News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on Hiring only senior engineers is killing companies. Parent comment

Re:Hiring only senior engineers is killing companies by qcnguy on Tuesday September 30, 2025 @10:26AM (#45425887)
How is that not understanding a hypothetical? Seems they understand it just fine, what they're saying is they don't have the needed knowledge/confidence to answer the question.

Not understanding a hypothetical would go like this:

"How would you troubleshoot X?"

"Why, is X broken?"

"No, but imagine it was broken."

"If it's not broken why are you asking me that"

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:Hiring only senior engineers is killing companies by protocolture on Tuesday September 30, 2025 @06:59PM (#45432311)
Ok, but a completely fair and honest answer is to google it. Or review internal documentation/asbuilt for the system. Or to ask your mate steve.

You don't need to understand the technical detail in the hypothetical, to extract search terms and research it.

The answer of "I dont know that system so I wouldnt know where to start" is failing the hypothetical. You have many starting points for all technical research. It means you cannot even imagine where to begin.

If you are so shocked by the appearance of technical term you don't understand, that you wont even take the first step of putting that term into google, you really shouldn't be applying for technical jobs.

The most common answer I get, if I fight the interviewee, and reposition it as a technical issue they do understand, is that they relay to me an anecdote from a time when they did complete the troubleshooting. IE, they still dont engage with the hypothetical, they just use recall.

[ Parent | on HN ]