, it's some combination of algorithms/data structures + databases/data manipulation + math/stats + analysis of a particular data problem. So yeah, since the fourth interviewer is asking questions about a completely different topic than the first three, they are picking up different signals. You really are just guessing how all of this works, aren't you? If you're proctoring math tests you have a pipeline problem. Maybe that's not your fault, but it's not mine either, and being the colossal douchebag you have been today isn't solving it.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:10
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Who said that technical interviews were a waste of time? Must have missed it. The fundamental problem with the standard white boarding gauntlet is that it doesn't effectively test the skills required for the job. It tests some (not all) of the needed skills in a contrived environment practically designed to throw anyone who isn't a young white male with an elite CS degree off their game. There are many other modes of skill assessment that are more effective and less exclusionary.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:14
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blah_blah posted:If there's one person here talking about The Only Way, it's probably the person who's making blanket statements about technical interviews being unreasonable for technical employees and 2+ hours being an unfathomably long amount of time to assess skills that have been cultivated for the last 10+ years, for jobs that routinely pay 200-500k a year. The particular irony of the situation is that you're basically doing here what every obnoxious tech 'disruptor' does when they go into a field that they have no domain knowledge of. sounds to me like your field would benefit from what most other technical industries did long ago by implementing standards like licensure examinations and state boards that make technical interviews largely unnecessary beyond chitchat about work history project specifics granted that's understandable for a field that was largely unaccredited by ABET a decade ago
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Sep 22, 2016 00:15
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H.P. Hovercraft posted:sounds to me like your field would benefit from what most other technical industries did long ago by implementing standards like licensure examinations and state boards that make technical interviews largely unnecessary beyond chitchat about work history project specifics You can do that with some jobs but I have no idea how you'd do that with computer science, especially considering that the field constantly changes. You can probably test on the bare fundamentals (What is a linked list? Which of these algorithms is merge sort? Why is merge sort good?) but the ability to engineer a large program is something you might not be able to test for beyond "tell me about a time where you literally did this." edit: Also, computer science degrees are a thing that exists. ToxicSlurpee fucked around with this message at 00:32 on Sep 22, 2016 |
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Sep 22, 2016 00:21
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Yeah many of the technologies I work with have been in wide use for 12-18 months at most and are constantly changing. This is something a lot of people not in startup land don't realize.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:25
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Gail Wynand posted:Yeah many of the technologies I work with have been in wide use for 12-18 months at most and are constantly changing. This is something a lot of people not in startup land don't realize. And yet requirements are always whatever you're currently using.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:31
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ToxicSlurpee posted:You can do that with some jobs but I have no idea how you'd do that with computer science, especially considering that the field constantly changes. You can probably test on the bare fundamentals (What is a linked list? Which of these algorithms is merge sort? Why is merge sort good?) but the ability to engineer a large program is something you might not be able to test for beyond "tell me about a time where you literally did this." software development is hardly unique in this respect and plenty of complex fields manage licensure examinations to ensure basic competence just fine (the tests are constantly being rewritten and updated) but discussing prior project history like how you just mentioned is typically how these interviews go since demonstrating advanced knowledge or even competence during an interview is wildly infeasible for something like a laparoscopic surgeon or a structural engineer when any skills test would be truncated to the point of uselessness
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Sep 22, 2016 00:38
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:He's either the exact kind of pedantic forest-for-the-trees idiot recruiter this thread has been talking about, or he's regularly getting fooled by people submitting the first hit on google for "Impressive Technical Smart Person Resume .pdf" Impressive resume/bad fit for role is pretty common in data science, which seems to be close to the field blah blah is recruiting for. I interviewed for a number of positions where the hiring manager was initially impressed and then disappointed, either because they needed very specific skill set or over-estimated my developer skills. I have only interviewed about a dozen people myself, but found a few PhDs with impressive dissertations who showed little initiative or ability to think outside the box. That said I do agree that things like that can be evaluated in less than 2-3 hours. Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Also lol forever that Mr. King Genius Recruiter couldn't possibly look at a person's actual work product, their portfolio, and asses their work quality from that. Too Smart to Learn Things: The Tragic Tale of blah_blah Over my 4 years in the field, all of my work is not public. Not many companies want their analysts making their algorithms open source. pokie fucked around with this message at 01:00 on Sep 22, 2016 |
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Sep 22, 2016 00:49
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Gail Wynand posted:It tests some (not all) of the needed skills in a contrived environment practically designed to throw anyone who isn't a young white male with an elite CS degree off their game. I see this being thrown around a lot, and I don't buy it for a single second. Having a good career building expertise in whatever you've done is no excuse to slack on your fundamentals. It's like saying "It's expected that a neurosurgeon can't distinguish between a flu and a cold anymore." However, I do agree that there is a large disconnect between the skills tested on the whiteboard and the skills actually required by the job on a daily basis, but that's just part of the picture. A good interviewer will use the whiteboard question to assess a variety of skills: - General software design. - Knowledge, fundamental language constructs. - Code quality. - Attitude when faced with a roadblock (a good whiteboard question can scale in complexity based on candidate skill to ensure that this happens) - etc. At the end of the day, the actual question asked is just a vehicle to assess a whole array of aptitudes. A candidate can completely fail to answer the stated problem, but demonstrate proper skills and still pass (If the interviewer is not an rear end in a top hat)
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Sep 22, 2016 00:53
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Gail Wynand posted:The fundamental problem with the standard white boarding gauntlet is that it doesn't effectively test the skills required for the job. It tests some (not all) of the needed skills in a contrived environment practically designed to throw anyone who isn't a young white male with an elite CS degree off their game. Gail Wynand posted:Yeah many of the technologies I work with have been in wide use for 12-18 months at most and are constantly changing. This is something a lot of people not in startup land don't realize. Arsenic Lupin fucked around with this message at 00:56 on Sep 22, 2016 |
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Sep 22, 2016 00:54
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H.P. Hovercraft posted:software development is hardly unique in this respect and plenty of complex fields manage licensure examinations to ensure basic competence just fine (the tests are constantly being rewritten and updated) I think the industry is finally starting to realize this. I read not long ago that even Google is trying to make the "tell me about a time you did this" question the basis for most of their interviewing rather than "do this thing on the spot" because all their data analysis about recruiting found it was the only class of question that was really predictive of anything. They also found that most interviewers are no better than chance at spotting a good candidate unless they were hiring for something really narrowly focused in an area where they were one of the world's foremost experts. Baby Babbeh fucked around with this message at 00:56 on Sep 22, 2016 |
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Sep 22, 2016 00:53
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Baby Babbeh posted:I think the industry is finally starting to realize this. I read not long ago that even Google is trying to make the "tell me about a time you did this" this question the basis for most of their interviewing rather than "do this thing on the spot" because all their data analysis about recruiting found it was the only class of question that was really predictive of anything. Also that most interviewers are no better than chance at spotting a good candidate unless they were hiring for something really narrowly focused in an area where they were one of the world's foremost experts.
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Sep 22, 2016 00:56
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pokie posted:data science you can just say statistics you know since all science tends to use data
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Sep 22, 2016 01:02
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MeruFM posted:Yes but they were all really bad. I remember this very forum absolutely losing its poo poo when Google Image Search came out back in 2001. It was like magic compared to what searching had been before. Like, before then, finding the right images for photoshop challenges had been an enormous pain in the rear end. e_angst fucked around with this message at 01:05 on Sep 22, 2016 |
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Sep 22, 2016 01:03
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It's fear of accountability - "I didn't pick that lovely hire, the process did! We asked for 1000 qualifications and he only had 999, but we took a risk and welp. Let's bump that up to 1001 next time" - combined with the fantasy that you can have a perfect team made up of perfect employees who are correct in all aspects of their professional and personal lives. Most companies that think they have bad recruits really have bad management. Which reminds me, job-seekers. The best question you can ever ask in an interview is "what happened to the last person who had this job?" If they got promoted, great, if they left the company, could go either way, but if they start poo poo-talking that person run for the hills. Anything they say about your predecessor they will say about you.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:06
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Which reminds me, job-seekers. The best question you can ever ask in an interview is "what happened to the last person who had this job?" If they got promoted, great, if they left the company, could go either way, but if they start poo poo-talking that person run for the hills. Anything they say about your predecessor they will say about you. absolutely "tell me about the last person who had this job" and "tell me about a typical workweek" are probably the most telling things you can ask an interviewer right up there w/ "when was your last vacation"
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Sep 22, 2016 01:08
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H.P. Hovercraft posted:right up there w/ "when was your last vacation" Ooh that's a good one, although it will send alarm bells ringing at a lovely company, and sometimes you gotta work at a lovely company to eat, so use at your own risk. "What did my predecessor do that was above and beyond" is a good one they won't see coming, because you can learn a lot if they're unable to come up with a compliment or if they seem derisive or exasperated by someone transcending their job description. It's a good way to get them to accidentally reveal that they expect you to walk their dogs and run their side business too, although maybe that's more of a risk in my neck of the woods.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:12
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i'm appalled that a loving hr drone is telling off someone who makes 5 times more how to hire people this is loving american exceptionalism at its worst.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:16
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Which reminds me, job-seekers. The best question you can ever ask in an interview is "what happened to the last person who had this job?" If they got promoted, great, if they left the company, could go either way, but if they start poo poo-talking that person run for the hills. Anything they say about your predecessor they will say about you. e: Namaste, it is just barely possible that hiring a good workforce is a trained and learned skill that is just as difficult as software engineering. Radical thought, I know, because all software degrees instantly confer the ability to know how to do anybody else's job.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:18
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H.P. Hovercraft posted:you can just say statistics you know I used to. That was when I couldn't find a job for 9 months. There aren't really statistics jobs. Yeah, I think the term is pretentious bullshit too, but that's how the job is called. H.P. Hovercraft posted:absolutely I am saving this.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:19
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:It's fear of accountability - "I didn't pick that lovely hire, the process did! We asked for 1000 qualifications and he only had 999, but we took a risk and welp. Let's bump that up to 1001 next time" - combined with the fantasy that you can have a perfect team made up of perfect employees who are correct in all aspects of their professional and personal lives. Most companies that think they have bad recruits really have bad management. Part of it is cover-your-own-rear end, part of it is a genuine desire to hire the best possible candidate, I think. If any one interviewer is only slightly better than a coin flip, then one way you can solve that problem is to take a wisdom of crowds approach. Of course, the better answer is probably just to not put as much emphasis on the interview and accept that you're going to get more false positives, but then structure your onboarding and retention process in such a way that people that marginal fits get the support they need to excel and people that are never going to be a fit are identified and let go quickly. But this is a lot harder in practice than just throwing interviewer bodies at it, so fat chance of it happening at many companies. Baby Babbeh fucked around with this message at 01:29 on Sep 22, 2016 |
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Sep 22, 2016 01:26
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Seriously have you people ever had a loving hr department that wasn't retarded and lazy?
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Sep 22, 2016 01:34
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namaste faggots posted:Seriously have you people ever had a loving hr department that wasn't retarded and lazy? why would any citizen of Freedomland ever care about what a canadian thought
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Sep 22, 2016 01:38
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Most companies that think they have bad recruits really have bad management. Let's be honest here, most companies have bad management. I can count on one hand how many good bosses I've had over the years but boy howdy can I tell you about at least a dozen horrifyingly terrible bosses.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:42
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Most companies succeed in spite of themselves, honestly. It's a miracle we have technology at all.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:48
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Baby Babbeh posted:Most companies succeed in spite of themselves, honestly. It's a miracle we have
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Sep 22, 2016 01:50
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Baby Babbeh posted:Most companies succeed in spite of themselves, honestly. It's a miracle we have technology at all. Not really; it's amazing how strong a motivator "do the work or you get to starve to death" can be.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:55
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Let's be honest here, most companies have bad management. I can count on one hand how many good bosses I've had over the years but boy howdy can I tell you about at least a dozen horrifyingly terrible bosses. Yeah, and my unifying theory of humanity is that if one person fails at something, they were wrong for the job, but if most people fail at it, it's the job that's wrong. Something about how we design management in the first place is fundamentally wrong. I know there are a lot of psych theories about how having power over someone reduces your empathy and I'm sure that's part of it, but the whole thing's a mess. Partly I think many companies are just too big and it turns the product the company actually makes into a useless abstraction. Dunno how to fix it though. I make movies. Maybe someone will write a movie about how to fix it, and then I can produce it.
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Sep 22, 2016 02:00
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Not really; it's amazing how strong a motivator "do the work or you get to starve to death" can be. Or just ride the ones that actually do the work and take the credit.
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Sep 22, 2016 01:59
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Aramis posted:I see this being thrown around a lot, and I don't buy it for a single second. Having a good career building expertise in whatever you've done is no excuse to slack on your fundamentals. It's like saying "It's expected that a neurosurgeon can't distinguish between a flu and a cold anymore."
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Sep 22, 2016 02:00
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namaste faggots posted:Seriously have you people ever had a loving hr department that wasn't retarded and lazy? Who needs hr departments in general?
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Sep 22, 2016 02:03
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namaste faggots posted:Seriously have you people ever had a loving hr department that wasn't retarded and lazy? I don't know. I work at a startup where we have an HR manager who is very competent but was hired approximately two years too late. He is so overworked that I feel bad asking him for anything.
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Sep 22, 2016 02:03
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We need an Uber for hr departments
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Sep 22, 2016 02:05
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Not really; it's amazing how strong a motivator "do the work or you get to starve to death" can be. the people with the ability to really gently caress with a company's direction and whether or not they succeed or fail aren't really motivated by lack of basic needs, unless they're self employed I guess but I don't think that's really the context that's being talked about here
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Sep 22, 2016 02:05
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Tiny Brontosaurus posted:Yeah, and my unifying theory of humanity is that if one person fails at something, they were wrong for the job, but if most people fail at it, it's the job that's wrong. Something about how we design management in the first place is fundamentally wrong. I know there are a lot of psych theories about how having power over someone reduces your empathy and I'm sure that's part of it, but the whole thing's a mess. Partly I think many companies are just too big and it turns the product the company actually makes into a useless abstraction. The fundamental problem is how businesses are set up; they are there to make profit for the people who own and/or invest in them. There was a study that says that sociopathy becomes more common the higher up you get on the ladder and we've all seen by now ho incredibly unethical American businesses have been lately. The simple fact is we've decided that "traits that make a good executive" overlaps heavily with "traits that literally make you a psychopath." Management isn't the problem in that we need people to organize things in modern society. People who organize other people and make sure that the people at work actually, you know, do work are a necessity but we've decided that the best manager is the one that generates the most profit. Invariably the one that generates the most profit is a jerk.
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Sep 22, 2016 02:08
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namaste faggots posted:We need an Uber for hr departments That's Zenefits, right?
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Sep 22, 2016 02:10
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Another good interviewee question is "what is a bad day here like?"
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Sep 22, 2016 03:16
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The important thing to always ALWAYS remember about HR departments is that they are there to protect the company. Period. If you report something to them, they will take action if they think that otherwise the company might get sued. Even then they may well fail. Your HR rep is not your friend. Your HR rep is there to minimize the inconvenience to the company of whatever just happened to you. (I haven't been screwed over by HR, but I know people who have.)
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Sep 22, 2016 04:35
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