[hanifbbz]

Author here. I do hire staff engineers these days. A few points:

1. Spotify is a Swedish company with a strong brand identity. Conformity culture is a bit strong, so I can totally understand why they would want "someone like us" than someone who would ask the challenging questions. That's my take on that interaction but maybe I didn't write it well. I edited the article a bit.

2. Staff is a leadership position and like other leadership roles, the impact of your personal belief will not stay at the individual level but rather spread. A positive attitude pays dividents. In that particular example, I went in with negative prejudice. The right interaction would be to have an objective argument and share their view as someone who bought into it and is working at the company. The least they could do is to use that as an opportunity to set the record straight. At least that is what I do if a candidate asks the hard questions. I don't have to convince them, but I'll do my best to honestly answer it and quite frankly maybe I learn something about the company I'm presenting that I didn't know.