[crusso]

I've been on the hiring manager's side and the employee's side, more the former than the latter.

I don't get your beef.

The phone interviews are there to screen the 80% of the applicants who don't merit the time of my team to interview them. The puzzles are there to watch people think on their feet. The detailed questions are to see if you're looking at someone superficial or someone with deep knowledge of the subject matter. The programming challenges are to see if the applicant wants the job badly enough to spend a couple of hours working on a programming problem that can then be used as a showcase for how they write some software.

Earlier in my career, I didn't have all those interview techniques in place. When I started, hiring people was a complete crap shoot and I ended up with some total lemons. Like the warning labels on products you buy, each interview technique I added to the process was the result of a lame hire that in hindsight, I could have avoided had I used that technique.

The last job I had to interview for used all the techniques above. I found the interview process to be thorough and challenging. I appreciated the rigor of the interview process since it meant that the people hiring really gave a shit about the quality of the people joining their small team. I got the job. In point of fact, if they hadn't had a thorough interview process, I probably would have passed on the job offer since that would have been an indication to me that they were naive and didn't have their crap together.

Do you want to send me your $100 via Paypal?

[rmATinnovafy]

I don't have a beef with it. I also think that of you apply to the jobs posted on HN, you will get my point.

Sadly, I don't use Paypal. You can make a donation to your local hackerspace with the $100 that you will soon lose.

Good luck.

PS. Have you ever asked the people you have interviewed what they think about the process?

[mgkimsal]

"Have you ever asked the people you have interviewed what they think about the process?", especially, perhaps, the people you didn't hire?

Almost without exception, people who don't get hired never hear back from a company as to why. Yes, I know all about "everyone's afraid to get sued for saying something wrong". So... develop a neutral feedback form to candidates as to why they were passed over, skills the interviewer(s) thought were lacking, etc. This will mean that people can get better, perhaps get another job (yes, maybe at a competitor, but also maybe somewhere else entirely), and continue to earn income, pay taxes, and contribute to society in a productive way. Some people can contribute without a job, sure, but right now most people need jobs.

Telling someone "we're sorry - we had 8 candidates apply for this position, and we ended up taking on someone with more experience in X, Y and Z compared to your experience level. We wish you the best of luck in your job search". This would be courteous, professional and helpful all at the same time. Between my own experience and that of several colleagues, fewer than 5% of employers ever provide something even remotely useful in terms of feedback.

How do we expect the job seeking population to get better without providing feedback mechanisms for them to learn from?

[yummyfajitas]

Telling someone "we're sorry - we had 8 candidates apply for this position, and we ended up taking on someone with more experience in X, Y and Z compared to your experience level.

And what about the cases where your reasons are not "more experience in X, Y, Z"? Cultural fit is a biggie - one might turn down a candidate who is more qualified because his banking attitudes would go over badly at a startup, for example.

[mgkimsal]

That's true, and in those cases, a more generic "we had other qualified candidates" letter/email would be fine. but all too often corporate america just ignores people altogether - won't return emails/phone calls, and basically leaves the person out to dry. Working via a recruiter, you at least have a person at the agency who might be sympathetic.

Companies don't seem to realize that treating applicants bad is just as detrimental in many cases as poor customer service. I've had bad experiences with job application processes, and I've told many people chapter and verse about the companies involved. If they can't even treat people well who want to work there, how will they treat customers after the money is received?

[yummyfajitas]

That's true, and in those cases, a more generic "we had other qualified candidates" letter/email would be fine.

If unskilled candidate X gets "other candidates had more specific skillz" while uncultured candidate Y gets "sorry, you suck for unspecified reasons", it sounds like a lawsuit risk.

[bobb3456]

Telling the candidate anything specifically negative invites argument and misinterpretation. In practice, the better companies always use the "other qualified candidates" letter. The worse ones tell you nothing.

[crusso]

> PS. Have you ever asked the people you have interviewed what they think about the process?

Specifically asked? I've received lots of feedback from people who made it through the process. They've added to my bag of interview techniques here and there. In general, they appreciated a hiring manager who spent a lot of time and effort fielding good people. Those kinds of comments tend to be a bit self-selecting, though.

I've had a couple of candidates who didn't make it get frustrated with the process. One in particular lost his cool just trying to pseudocode a routine to determine prime factors of the input or something like that. If you lose your composure doing something like that, I don't want you in the trenches with me late at night when we have a demo to show to customers the next day and something isn't working.

When people have asked me for feedback on why they weren't made an offer, I've always tried to be as candid as possible; especially when it seemed that they were sincerely trying to improve. Screw HR and their obsessive need to CYA.

[theoj]

>> The puzzles are there to watch people think on their feet

Genuinely curious: why do you consider spontaneity an essential trait in a programmer?

[bobb3456]

I agree with everything you've said except for the bit about puzzles -- I've never found any correlation between the results from burn-the-ropes/odd-shaped manhole cover-type questions and strong programming skills. I've had at least one candidate who did superbly on the puzzlers (had clearly not seen them before)- best performance we'd seen-and could not program his way out of a wet paper bag. We stopped the puzzlers shortly thereafter. Brain teasers are a waste of time.