News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on People suck at technical interviews (2014). Parent comment

Re:People suck at technical interviews (2014) by Chris2048 on Friday June 10, 2016 @12:47PM (#11877710)
To be honest though, just because you can get by without knowing how hash maps are implemented, doesn't mean it isn't useful to know - and if another candidate does know, they would sooner hire them.

Further, they may be looking for factors that correlates with other, hard-to-measure factors. Even such as reading a "common interview questions" book - it correlates with focused pragmatism...

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:People suck at technical interviews (2014) by heartsucker on Friday June 10, 2016 @01:47PM (#11878327)
I'm not saying it's not useful to know or that having that knowledge might make someone a better candidate, but it seems like that alone shouldn't be reason enough to reject someone.

And I disagree that looking up the answers to common interview questions is focused pragmatism. I don't bother, even with the knowledge that it would help me get a job. I spend my time working on side projects or learning practical things. I think I will never in my life have implement a hash map, and that knowing it's all O(1) operations is sufficient. But also I guess I don't want to work for a company that is interested in my ability to jump through hoops. (shrug)

[ Parent | on HN ]