[scastiel]

I have a mitigated opinion about technical interviews. I know several companies hiring mostly in the employees’ network, so technical interview is not really necessary. Good references are far better than any whiteboard test.

On the other end, by hiring only in your network, the result is often companies lacking diversity. If you only work with people you know, you’ll probably work with people from the same schools, same social class, same experiences, etc. as you. At least technical interviews are more objective and give a chance to people with diverse backgrounds.

We can probably find a proper mix between network and technical interviews. In my opinion the technical interviews should be here to select candidates as a prior step to any other interview. So they should be quite easy. (I’m always surprised by the proportion on candidates to fail in very easy technical tests.) The true candidate evaluation should be done according to soft skills: ability to communicate, curiosity, desire to learn and help people, etc.

[throwawayc2020]

Makes sense to me, thanks for the perspective.