Thanks for this blog entry. I happen to be going through this problem right now. I'm a developer who just moved to SF. There are tons of jobs, but I freeze up during tech interviews. In the past I have landed jobs at small companies with a looser interview structure where I can basically distract them with interesting nerdy stuff so the time runs out before they can get to the programming questions.

I am wondering 2 things: 1. How do you phrase it to a potential employer that you would prefer a take home project? Do you say you do bad under pressure? Do you say you think your abilities would shine though on a larger thought through assignment instead? 2. Do people have other strategies for dealing with such issues? Perhaps using a head hunter who knows the hiring process of each company, and can pass you along to ones with a less rigerous tech interview component.

Maybe I should just find smaller companies that have not figured out their interview process yet and hope they wont drill me.