[fdye]

So my $0.02 from being on both the hiring and trying to get hired side of the fence. Also I can't do a whiteboard interview to save my life, never could. I mostly think the process everyone is running makes a bit more sense for entry-level applicants. You are dealing with a candidate pool exactly like what you describe above. However, for anything above a junior dev it is horribly inefficient.

Instead I'm always surprised more places don't rely on references and prior experience. Yes people lie, but in my experience its relatively easy to tell the difference with a simple glance at their LinkedIn. If I look at a candidate that spent 2-3 yrs as a Software Engineer at some company that I'm relatively familiar with, and they seem to have 2nds and thirds to people I know in the industry, then pretty good chance they aren't lying. Same for people taking the time out to write recommendations for them. Even bigger signal if they want setup some calls with their prior co-workers who can vouch for them, to me that means they stand by their work and reputation.

I recently went through about seven rounds for a senior role. During that time I repeatedly offered to setup some time with my prior coworkers from those I directly managed, to peers, to those I reported to (executive team). My thinking being that they could hear from the horses mouth how I lead a team, my work ethic, etc. They did not take me up on the offer, which to me was crazy. Yes, I could be running some machiavellian scam with 2-3 people who also made a fake LinkedIn, I also could have put up fake articles in PR Newswire announcing my last position, could have spoofed all those blogs I co-authored from the company I worked at 2 jobs ago, etc. But really, wouldn't it be a better signal for a candidate to offer and have all these things?

Instead you see an industry that puts someone with ~10 yrs experience through a whiteboard interview. It makes no sense.

[eldavido]

I think this is more in line with how hiring works for senior jobs. I've been part of 50+ hiring decisions and do it like this.

Social stuff is absolutely the first thing I'm checking. It's a quick test to spot total lies, e.g. you claim you worked somewhere but are connected with zero people on any social network, or claim attendance at a school with zero connection to anyone. If nothing else, it helps to build rapport for the interview.

I would 100%, absolutely trust a personal recommendation over a dumb whiteboard interview.

[aleph_minus_one]

> Social stuff is absolutely the first thing I'm checking. It's a quick test to spot total lies, e.g. you claim you worked somewhere but are connected with zero people on any social network, or claim attendance at a school with zero connection to anyone. If nothing else, it helps to build rapport for the interview.

There exist quite a lot of people who have no account on any social network for privacy reasons.

[eldavido]

You want to make it hard on yourself, that's your business.

[aleph_minus_one]

> If I look at a candidate that spent 2-3 yrs as a Software Engineer at some company that I'm relatively familiar with, and they seem to have 2nds and thirds to people I know in the industry, then pretty good chance they aren't lying.

The problem is: there exist a lot of companies - you can only be familiar with a very small fraction of them. Also, for many big companies, the differences between departments or groups can be a lot larger than between companies of similar size and sector.

[relaxing]

Seven rounds! What questions was this company asking you for seven rounds?

Every time I’ve had a company go longer than 2 rounds, another company got me an offer first.

[gedy]

Not the OP, but Elastic and Glassdoor had me do 6-7 rounds.

Glassdoor had the gall to just ghost me after the 6th! Never again.

[relaxing]

What questions were they asking you over so many rounds? Like how much more information about a candidate could one possibly need?

[gedy]

I think they were stringing me out while interviewing others. I should have seen through it, but wanted it to work out at the time.

[relaxing]

Wow. I feel like for most recruiters, a simple "hey just to let you know you're still in the running"-type of check in would suffice?

[bluecheese452]

If you could credibly spoof all that most companies would love to hire you. Would likely be your most valuable skill.