Re: interviews, as an interviewer for the last few years, there’s some transparency I’d like to provide

Often times companies are hiring for a role. That role is often driven by a need. So you’ll be tasked with finding a good fit for someone to get certain work done.

I try to ask questions directly related to the role. A lot of times right or wrong is a question of have you ever actually done this.

Other times, I’ll ask more general questions like hand implement a reduce, or a make a second counter in react. And I watch them do it. This is so that, even if they missed the specific niche questions, perhaps I can get insight into their experience level.

This is important to do. If someone is not the right fit for a role, it’s not fair to either party if they get hired on a whim. You end up losing a ton of time and money. Someone at a good job could take a leap of faith and switch jobs, only to be let go rapidly.

You see a lot of pushback like “why test this stuff and not exactly what the job does”, and it’s because it’s compartmentalized and terse. I’m able to gauge level in a short time period.

Then you see some companies literally have people work half a day on exactly what the company does, and you see the “I’m not doing unpaid work” sentiment

I like to think I provide a comfortable and fair interview. But if it’s hard, it’s hard for a reason. I’ve failed Google twice, and in retrospect, I wasn’t at an engineering level where I would have been set up for success.