Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by asafira 4449 days ago
I am going to respectfully disagree. Just because the company can do it doesn't mean a weekend is plenty. You are given a weekend to decide where you might spend months of your life, potentially in a place you've never been. On top of that, who knows if that weekend was going to be extremely busy for you? Just because you take one week to decide on an offer doesn't mean you don't want to be there. It's also not at all an industry standard to give such a short timespan for the decision; if anything, it's a reflection of how little the company will care about the intern when he/she is there.

All in all, a weekend is certainly not "plenty". I sympathize with crazypyro.
3 comments
scrumper 4449 days ago
Thank you for the respectful disagreement (vs. 'smug'.) You make good points and I have some sympathy too - I understand that it's not easy being forced to make a quick and major decision. That being said, you don't always get to set the pace, and being confident in making decisions on the basis of imperfect or incomplete information is a valuable life skill. I can think of no better time to make a low-risk, snap decision about where to spend a few months than in the middle of college.

With regards to the decision around where you might spend months of your life, it's not like the location of the internship was a secret before crazypyro interviewed. The question about whether the company will treat the intern well is more nuanced, and you'd have to go with your gut.

Given the competitive nature of the market for CS interns and the quick decisions needed, the Secretary Problem might offer a good solution for crazypyro and others in that situation.

link
crazypyro 4449 days ago
Just to re-iterate how quick the turn around was, I interviewed on Thursday, got offered on Friday while I was at an interview for a different internship and then had to accept by that Monday.
link
_pmf_ 4449 days ago
> You are given a weekend to decide where you might spend months of your life, potentially in a place you've never been.

Well, I tend to think a bit about these matters before applying.

link