[yomly]

> I believed people valued coming up with the solution on the spot.

So I 100% agree with this. Being intuitively clever and being able to apply what you know is intrinsically valuable:

Think of the extreme, imagine someone who is unable to apply something they've learnt unless it's exactly in the context they learnt it.

That said, I think it's often underestimated how valuable prep is. Some people even get a bit salty over it, people who are unwilling to "jump through the hoops".

As a teacher, I've seen all kinds of people, people who need absolutely nothing to figure out things on their own, whose limit is only their imagination. On the other hand, there are bright people who need a bit of guidance but are nonetheless otherwise very brilliant.

We are the sum of our experiences. How we've arrived at our present is completely unrelated to other people's. Some people have had parents who are scientific, other people were hacking consoles/linux/coding since they were 10. Other people got bored with their careers and decided to try something new in their late 20s.

Who's to say a month of prep is too much or too little to get ready for an interview.

Though, to the people who want to derive everything on the spot, I'd ask:

"how did you figure out how to start a fire?"

"when did you derive differential calculus?"

"how old were you when you solved the schrodinger equation?"

My point is, "solving something on the fly" is a misnomer. Without a doubt, it takes intelligence to apply a combination of tricks to a new problem in an unfamiliar context. But trying to come up with a solution when you've never seen the trick is a completely different ballgame, and its worth trying to see the picture from a different perspective.

Is the interview process flawed? Well that's an entirely different question ..

[catchmrbharath]

I am not talking about inventing data structures or an algorithm on the spot. It takes some amount of time to find the right data structure and the algorithm. I felt that the interviewers are not ready to give that time.

Say you have not seen a particular dynamic programming problem. It takes some time to get to the fact that there is a recursive solution to it, and then apply DP to it.

For a person who has seen that problem, it doesn't take a lot of time to write the code. While interviewing, you are compared to that person. Nobody takes that extra effort to actually appreciate somebody who thought about the problem and answered it.

For a tech industry that prides itself in hiring the best / most talented, this is ironic.

[yomly]

The thing is, that Amazon/Facebook/Google are in the unique position of having too many applicants, not too few.

This is by no means vindicating their process, merely shedding some light on it. A bit like case studies and consulting...

Edit: though on that note, a good case study will extract / give a candidate the opportunity the opportunity to demonstrate key competencies aligned with consulting, much as in the same way solving some algorithm on the spot is a reasonable proxy for being a good googler. The only problem is it has a high false negative rate...

[jbooth]

They've got an absolute shit-ton of recruiters out there manufacturing those candidates. I've never done an on-site Google interview (never the right timing) but they hit me up once a year trying to drum up interest. And then every one of those drummed-up interview loops takes time from their engineers who could be working on stuff.

They could probably do better for themselves as businesses with an interview process that looked for skills that are necessary to get the job done (not white board big-o olympics) and sufficient to get the job done (not white board big-o olympics).