[the_watcher]

I just wrapped up a take home project. When I was told about it, I told the HM that I withdraw from processes that include a take home. They told me that they understood, but that this one really did only take an hour or two, and that they’d send it over to me anyway. All they asked was that I take a look, and if I completed it, they’d send me a $150 Amazon gift card. I took a look, and it really did seem straightforward (basically testing what I’d expect a live, 30-45 minute DS interview to cover), so I went ahead and did it. I ended up spending 2.5 hours on it, but only because I got sucked into making very pretty charts.

I’m pretty anti-take home, because they’re usually scoped as “it should only take you 4-5 hours, here’s a project that would take an in house DS a week at minimum”, but if they were actually scoped like this one (and even mildly comped), I really wouldn’t mind much.

[skeeter2020]

I think I share your interpretation, plus it is possible to scope something small that's (gasp!) interesting. The last one I did was use the company's product to create something and then demo it to the team. In addition to a gift card is was (almost) fun.

IMO a (very small) take-home assignment is the least-worst of a lot of generally bad options. A pairing exercise focused on teamwork and communication (vs hardcore coding) is the only other option I even consider these days.

[throwaway81523]

I'm happy with the idea of a pairing exercise. I've felt regretful about every time I've gotten involved with a take-home even when my submission was successful, so maybe that's why I'm reacting badly to it here. You mention scoping, but there really has to be a way to enforce that other candidates don't spend more time on it than you do. Otherwise it is a resource consumption contest.

[the_watcher]

I agree - I have regretted every time that I agreed to a take home assignment, including when it’s been successful. The reason this worked was the HM simply sent me the assignment and asked me to take a look (and clarified that there’d be no hard feelings if I decided not to move forward). I took a look, and it turned out they weren’t lying about it being well scoped!

[roguecoder]

I always appreciate when they resemble the work the company expects I'll end up doing, because I do actually enjoy the work I do.

If I don't like the take-home, I assume I'll probably hate the job too. Whereas traditional interviews tell me almost nothing about what I'm going to end up doing day to day.