[mattacurtis]

You're likely not going to have a business situation which requires an employee to code a solution in 5 minutes. Even if you do, the team + collaborative environment in that situation vs in this present interview situation will make a major difference in the employee's performance.

You obviously want to hire people that can handle stress and perform well under it, but it doesn't make a lot of sense to create these unrealistic situations to test how well a candidate might perform on the job.

I'd recommend informing the candidate upfront that the interview will be taped. Then give him the problem and come back in an hour. Make the candidate provide you with all the scratch sheets / work and use these in conjunction with your tape to evaluate his/her performance.

I realize this may not be realistic, but it is possible and I think it would lead to some interesting and useful results.