[d23]

Recruiting and hiring are garbage right now in the industry. Part of the problem is easy to recognize -- idiots designing interviews. This is where the puzzle crap comes from, as well as theoretical stuff that's far removed from the day to day of what a person will be doing.

The other problem is that the people who could be designing better interviews aren't stepping up. There are plenty of intelligent people who aren't 1) taking the time and effort to introspect and think about why they are effective as people and 2) taking those insights and translating them into an interview process that selects for important traits in simple, reproducible ways.

It's bizarre. A job could require years of experience with linux, programming, and networking, all of which could be tested with a multiple-choice style test to get a sense of where a candidate stands. Instead, we look at their resume, check off that they have our requirements buried somewhere in the forest of buzzwords, and then move onto whether someone can finger-paint their freshman year CS lectures onto a whiteboard. Then when we end up hiring a completely ineffective person who spent their entire time trying to game the interview system, we are surprised, even though we've been selecting for that kind of person all along.

[IndianAstronaut]

Another thing missing from interviews is being able to find various talents in engineers for the diversity of the engineers out there. Are they good at finding corner cases, are they creative with product design, are they good communicators with a non technical audience.

[yitchelle]

> This is where the puzzle crap comes from, as well as theoretical stuff that's far removed from the day to day of what a person will be doing.

I find looking through past project work is one of the best indicators of their ability. However I have found this to be extremely difficult to get. NDA restrictions of their previous employers is one major restrictions, or he is transitioning from a different domain or career path.