[tway12]

Unfortunately, my experience with TripleByte was terrible and a waste of my time. I completed the interview with a very high evaluation across all categories as provided by the interviewer.

There were certain areas where the interviewer messed up in their evaluation, e.g. they felt I "was a little weak at hashmaps and API design", which is probably because they did not know what I was talking about when I described the details of advanced hashmap implementations. There seems to be a bias to discredit the interviewee if the interviewer lacks knowledge in an area.

Either way, despite getting great evaluations, I was matched with a total of 5 companies most of which were highly underwhelming early stage companies with minimal traction. Furthermore, I was matched with full stack companies despite begin evaluated as "weak in API design", which is perplexing. I was able to get higher quality offers in my own search and it seems like the TripleByte pipeline consists of many mediocre companies.

If I had known, I wouldn't have wasted my time with this service and invested more time in my job search.

[dan7678]

This matches my experience almost exactly.

I had a common point about hashmaps -- the interviewer seemed to be at loss, and was asking weird questions that had little connection or relevance to the implementation path I'd chosen -- I politely explained the confusion and we swiftly moved on. They then marked that as a weak/"fuzzy" spot in their evaluation. I made sure to give my feedback about this to the person who shared the evaluation, but did not receive a response.

In the end, after making it to the company-matching phase, they found a whopping 1 company with <5 people, in an area I had clearly said I didn't plan on moving to. I don't know which part of the data-centric recruiting process got this so badly wrong.

Hoping that this process improves, but so far it hasn't lived up to expectations and I ended up finding multiple great matches on my own afterwards.

[triplebytelol]

Throwaway, because I'm well-known on HN.

I ran the TripleByte course once, and it was 100% not worth my time as a professional.

The "coding test" was criminally simple, but got me in the door quickly for an interview. I spent a number of hours building out projects with a paired interviewer, as well as answering questions. This part I enjoyed, it felt like a nice back and forth while building an interesting bit of software. It was like an open discussion, and getting to tap away on my laptop was such an enjoyable time.

Then came the technical questions. The interviewer asked if I knew anything about a specific Technology X. I'd list the tech here by name, but it's so specific I'm afraid of it being linked back to me. It's not something most engineers would run into.

I responded with "I have not worked with that, I've heard of it" as well as it never being listed on my resume or professional work. The interviewer went ahead and simplified it down for us to discuss, much like "Ok well it works like this, so let's chat abstractly". I went along with the discussion since I figured it would be fine to chat abstractly about a technology I never worked with.

The interview concluded, we parted ways and I thought things went very well.

The following days later I received an e-mail from Triplebyte. They praised my clean code and thought process, but specifically said my weakness in said Technology X, which I would like to call out again I never worked with professional nor had it listed as a skill or on my resume, was too much to consider me for the next round.

TripleByte literally evaluated, and discounted me, on not knowing an uncommon bit of technology. Just what the hell.

I was shocked at the levels of failures that occurred to reach this point. It was unfair to use that as any benchmark, and unfair to waste a day of my time doing that. It was a smack in the face to an industry vet like myself.

I tell all job seekers to stay far, far away from TripleByte for this reason. They're not really changing the game at all, but like to pretend they are the magic answer.

One footnote: I'm an engineer at one of the giants (Google, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, etc) who was and is way more qualified than anything TripleByte was or is pushing out.

[taurath]

The giants fail people for the same reasons as well. I've learned over time that qualifications matter far far less than interview skills at software companies, and even a maximally qualified person only has a 60-70% chance of passing any arbitrary interview.

[Cyph0n]

That first sentence, if true, already narrows the search space drastically for anyone who wants to find you, especially given the length of your comment.

[khazhoux]

Plot twist: it's pg!

[meggar]

You can always learn Technology X and try again.

[zdky]

Before reaching any conclusions, would you let us know how specific is Technology X? Is it like a library or a framework? How uncommon is that?

If it's something commonly used by lots of developers and needed by lots of companies, I think it'd be fair to think of it as a bad signal at least.

The giants (Google, etc) have great engineers, but they also often use technologies that's very different from the general public.

Being an engineer from those companies are great, but it doesn't automatically qualify you for any job on the market.

[vonmoltke]

> Before reaching any conclusions, would you let us know how specific is Technology X? Is it like a library or a framework? How uncommon is that?

> If it's something commonly used by lots of developers and needed by lots of companies, I think it'd be fair to think of it as a bad signal at least.

From GP:

> I'd list the tech here by name, but it's so specific I'm afraid of it being linked back to me. It's not something most engineers would run into.

GP specifically said it it isn't something "something commonly used by lots of developers and needed by lots of companies".

[hunter23]

Echoing with a similar bad experience although this might be their customer's (Mixpanel) fault. I applied to Mixpanel and they sent me a Triplebyte quiz. They bugged me a few times to fill it out and then promised to give me feedback "very quickly". I never heard back (I applied several months ago) and sent them 3 - 4 follow up emails.

I'm not sure if the fault lies with Triplebyte or Mixpanel but it was an overall shitty experience. To be asked to take out your time to complete a quiz (which can be automatically scored with an algorithm since its multiple choice) and then get radio silence is terrible. Even if it was Mixpanel's fault, they should ensure their partners actually follow up with interviewers. For example, I know that Hired (another platform) actually will ding an employer that doesn't respond to applicants.

Anyways, Mixpanel & Triplebyte are probably on my "never apply to again ever" list.

[vonmoltke]

It may well have been Mixpanel. I applied to them and they sent me a non-Triplebyte quiz before having any human contact with me (not even a personal email). It was horribly designed; all edge-case language trivia and multiple choice design questions. Needless to say I didn't pass, and I will never go near them again.

Edit: fixed the formatting

[pryelluw]

About a week ago, I did some A/B testing. I completed their online screener twice. Once answering all of the questions as good as possible. The other answering the questions with the third option (multiple choice). In both cases, I passed the screener. (shrugs)

[e_b]

Cargo cult data science.

[dabockster]

aka most "big data" projects

Who else has noticed that most of those graphs don't start at zero and instead only show a very filtered view of the statistics collected?

[ScottBurson]

> There seems to be a bias to discredit the interviewee if the interviewer lacks knowledge in an area.

That reminded me of this classic HN comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12701625

The containing discussion is also relevant.