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Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by apta on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @02:41PM (#23849712)
> She will just say that the process is designed to minimize false positives and the expense of more false negatives. A bad hire is more expensive than a no hire.

That's what they keep saying. However, it remains to be proven that regurgitating answers on a whiteboard in 45 minutes implies that the candidate is not a false negative, or even a true positive to begin with.

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by u67583 on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @02:52PM (#23849884)
Someone who able to immediately understand and write out the solution to 80% of hard DS&A questions is at least able to write code. The question is if this is honestly better than generating your own FizzBuzz. I don't think so. I have heard rumors that Google has studied employee performance predictions based on interview score and found no correlation. I would bet this is an open secret and no one knows what to replace it with that isn't enormously expensive.
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by Apocryphon on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @03:48PM (#23850663)
> no one knows what to replace it with that isn't enormously expensive

That's the crazy thing about this. FAANG has near-infinite resources, relatively speaking. Google could be A/B testing their interviewing process, experimenting new approaches, experimenting (as the OP study did) with eye-trackers and other tech to try to gain insights on candidate behavior. They have the "engineering for the sake of engineering" and "innovation for the sake of innovation" culture that allows for moonshots and boondoggles. I don't think they're exactly known for following "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", given how many times they kill off products only to recreate them later on, especially their chat apps.

Yet they stick to the traditional whiteboarding method because-- why?

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by starpilot on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @03:56PM (#23850805)
Maybe Google has studied all of those things and found whiteboarding to be the best predictor. The company seems to be doing well, so something must be working with their hiring. They dropped GPA/college requirements so they're clearly open to non-traditional backgrounds.
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by Apocryphon on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @04:05PM (#23850933)
> The company seems to be doing well, so something must be working with their hiring.

People use this argument often, but is technical competence of engineers- specifically at passing their interview process -the explanation for their economic success? And not market penetration, near-monopoly positions, great UX, etc.?

Not to mention, as we've seen in the high-profile Facebook SDK crashes this past week, share price doesn't necessarily mean product quality.

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by pb7 on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @04:29PM (#23851261)
>Not to mention, as we've seen in the high-profile Facebook SDK crashes this past week, share price doesn't necessarily mean product quality.

These events are noteworthy because of how rare they are for such a large software-based company.

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by Apocryphon on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @04:32PM (#23851305)
It was the second time it's happened in a matter of months- the first time was in May.

It's also noteworthy because of how destabilizing this was for the immense number of apps that depend on that software.

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by WrtCdEvrydy on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @03:01PM (#23850025)
It means you're someone willing to spend two to three months on your life sucking a little dick for a chance to work at FAANG... the companies so good they've recommended 15 vacuum cleaners after purchasing one. How many hands do they think I actually have.
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by StavrosK on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @03:15PM (#23850221)
The answer is sixteen, you'd know that if you'd spent a bit of time practicing your addition interview questions.
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by WrtCdEvrydy on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @03:38PM (#23850535)
Damn it, back to grinding leetcode!
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by ergocoder on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @05:18PM (#23851999)
Boy, am I the only one who thinks working at FAANG is pretty great and worth the time practicing the interview?

The compensation is much better. The management is much better. The work life balance is much better.

I moved from SEA. Everything is worse there.

I read this and feel like people have unrealistic standard. FAANG isn't good enough? Working there for a year probably put your wealth of life at 0.1% of the world. That's not good enough?

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by Apocryphon on Thursday July 16, 2020 @02:14PM (#23861968)
That's why people join unicorns. All the comp and potential equity upside of FAANG, less bureaucracy, greater urgency, more sexy work or technologies.
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by edw on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @02:48PM (#23849823)
We don't care about reality, merely perceptions. "Well I humiliated the person for an hour in front of a whiteboard" is the new "Nobody gets fired for buying IBM."
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by ZephyrBlu on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @03:43PM (#23850608)
I've seen people say it's like a form of IQ test and I agree with that.

Generally speaking, I think more intelligent people will have an easier time learning the patterns in algorithms.

It's not the best filter, but it's easy to see why it's an attractive option for companies.

Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by aprdm on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @05:27PM (#23852133)
intelligence is multi dimensional. Even more so at a working environment. I can't believe algorithm intelligence is a relevant skillset for 99% of the projects. Including projects inside google.
Re:Tech sector job interviews assess anxiety, not software s... by ZephyrBlu on Wednesday July 15, 2020 @06:20PM (#23852959)
I agree, which is why I said it's not the best filter, but I think it's good enough that companies are happy with the people they hire.