[johnrob]

Well, in the real world I find that you don’t understand the problem you want to solve until you’ve applied a working solution to it. Practically speaking I tend to deliver quickly to accelerate the process, then refactor once all the requirements have been exposed. As mentioned here, this probably doesn’t project well in an interview. It’s a case where the most efficient practice is not the most presentable one. I’ve failed interviews for this reason too. Lessons learned!

[jconley]

Same experience here. Been writing code for over 20 years. There's a reason we don't do big Waterfall projects any more. No amount of research uncovers all requirements. In the real world, with the ease of refactoring in powerful IDE's these days, there is no reason to spend too much time thinking about a small problem like those presented for whiteboard coding.

In practice, in an interview, this is the wrong approach. I've failed interviews for this as well.

Most of what differentiates a Senior Engineer is communication, mentorship, ability to compromise on product requirements, set realistic expectations, design solutions to big problems, think in the large and hold the whole system in their head, design API's, things like that.

I no longer do interviews that require me to write code. They're just ridiculous for the type of skills I'd hope a company would value in a Senior Engineer.