from the boss-wants-to-see-how-you-handle-pressure? dept.
I recently applied for a job in Silicon Valley.
The recruiter had me take a battery of tests that measured my verbal, mathematical and visual aptitude. I'd guess it was a mini-IQ test; it wasn't a mini-MMPI. As a result of the tests I was invited to interview onsite.
At the end of the interview the manager declared that he wanted me to take some tests.
His tests were brain teasers he had downloaded from a random website. The brain teasers had nothing to do with the work I was interviewing for. He seemed to ignore the battery of sophisticated tests I had been subjected to, and to believe that he could do better.
What is the REAL purpose of using brain teasers during an employment interview?
Is it just to make the candidate feel stupid? Are any of these people qualified to interpret the results? Are any of them industrial psychologists? Or is this all about power and control?
Please advise.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Friday October 05 2018, @03:31PM (17 children)
These questions do approximately nothing to sort out whether a candidate is good at what they do. Ergo, don't use them.
My favorite question to get someone going is to describe a project that they did at a previous job, and combine that with some whiteboard coding and such for technical positions.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @03:45PM (16 children)
People think differently when seated, alone, at a keyboard, than when they are in front of a group of strangers, standing, with a fat marker in hand, writing on a goddamn wall.
Programming is an intimate affair; it's the encoding of one's thoughts.
All you're doing is picking out the "extrovert" coders, not the deep thinkers who spend the quiet, alone moments constructing a beautiful description of their own minds' processes.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Thexalon on Friday October 05 2018, @04:07PM (11 children)
I am not extroverted by nature. But I can both explain some of the work I've done, and can demonstrate my skills to others. And yes, I expect any coder I hire to be able to do that as well, because they're going to need to be able to explain their thinking to me, to their colleagues, and possibly their counterparts at other companies.
Sure, the code also speaks for itself. And I want to make damn sure that the code not only does what it's supposed to do, but correctly communicates what it's supposed to do so somebody trying to debug or maintain it has an easy time of it.
The stereotype of a great coder being an autism-spectrum geek going off on his own and coming up with some sort of brilliant algorithm that no one else would have thought of is inaccurate at best and downright damaging at worst. I've worked with guys like that, and their stuff was decidedly not brilliant, but they got away with it because they fit the stereotype.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:17PM (7 children)
The work for which you are trying to hire someone is NOTHING like the situation in which you put them in the interview.
It's not just stupid for that person being interviewed, but it's also stupid for your as the employer.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:30PM (3 children)
You need to be explain to be able to talk about your work and your field. You don't need to be an extrovert, dumbass. Part of being a professional is sharing your ideas with your peers.
I mean, otherwise all you're going to amount to is an autistic retard in his mom's basement modding some shit FPS game that nobody's heard of.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:50PM (2 children)
Indeed, the OP even put the word extrovert in quotes.
I wouldn't hire you; you seem incapable of abstract thought.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:07PM (1 child)
Why would I want to work for an autistic retard?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:55PM
That's one reason, any way.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by RS3 on Friday October 05 2018, @05:35PM (2 children)
I see both sides of this, but strongly agree with you (AC), and have felt this way about HR / interview insanity most of my adult life. I've been there doing the work, and I've hired people. I remember a job (long ago) where the basically non-technical boss hired a tech to work with me. I remember feeling great fear and trepidation because during the interview they were laughing and joking and telling stories, and sure enough the guy got the job. It involved, among many things, logic circuit troubleshooting, mods, etc., and sure enough after being there a few days the very nice likable guy asked me to explain the difference between an AND and OR gate. Ugh. As much as it bothered me, I learned from it, and now more than ever "soft skills", personality, social skills, adaptability, are more important in hiring because "hard skills" can be taught / learned more than "soft skills".
But I digress. One of the major points I agree with you (AC) on is the time factor. I'm very happy and able to explain my thoughts, methodology, analysis, etc., about technical work I do, but it's rare that I have to quickly come up with a complex solution, on a stage with audience, and explain it. Some people simply have stage fright. For much of my life I had a gripping fear of speaking in front of people. I remember for years being afraid to make phonecalls. I simply didn't have good command of language, and frequently got flummoxed in conversations. Standardized tests show I'm very strong in critical / analytical / logical / rational thinking, but weaker in verbal communication. I've been working on it and it's been getting better.
All that said, I've been very good at technical writing, documentation, manuals, etc. But again, I can edit and correct, as opposed to being on stage where there's great time pressure (people get bored very quickly) and you can not take back misspoken words.
tl;dr: If you hire based on presentation skills, you'll hire a good showperson.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by sjames on Friday October 05 2018, @08:36PM (1 child)
The whiteboard/audience thing is a non-starter for many, including many of the best. A typical workflow is to learn what the problem is, mull it over for a bit (sometimes days), then it all comes together leading to the code being pounded out in a couple hours and debugged and tested in a couple more hours. At that point, I can explain it quite well though I tend not to use diagrams to do it.
Naturally, for simple tasks, the above workflow runs much quicker, but would still result in an awkward people watching me sit and think with the sensation of my neck being breathed down.
Use the whiteboard test and you'll select for people who will crank out a sub-optimal pre-mature design that more or less works today but breaks tomorrow.
If you want to see if the candidate can explain something, have them explain a solution they have already done. However, be aware that they may not be able to explain every detail for non-disclosure reasons if you insist on something they have solved as part of their previous employment.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday October 06 2018, @02:12AM
This seems to be a two-minutes' hate thread for people with no social skills. Look, when somebody throws a brain-teaser at you, you respond quickly with something stupid if you don't have something smart to say. Seriously, it's okay to look like a fucking idiot there, just do it quickly and with a smile on your face.
I'd wear heavier fucking shoes. See how easy that was? That's an actual example I was asked during an interview.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:30PM
the op's point has fuck-all to do with explaining one's work(that's what comments and readable code are for). it had to do with the creation of a solution to a problem, or the code, and that process not being facilitated by being treated like a goddamned show pony by some dumbass suit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:48PM (1 child)
A coder who can't explain their work is useless. I don't care how well it works. If and only if the spec is for a black box with an acceptance test set is that ok.
Otherwise the work is write-once read-never, and I won't take it.
Good code expresses ideas both correctly and clearly, and the map of desired idea to code must be clear, or it's bad code.
If there's a tricky one line hack, take the paragraph to explain it in comments. That's life.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:12PM
I would then ask the candidate to demonstrate code with those properties.
(Score: 2) by ilsa on Friday October 05 2018, @05:28PM (2 children)
During an interview, nobody is expecting you to pull an algorithm out of your rear and write it on the white board. Or at least, they shouldn't be, for the exact reasons stated.
But if given a simple, relatively rote problem, if you are unable to at least sketch out a basic workflow of how you would approach/code the solution, maybe you're not as good as you think you are.
Similarly, if you say that you have 10 years of database experience and you can't write a basic or even moderate ANSI SQL statement off the cuff, then GTFO cause you're wasting my time.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:00PM
How is it possible that you ever find yourself in the straw man argument you've constructed?
Maybe your company or industry should review the way you cultivate workers; there should be no guessing about total strangers—you've either got a known and objective pedigree, or you don't.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:19PM
Along the lines of your database comment, Elon Musk reportedly has said that the most important interview question he asks is something to the effect of "describe the hardest problem you've faced and how you handled it." He says that when you've really banged your head on a problem and gotten through it, that is burned in your head. You can talk in great detail about the problem and your solution. If you can only talk in generalities or at a superficial level, then he figures that maybe you were part of the team working the problem, but you aren't one who really understood and solved it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @09:04PM
That's the thing, this is more a personality test than anything else. I'm personally a non-linear/divergent thinker and I'd probably do terribly on this sort of a test, so would numerous great minds. Tendency towards inspiration and creative insights aren't something you can put into an interview.
Linear/convergent thinkers that are also extroverted might do well on this sort of thing, perhaps.
There's also the issue of what happens if the answers are either leaked or the applicant has seen something similar before. Everybody is a genius when they've memorized a complicated process, but most couldn't come up with it without somebody giving it to them or at least some hints.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Friday October 05 2018, @03:39PM (5 children)
Lots of people have careers. They might be "the best" in their chose field - but they are restricted to that field. Some of them may not bother to read anything, other than tech manuals, or corporate training manuals.
Some guy who has changed careers a couple of times, has an eclectic reading history, has traveled, has a hobby or six - he's probably equipped to handle these "brain teasers".
This guy is probably prepared to "think outside the box", when needed. He can probably cope with unexpected emergencies, as well as lesser problems.
Alternatively, the interviewer is being careful to NOT HIRE anyone smarter than himself.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 3, Funny) by c0lo on Friday October 05 2018, @05:08PM (4 children)
Runaway, no, seriously now... about how much code do you engineer on average a day?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday October 06 2018, @12:39AM (3 children)
Zero. I'm not a coder. But, you knew that.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday October 06 2018, @01:03AM (2 children)
And yet you are sure thinking outside the box is critical for software engineering.
As in any branch of engineering, if you deal with emergencies that's a clear sign that somebody is doing the hell of a bad job. Imagine you are at a parent-teacher conference and the teacher reassures you that he always wears a condom while teaching [xkcd.com]
If the interpretation you gave is true, the correct reaction for the candidate would be to apply your nick as fast as possible.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday October 06 2018, @01:30AM (1 child)
And, of course, no one does the hell of a bad job in coding - ever. That's why sometimes updates crash computers.
But, my response was more general, rather than specific to writing code. A manager - any manager - decides to pick the mind of an applicant. Why would he do that? He wants to know more about the applicant. If you're applying for the job of reading water meters, and the manager asks you questions not related to reading meters, obviously, he thinks that you should have some knowledge and skills aside from reading those water meters.
Abortion is the number one killed of children in the United States.
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday October 06 2018, @02:03AM
But of course too many do a bad job in software engineering, no matter how brilliant coders they are.
Don't delude yourself in thinking that management is a discipline that can exist in no relation with the things which needs managed.
A construction manager and a software dev manager need to think and act differently because the things they need to manage are different.
Expecting the "mind picking" to be the same for the two is naive.
And this comes with the big assumption that the manager is always "clueful" and can't ask wrong questions.
Which, in my experience**, is more often than not a failing assumption.
** I worked in this industry for quite a long time, both as contributor and manager - I've seen heaps of clueless managers and, on occasions, I even been one myself. In the latter position, I have had the common sense to notify those better positioned to solve the problem that I'm doing it only until they find one more suitable and I expect that they solve it soon or else I'm gone.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0
(Score: 1) by Sulla on Friday October 05 2018, @03:40PM (2 children)
I always assumed it was to see how well someone can reason when under pressure, to this end it does not matter what brain teaser they use as long as they can see how you act when trying to solve one.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @03:47PM (1 child)
Every day, being in an uncomfortable verbal situation with strangers, solving deceptive riddles or writing code by hand on a wall with a marker.
It's all so stupid.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:27PM
The brain teaser is bullshit, so why not bullshit right back? That way you can quickly find out whether or not that position involves working under a stuffy gaslighting asshole with a superiority complex.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @03:47PM (3 children)
Is it just to make the candidate feel stupid?
Yes. And to accept peanuts as payment for the priviledge of working for superior beings.
Are any of these people qualified to interpret the results? Are any of them industrial psychologists?
No. No. Prfff. What are you smoking?
Or is this all about power and control?
Gotcha!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bzipitidoo on Friday October 05 2018, @04:59PM (2 children)
LOL, I might have asked questions like that when I was starting my career. As the parent is saying, don't take it so hard. Lot of what they do isn't about you, not in a personal way. What some organizations really want is cover. They may have already decided, or been ordered, to hire a crony-- the boss's nephew, or some "friend" the boss knows will be a reliable sycophant. An important customer can ask for favors of that sort, and they really can't say no.
To comply with EEOC rules, they have to put on a charade and pretend to offer the job in question to any and all candidates. Gaslighting the heck out of the candidates with extreme IQ tests is merely all about generating the excuses they need to say those candidates are not qualified.
That's not to say it's all like that. Many organizations really sincerely are interested in finding the most meritorious candidates. But it's still a very difficult problem. When they are flooded with 1000 plus resumes for less than 10 positions, they have to do something to winnow that enormous pile down. Even if they can immediately reject 90% of the candidates as unqualified, that still leaves 10 times more qualified candidates than they have position to fill. They resort to splitting hairs, reaching for anything to narrow the field. It's a hard world that way.
A few times I have been told that I was eminently qualified, but they can't hire me anyway. In one case, the budget was cut and the position they were recruiting for was eliminated without anyone being hired. In another case, they just flat out told me I was qualified but they were hiring someone else, sorry. I suppose I ought to be grateful they had the courtesy to say even that much, and as far as I could tell, were honest. I have also received a few "Dear John letters", as they were called, but most of the time, you get total radio silence. "Don't call us, we'll call you." And then they never call of course.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:06PM (1 child)
In an actually Free Society (you know, where people are free to associate as they see fit), then there is no lying about motivation; people just do what they intend, such as hire the boss's kid.
In a Regulated Society (often a Fake Free Society), everyone just lies their asses off, and then gaslights each other when called on their bullshit.
Enjoy your Regulated Society.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:17PM
Thanks! I'm sad for you that you hate it enough to construct such a hypothesis.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by pendorbound on Friday October 05 2018, @04:05PM (14 children)
I don't care if you can figure out how to get a wolf, a sheep, and a bag of grain across a river in one boat... Can't remember a single user facing feature that ever involved livestock & feed management, but perhaps that's just my industry segment.
For phone screens, you write code over Google Docs. For in person, it's the whiteboard. *Very* simple programming problem, use whatever language you consider your most fluent, every day language. I know interview stress is a thing, but given the latitude to use ANY environment that is your go-to, your jam... And we don't particularlly care if you miss a semi-colon or misspell something. If you can't pull FizzBuzz out of your ass under those conditions, it's a short interview, thanks for your time, we're still evaluating lots of other candidates, we'll be in touch.
I think one way we differ from the way a lot of interviews use brain teasers is we get to the code very early. It's not an "out in the lobby homework" kind of thing I've seen other places use. You come in, we make you as comfy as we can. Tell us what you're into, what field-related hobbies you might have, favorite project, etc. Then write code. You do reasonably okay on that, then we start figuring out what you know about specific tech. Some fiddly frequent bug causes in whatever environment we're hiring for (threading, shared variable scope, database design, whatever). Lots of open ended stuff with plenty of invite to show us your extra pieces of flair if you've got them.
But you bomb the whiteboard, and we're out in under 20 minutes, guaranteed...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:13PM (7 children)
Whiteboard?!
WTF is standing around writing code by hand on a wall all day long? That's awkward and weird, and automatically takes up brainpower, enhancing the discomfort of being judged by people who are probably not that great themselves.
I don't know. There's something seriously wrong with the programming industry; no other profession involves this kind of ridiculousness—when did you last quiz an HVAC tech before hiring him to fix your furnace, which itself can be a very diagnostic, methodical job that requires real ingenuity both to figure out the problem and to insert the solution (often ad hoc).
Apprenticeships. That's what the programming industry needs. This whole "prove yourself in the moment" mentality is just plain dumb.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:26PM (6 children)
Maybe because programmers get paid (currently) much more than other low peons, so corps will care more. And the other peons are an especially critical kind of people, who may also had the displeasure of having a mishire on their team who got through the interview process.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:30PM (5 children)
There's a reason why technical trades (including the medical doctoring) ALL involves lengthy apprenticeship, followed by journeymanships, followed by certified mastery.
There's no fucking guessing.
"Man! These programmers are costly; let's find the right guys with.... in-the-moment, gotcha riddles and hand-written code!"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:45PM (3 children)
Law too.
When will software developers/IT people organize and form a professional association?
It won't happen until we make it happen.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:50PM (2 children)
Software and computer engineering are recognized engineering professions now, and you can take the exam and call yourself an engineer.
However, no employer is requiring such accreditation, so nobody bothers. It also requires jumping through any hoops the State may come up with for engineers, so interest from freelancers is rather subdued (nil?).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:12PM (1 child)
How do you think doctors and plumbers achieved what they achieved?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @12:52AM
Lobbying? To do that requires cooperation. Programmers however think that everyone by himself is the true master.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @09:09PM
There's a few reasons for that, on the labor side, having such a program set up to certify potential employees cuts the supply significantly, but it also means that the value that you're bringing forth for a job application is somewhat less of a mystery. Sure, you get dumbass lawyers, teachers, doctors and others, but on the whole, people in these sorts of jobs tend to know what they're doing to at least the level demanded by the profession. You're much less likely to have a professionally trained doctor killing your patients than a random stranger that just shows up to a job interview, but interviews really well.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by requerdanos on Friday October 05 2018, @04:18PM (4 children)
User facing or not, solving problems like that one are also known as "writing an algorithm to perform a necessary task" which can be pretty important as far as programming goes.
A candidate that is literate in n programming languages is not necessarily capable in writing something useful in any of them, whereas a candidate that can figure out the significance of the fact that wolves don't eat grain is potentially able to write useful software that solves actual problems.
The problems do not need to involve livestock and feed management because the idea is that problem solving skills are more important than in-depth knowledge of farming to solving the task. Those problem solving skills can come from having a creative mind, or from experience, or both.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:33PM (3 children)
Most algorithms of any note are designed slowly, as the concepts and corner cases and percolate through the mind.
You know that such in-your-face, judgmental riddle-solving has ZERO bearing on the kind of work that you as a programmer from day-to-day.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday October 05 2018, @05:01PM (2 children)
I do know that this sort of spring-it-on-you puzzling has very little to do with job performance.
At the same time, I note that had this been part of the interview process when I got my first freelance contract in 1983 (to port software from some CP/M based BASIC on a DEC Rainbow into Applesoft for the Apple II) I might not have got the job, not having the critical thinking and creative skills to envision the solution, whereas now, after decades of (hopefully) improvement, I would probably see the answer to something like that at once--so it might be some sort of indicator after all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:06PM (1 child)
That's why software sucks. You guys are tinkerers, not engineers.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday October 05 2018, @05:17PM
No argument there. I lay no claim to being an engineer. After initially declaring an Engineering major, I soon switched to Business and there I graduated.
If you know of a way to enforce engineering first, code second, especially in the wild, where most free software communities do their bad-engineering-code-tinkering, you would be doing the world a great favor.
(Score: 1) by Ethanol-fueled on Saturday October 06 2018, @02:18AM
I'd do the Whiteboard part in block-diagrams, and explain that my favorite language is LabVIEW.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:10PM (6 children)
I ask all candidates "If I were to send you into the cellar to retrieve the plans for the project you are being considered for, what would you expect to find?" iI they don't mention the sign warning of the leopard I don't hire them. It's as simple as that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:29PM
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Friday October 05 2018, @04:39PM (3 children)
While this screen of create a monoculture which is not necessarily a good thing, testing for compatibility of personalities (you can reference that thing that I like) is what the interview should be mostly about.
Anyone who didn't lie on their resume can likely learn the tech skills. Incompatible minds is the most important thing to flag.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:40PM (2 children)
Oftentimes, lying on the resume is necessary because companies are stupidly requiring degrees for jobs that don't need them and didn't used to require them, or asking for N years of experience using a technology that hasn't even existed that long. Because of that, people lie, use degree mills, etc.
(Score: 2) by The Shire on Friday October 05 2018, @07:32PM (1 child)
Job postings like that are generally written with absurd requirements because they really don't want to hire you, they want to hire an H1B but they're required by law to post the position for citizens first.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @09:12PM
Yes, so even if you do lie on your resume in response, you're still not likely to get the job because they'll look doubly close because they know only a liar or great fool is likely to be applying for the job they're offering. And the rare exception won't stick around long enough to justify worrying about false positives.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:11PM
I'd expect to find insidiously evil death traps, prepared for my demise.
I don't interview well.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Zinho on Friday October 05 2018, @04:15PM (5 children)
I had an interviewer pull one on me once, it was memorable:
He asked me to imagine a white foam cube, painted black on the outside, and cut twice on each axis (like a Rubik's cube). He then asked me group the pieces by number of painted sides and give him the count in each group, sorted from most to least paint.
He admitted, after I gave the correct answer, that he had no intention of giving me the job; he was told go interview me, so he was having fun with it. He had discerned that I was a visual thinker, and had heard that giving this problem to someone who thinks visually leads to amusing pantomime during the visual analysis, followed by a quick correct answer [1]. Apparently, I did not disappoint.
I have mixed feelings about this event. I didn't like having my time wasted, nor being used for the interviewer's amusement. On the other hand, he was honest with me about what was going on, I was able to grasp that his time was being wasted as well, and I learned something about how my brain works. I've had worse afternoons.
[1] The pantomime was that I reached out and touched the pieces I was counting as I visualized them. The incorrect answer often given by non-visual thinkers is off by one (the sum of the group counts is not 27 mini-cubes), and is missing a category. Visual thinkers "see" the otherwise-uncounted piece and correctly place it in its own group.
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday October 05 2018, @04:32PM (3 children)
Are you saying the answer isn't four groups (8, 12, 6, and 1 having 3, 2, 1, and 0 painted sides) such that 8+12+6+1=27?
Or are you saying that people whose thought is insufficiently visual tend to omit the 0-side one-cube group, identifying only 26 of the 27?
(The Rubick's cube itself has no cube or portion thereof in that position, by the way, leaving space for a universal joint.)
Also, thanks for the heads-up; after hearing your warnings I was careful to visualize this without the benefit of hand manipulation...
(Score: 2) by Zinho on Friday October 05 2018, @05:34PM (2 children)
You have it right, the interviewer's assertion was that non-visual thinkers tend to omit the center cube, and only identify the 26 surface cubes. And, yes, the question explicitly avoided using a Rubik's cube as the example because tech interviewees often are intimately familiar with the inside structure of the real toy.
I take comfort knowing that I've perhaps now spoiled some other interviewer's fun by inoculating you against the pantomime. Potential revenge is mine!
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @09:30PM (1 child)
The irony there is that by excluding the non-visual thinkers, you're excluding the group that likely is the best for the job.
I'm more or less completely non-visual and it allows me to do things mathematically that other people struggle with because I don't have to worry about what it looks like. A banana shaped object is just the shape of a banana. I don't really have to worry about what that looks like other than to know that it's a longish yellow thing with a bit of a curve.
When doing more complicated math or engineering where you're dealing with more than a few dimensions or you're dealing with a complicated system, not visualizing can eliminate a lot of the distraction. You just have to be comfortable with the procedure from getting from one state to another and knowing how they interact. Trying to do that visually is a real mess.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @12:45AM
But the interviewer in Zinho's interview wasn't using it to exclude non-visual thinkers.
He posed this problem on a lark, hoping to see Zinho waving his hands in the air like a retard, but since he had only heard about it, he apparently didn't pose this question in serious interviews. (Or perhaps someone else handled the serious interviews, and this guy was hired for his time-wasting skills...)
Also, you're assuming it's a "more complicated math or engineering" job, when that's not stated. For all you know, Zinho was interviewing for a flower-arranging job.
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Friday October 05 2018, @10:41PM
Then there's having fun with the interviewer, especially if you're Richard [sellsbrothers.com] Feynmann [microsoft.com].
(Score: 2) by YeaWhatevs on Friday October 05 2018, @04:18PM (3 children)
I thought that style of interview was going out of style. Was it google (when they were the new hotness) that started all of this nonsense or before that? No matter, some company was making a lot of money, and then some news-site reported (mis-reported?) this was how they did their interviews and others started emulating that in the hope they would be the next thing. Come to think of it, just substitute in "X" for "how they did their interviews".
(Score: 4, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @04:36PM (2 children)
Judging from the new hires I have seen lately, I think at least one of the questions should be "You have a bucket that holds 2 gallons and a bucket that holds 5 gallons. How many buckets do you have"?
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday October 05 2018, @05:06PM
Bonus points if they answer "Not Sure?"
(Score: 4, Touché) by danmars on Friday October 05 2018, @05:56PM
Would your expected correct answer be "at least one"?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Friday October 05 2018, @04:47PM (2 children)
When interviewing candidates, I have never used those sorts of tests. I talk to them about the work they have done. If they know what they're talking about, it quickly becomes clear. If they don't, that becomes clear also. I am upfront about what the needs of the job are, and focus on gaps that I see between the information on their resumes and what the job is asking for, and those areas that seem relevant. I like to see if the candidate is somebody that can figure out what they don't know and get the job done, not if they've done 100% of what I need by rote. People who can only do the latter are dull and I don't like to work with them. When requirements change, and they always change, they can't roll with the punches and become a drag on the team.
So I find tests and game playing like that insulting and counter-productive.
As an interviewee, I always endeavor to get the hiring agent to talk about what they need in the job instead of rapid firing stupid games and gotcha questions at me. It works most of the time, because anybody who takes their job seriously wants to know if you can help them solve a problem, not how well you can tap-dance through stupid gotcha questions. On the few occasions when side-stepping that BS doesn't work, I answer a few of the questions and then bring things to a close: "Hey, thanks for inviting me in, but I think you're looking for a different fit; I know some guys who might be better for you--I'll forward their info to you." I figure I don't want to work at a place that goes in for that kind of bullshit, and I get to go out a hero.
It's an artifice, I know, but when you're in the job search process it is critical to maintain the conviction that you're in control of what happens. That is a key take-away I got from What Color is Your Parachute, and it has served me well for several decades. I highly recommend it to anyone.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:09PM
Yes, I think that's the reason people get upset about this topic; these kinds of puzzlers can gaslight people into feeling like they're incompetent, thereby undermining years of hard-won skill.
It's important to remember who you are, that you have worth, and that other people are probably not better than you are.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @10:46AM
Ok, I hear you. But I hire fresh students and co-ops. They don't have training or experience to talk about or even hard projects in school most of the time. So for them, yeah, brain teasers it is. If you can figure some out, maybe you can dicern requirements, and encypher them into code.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:07PM
I always ask my candidates to explain their background and how they got interested in programmimg. I want to hire people with a passion for writing good code and a love the industry for which they are working. You can evaluate logic and technical skills just by having nice casual conversation. I’ve never regretted a new hire and my employees are the best!
(Score: 2, Funny) by realDonaldTrump on Friday October 05 2018, @05:33PM (2 children)
Fantastic way to get to know someone. Possibly the best way, without taking our clothes off.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:53PM (1 child)
Exactly! And if the candidate doesn't reply "my politics are none of this business' business" they fail the interview!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ikanreed on Friday October 05 2018, @07:01PM
And if they sue you for hiring discrimination, the actual correct solution, they win the interview.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @05:37PM (6 children)
I interview and hire sysadmins. I've been a sysadmin myself for close to 23 years now. I've worked for Major companies, small companies, I've been on strike teams (we come in fix major issues and vanish before anyone knows wtf is going on). So I've done a LOT in my career.
My favorite question to asks SysAdmins is "You have a computer, server/workstation doesn't matter that has link lights on both ends, has connectivity. But you can't ping your gateway, how do you troubleshoot it"
My god the answer I've gotten back from, replace the full machine, to write a peice of code to do X Y Z.
I do this cause I want to see how they think and how they come with a solution.
The ultimate answer I am looking for is "Replace the cable"
I would say 1 in 6 people I've interviewed come to this solution.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by requerdanos on Friday October 05 2018, @06:04PM (2 children)
I wouldn't call "replace the cable" the "ultimate answer" for that particular situation. Especially given that link lights are claiming it's probably good.
It is, however, admittedly. a lot better than "replace the machine" (and I had a supervisor in an IT department who would have done just that--but this supervisor also ran a computer company under an alias and had given himself a contract to supply new computers to our organization).
But sure, "try another cable" would be a diagnostic step, but not necessarily the first one. Looking at the IP configuration (address, routing table, etc.) is an example of something you can and probably should do before starting to swap hardware items around.
Last time I had those symptoms, the problem was that the gateway had dropped parts of its configuration leading to a misconfiguration-via-dhcp of the host in question. Fixed by replacing the gateway device (not the first time it had randomly dropped configuration and it was under service contract). The cable turned out to be OK.
Not saying you don't have a good approach--finding out how someone things is a big help.
I had an interview once with the problem posed, how to troubleshoot "a network printer that won't print". I mentioned that you could try to ping it or make sure it otherwise shows up on the network, check the printer to be sure it's connected and ready for print jobs, print a config page and verify its configuration, etc.
They were looking for "Try to print locally" and actually said "The answer is try to print locally." They didn't know what a "network printer" was; they meant a windows machine with its local printer shared on the network via SMB. I mentioned that such a thing might be better termed a "shared Windows printer", and from the head of the IT department got the sage answer "same thing." I got the job but it didn't last long.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:11PM (1 child)
Probably good, doesn't mean it is good. Last few jobs I've had this has been #1 connectivity issue. Still have link at both ends, networking config is fine. Just can't pass packets. (oddly enough dhcp still works but anything heavier doesn't).
It's been a strange one, so I've fallen in love with this question cause you get a person to walk thru what they would check.
Much like you said, I would expect, check configuration, check link, check the switch. BUT the first thing you swap in my world is the cable (before you go down the rabbit hole of replacing nics, motherboards, etc, etc).
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Friday October 05 2018, @08:17PM
When I first learned to crimp ends on ethernet cables, I quickly learned that there is a way to screw it up which makes the link lights glow but fails to transfer data. It was a bit mystifying until I went with the "try a different cord" option.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:11PM (2 children)
How about check the routing tables on both machines, not only can they be screwed up by users or errant software, but sometimes just ICMP messages get filtered out as part of a firewall or the like.
Replace the cable? Nah. That's second, and unlikely.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @06:56PM (1 child)
> Replace the cable? Nah. That's second, and unlikely.
Someone doesn't work in an environment where cables get moved, and sometimes run over or worse.
You know some ethernet cables are specced for the number of times they can bend? They do have a fail rate - that's mostly in robotics though.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @09:03PM
I work in a professional setting where we engineer our layouts for maximal productivity.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:02PM (3 children)
DEAR Mr Fiaccone,
After interviewing with you on the phone, last Friday ... when I did not hear from anyone by the end of last week, following up on your declared intent to bring me in for an interview ... I followed through on plans previously made, to visit my daughter, at college, and to pick berries, in remote Northern California, for canning.
I did this, in part, because of the dismissive way you suggested that interviewing me, after I had dared to spend three years less than fully employed, was some sort of a "risk". Exactly what sort of risk does one undertake by hiring a seasoned UNIX engineer with three decades of verifiable experience and employment? I seriously wondered if you would even call your recruiter and ask her to schedule an interview; IE, could I even trust you to do what you said you would do? That "trust" thing cuts both ways, you see.
(As previously discussed, Mr Fiaccone ... I didn't work for a few years because my daughter was hospitalized for six months, just after I started working at Roche Molecular Systems. Then, a few weeks later, my mother died. Roche immediately terminated my contract; since then, despite many job applications, and a few phone interviews, I haven't had any work. Although it's tempting to assume that I bear some sort of responsibility for this state of affairs, it has been my observation that the sorts of jobs I was used to filling had been filled with H1Bs, and the industry had no interest in hiring Americans. When we talked about H1Bs, Mr Fiaccone, you got very flustered - just sayin'.)
So when I got the email Monday morning, that Actiance wanted to interview me Monday afternoon, I was not able to comply. We arranged for Tuesday afternoon (today). I got up before 5 AM and drove around 300 miles back to the Bay Area to meet with Actiance, this afternoon.
Let me say that normally I impose a requirement for 72 hours' notice for an in-person interview. I bent over backwards to meet with you. But we were never introduced; and you were not even on the agenda.
(Let me add that trying to schedule AND carry out an interview, all on the same day, is a mark of something, I'm not sure what. Desperation? Maybe. I should have taken that as a warning.)
The first portion of my interview was free of defects. Harun handed me over to Hrushi. Hrushi and I met. I sketched some diagrams for Hrushi. I showed him some source code. We discussed some difficult situations I'd been in and finessed solutions to. I gave Hrushi a copy of my full resume, so we could talk about the Big Picture.
Then Harun took over the interview.
I found Harun was constantly interrupting me. No, really! I'm a court-appointed foster parent. I've been professionally trained in managing shared conversational spaces. Harun was constantly talking over me. It was very rude. It was so rude that I explicitly asked him to stop interrupting me. I've never done that before.
He lectured me about an egoless workplace but unless I miss my guess, Harun has a big 'un.
Harun also lectured me about how terrible the 65% efficiency of network interface cards was before his previous employer, SGI, exposed the bad, bad, NIC architecture imposed upon the free world by Bill Gates.
Because Harun did not demonstrate any skills or knowledge associated with chip-level electronics analysis (which I would recognize, because my younger brother is a component-level electronics engineer, self-taught - he was formerly known as Kilo-Kilo-Six-India-Xray) ... I can say with confidence that Harun had nothing to do with this discovery, and in any case I do not see the relevance of a chip level architectural defect, to my role as applications support engineer, unless I am expected to remotely diagnose functionality down to the chip level.
Harun also spent a lot of time reciting the story of how he had been hired as a manager, someplace, and how the very first thing he had done - after watching his direct reports work, for eight weeks, on trying to upgrade some functionality, and fail - was to call a meeting of everyone. He spent the better part of an hour trying to get me to say that calling a big meeting was the only solution to the problem, even though, as a non-manager, I would not have any such option, and would be putting my employment at risk by ordering people who did not report to me, around. Harun insisted that everyone was equally empowered to be a whistleblower, there, at Actiance, and that being a whistleblower, and demanding meetings, would be part of my duties, there, at Actiance. Needless to say, I did not agree.
Because I would not agree, Harun told me that he concluded that I did not have the sort of initiative that he was looking for - this, despite being a senior UNIX systems administrator, having just spent the past thirty years resolving problems that tended to span my employers' entire software stacks, crossing organizational boundaries in hot pursuit of solutions, for R&D organizations, hospitals, banks, and dot-coms.
Between the interruptions and the ongoing oneupsmanship, we never got around to looking at any source code or talking about UNIX.
Harun never got around to explaining exactly what Actiance's product or service even was! He was too busy reliving his glory days at SGI.
And that bothers me. That's NOT why I came, dude! What a waste of time.
Harun concluded by saying that he had a "test". He went and got it from his desk - he had not brought it into the room with him. (Why not?) It was two problems. He said he was following his boss' (you?) instructions in giving me these two tests - that it wasn't his idea.
Before I introduce these two tests, I am going to take this moment to point out that highly skilled automotive mechanics solve problems all day, every day, and nobody forces them to engage in stupid brain teasers for the privilege of earning a living. Why not?
So here's how Silicon Valley's best and brightest (Alan Fiaccone, that is) tests the technical capacity of their candidates:
#1: There are nine marbles. Equally big, equally heavy, except for one, which is a little heavier. How would you identify the heavier ball if you could use a pair of balance scales only twice?
#2: You have two strings and a lighter. Each string takes one hour to burn, but they burn at variable rates. So, for example, after 30 minutes, you have no idea how much string is burned. Using the two strings and the lighter to determine exactly when 45 minutes have passed.
What relevance do these questions have to the work at hand?
Maybe, MAYBE you could make an argument that question #1 is actually a test to see if the candidate knows what a bubble sort is. I know what a bubble sort is - but only because my brother went to MIT, and it was a topic of discussion.
I don't have the bubble sort algorithm memorized, I'm not a computer programmer, and when I do need algorithms I either develop them myself or I look them up.
Personally, I don't mind an occasional puzzle, but I'm a visual thinker, and I'm not going to apologize for it.
KLOPS' testing picked that up, because KLOPS' testing includes tests that are visual, tests that are verbal, and tests that are numeric. Your tests are only verbal.
KLOPS' testing was probably intended to estimate my IQ, and I'll estimate that it estimated my IQ as being between 130 and 140. That doesn't mean I'm right but it does mean that you'd be stupid to ignore what I have to say.
And so, I ask you, Senior Director of IT: WHAT WERE YOU TESTING?
Don't give me that bullshit about how you were testing my resistance to adversity. If you were, then my email, here and now, would get me top scores. And it isn't. So enough rhetoric. What do you THINK you are doing? Teach me.
Don't give me that bullshit about how you "wanted to see how I would solve a problem". Testing isn't a spectator sport. I'm not taking tests to entertain you. You're not qualified to interpret the results. You have no degrees in industrial psychology. Just quit it.
Please explain to me what you thought you were measuring, why KLOPS' metrics weren't good enough for you - and what you were using as a baseline for your measurements.
Lacking evidence to the contrary, I'm going to suggest that the only thing these sorts of tests prove, is how smart the manager giving the test is, and how stupid the candidate is. It's an equalizer, used by managers who feel inadequate to the very people they manage.
Or is a test to see if I am willing to subordinate myself to authority figures?
If so, it is absurd. Your manager, Harun, is trying to recruit people with initiative (or so he says). And yet, you have him imposing tests upon your candidates, to test to see if they are willing to subordinate themselves to authority. Doesn't that seem a little, well, schizophrenic? Which do you want? Independent thinkers ... or obedient zombies? Make up your fucking mind.
I had a Google HR person ask me, once, what 2 to the 64th power was. I mean, really - WHAT WAS HE TESTING? All it did was piss me off and end the interview. That's not what he was being paid for.
My conclusion is that Actiance needs a massive injection of brains. And integrity. Smart people, honest with themselves, not stuck on themselves ... and more smart people, not stuck on themselves, to MANAGE.
I didn't see the people staffing the help desk, and I'll bet that's no accident - I'll bet they were all H1Bs.
In exiting, I could not help but also notice that Actiance management had created their Help Desk by cramming tables and computer displays for maybe ten people into a crowded footprint, about ten feet wide and maybe fifteen feet long.
My recommendation, Alan, is that you quit looking for someone who comes pre-trained in every single Apache Foundation project that exists (~300, I think). You chose to give the opportunity to learn these new technologies, to people not even from this country. Now, you're OUTRAGED that you cannot find people trained in these technologies. Figure it out. Everyone else who is technically minded, has.
And ... ditch those stupid Romper Room tests. They make your management look like a bunch of children.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @10:52PM
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @10:55PM
Asking what 2^64 is, is how Google's HR people piss off old people so the don't have to hire them.
He *WAS* doing *EXACTLY* what he was being paid to do.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @11:04AM
Wow. I'm glad you vented here, to us. Thank you. That sounds like terrible treatment, and we soylentils can learn from your pain. Consolations. I hope the berries were delicious and canned well.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:18PM
Depends who's doing it, but from the description in TFS, and making the (generous) assumption that it's even a good-faith effort to test something about you, it's probably not about how well you solve them, but about your attitude on seeing a new thinking problem. The idea would be that if you go "Puzzle? Cool!" and dig in, you win; if you go "What, use my brain? Hell, no!", you lose. Of course, it's not a very good test, because there's perfectly good reasons a person who happily engages with actual problems that need solved might get pissed off at made-up and irrelevant "brain teasers", but then most interview tricks are stupid -- this one's probably better than average.
(Of course, it could just be a dumb manager who thinks he's smart (goodness knows there are plenty of them) who really believes he can make a better brain test than actual scientists.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday October 05 2018, @08:51PM (3 children)
I don't like using brain teasers for interviews because they don't tell me much about the person but since the OP did ask for them here's one (of many).
You are given nine marbles. Eight of them are of equal weight and the ninth weighs a little more. Visually, all of the marbles appear identical. Given a balance, how many weighings are required to deduce which is the heavier marble?
(Answer: 2)
(Score: 2) by VanessaE on Saturday October 06 2018, @01:05PM (2 children)
Maybe I'm just stupid, but I don't see how to get the answer in two (then again, I've never had to write a general sort function).
If I bisect, I can get it in three at worst:
Pick eight marbles at random, leaving the ninth one on the table. Weigh those eight against each other, as two groups of four. If the scales are in balance, the heavy marble must be the one on the table.
If the scales are not in balance, toss all of the lighter group, and the one on the table, back in the bag. Split the heavy group into two pairs, and weigh.
Toss the lighter pair from that weighing back in the bag. One of the remaining two must be the heavy one, so weigh them against each other.
(Score: 2) by VanessaE on Saturday October 06 2018, @01:10PM (1 child)
...and now I feel stupid, after having looked up the solution.
/me hands in her geek card.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @04:08PM
That's the whole idea - to make you feel stupid.
Technically, it borders upon premeditated harassment.
It has nothing to do with your quality as a person.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday October 06 2018, @04:21PM
It seems to me that those situations where an employee is under pressure are usually those situations where the vision and leadership of their management have failed.
As such, these failures are failures of MANAGEMENT and the focus needs to remain upon the TRUE source of the problem - the self-proclaimed leadership.
Shuffling off responsibility onto the shoulders of the bottom-most rungs of the corporate ladder is an old trick, made easier by the fact that they are all contractors, or indentured servants - I refer to H1Bs, of course.
Having worked with and for good management, competent people, with imagination and mathematical capacities to turn their worst-case scenarios into budgets that built infrastructures that anticipated failure and handled it, so that people did not experience stress - not even support staff - I can say, with confidence, that workplaces that incorporate stress tests in their interviewing process are organizations that plan for failure, instead of success.
They are looking for people who can deal with the stress of being blamed for the mistakes of their superiors.
They are looking for grovellers, in other words! (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/grovel)