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A lot of dismissive complaints that boils to "this is objectifying programmers", and yes I get it. But now I'm on the other side (VP, but still coding), and actively recruiting, I realized some things taken for granted from myself and my good engineers, are still missing from a large number of candidates I've interviewed so far.

I usually ask the candidate for a live coding test over zoom. "Here's what you need to code, please share your screen while you're doing it so I can see how you work. You're free to google, of course, because that what we all do at work. The guy who wrote the quiz did it in 5min, I did it in 10. I give you 20 just in case. Please start now."

Then I watch them code. After that, we discuss their approach. But usually the second step never happened, because as soon as the timer stops and I see their code, the code (and how they're writing it) usually tells everything.

2 comments

That's why programming has declined from Software Engineering to 'coding'. I'm sure there are similar scoring tables in Civil Engineering, and Engineers there dont whine because they don't know or y principle.

Thats why I invite them to a live bridge building session over zoom!

You kid about it but I was curious enough to search for Civil Engineering interview questions:

https://targetjobs.co.uk/career-sectors/civil-and-structural...

Some examples: Being asked the following questions in an interview: ‘You are going to build the bridge that you were given as a case study earlier this morning. What are the ground investigation steps that you need to undertake? What sort of tests will you do?’

At the end of an interview being given some beam sketches and being asked to draw the shear force diagram and bending moment diagram.

Being asked to draw a strip foundation and build up to how you'd construct a suspended slab.

Being asked what factors you would need to take into account if asking to site a railway station.

How do you compress months of product development in a zoom session? Answer: you don't.

That's why they don't build a bridge over zoom, just like nobody ask you to build a complete app over zoom. They only ask the engineer basic engineering questions to ensure the guy is not a dud.

How do you standardize this across applicants? I'd worry that there's not enough to compare across candidates doing something as generic as this.

In my experience it’s used as a prescreen qualification- the actual interview of multiple candidates happens afterwards or in a second round.

But aren't prescreens subject to the same subconscious bias as the actual interview?

Sure - but this is overt bias: “can programmer program?”

How do you know that’s actually what you’re measuring, and not, “can programmer execute a livestream programming session successfully?”