These days, my company is doing a lot of interviews for both Junior and Senior Developers. Most of the Juniors are happy to do the basic programming (just some for loop test) and the IQ Test. Of course, there were some who refused and just left. The thing that got my attention is not the result of the test, rather the number of Senior Candidates refused to come to the interview and even when they came, they refused to do the test and asked for direct interview.
A big question came out of my mind: WHY? I guess, most of them felt: Offended. I asked around and most of the answers i got:
Senior Developer does not want to take the test since they think they are better, they feel offended. And the test does not tell anything about them.
And some of them look down on the company that send the invitation.
That’s fine and we respect that. We are happy to learn that we should change the hiring process to fit the situation. Yeah. And we actually did change:
So, now, we remove the test for Sr. Developer candidates. And we do interview directly instead.
However, it did still not make much sense to me. Then I asked myself, what if I am looking for a job, and they ask me to do the test. This came out of my mind:
FEAR.
And i recalled that it is actually natural. When i was in the school or university, I got those feeling when the teacher gave me the test. Even I was a good student. Still the same feeling. Not really a good or bad thing. It is just a fact that we have to deal with 🙂
So far we are happy with the hiring result. We have many candidates applied for the Job Ad. And lost of them have very high skills.
We keep interviewing, we keep hiring 🙂
Walking away from a job interview because you were asked to do a simple test indicates many things. For started, you do not care or respect the position for which you are applying. Secondly, your inability to communicate and discipline should, by default, disqualify you from such position. That said, if you believe the test was completely unnecessary, why didn’t you speak out your mind with the hiring people? If your logic is, indeed, flawless, I believe they would be happily convinced.
Best regards,
Khoa Pham.
Ok, that’s fine. Why do we not go to a coffe shop to discuss ? I always like discussing a open meeting in a coffe shop. I will glad to meet you. You can reach me via skype jornathan.le .
Scott Hanselman ‘ post is very interesting. I was reading the post one year ago but now I can’t answer a half of list questions. So sad I thinks my level is mid-level developer and I will keep learning in next 2 years before I am appying your recuitment :). Don’t be annoyed by my comment but this is exactly I was facing when I came interview a little company in Viet Nam. I doesn’t answer why they did the IQ Test for evaluting their expectation candidates. In fact, all candidates are hoping to show their knowledge, their personality, their excellent skills that are suitable for this expectation job but not their IQ, their scores. They feels they waste a lot of times for doing the test. Last words, hope you to find some best candidates but they don’t like me :).
Is there any chance that i can meet you or having some discussion? I love coding and meeting new people 🙂
Thank your for your comments 🙂 Yeah you made your point. No doubt about that. What I really concerned was that, why did they make such a big reaction when came to the testing. Those test can be considered as warm up test. The company put some effort on making those tests, therefore, it should contain value. There is no measurable definition of Sr. Developer (or at least Scott Hanselman mentioned this: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/WhatGreatNETDevelopersOughtToKnowMoreNETInterviewQuestions.aspx). It is more about of verbal concept and self-status. For your question, if i am looking for a job, i will do whatever it takes to get that job 🙂
If I was the candicate for Sr position, I would not need to do your IQ test (or algorithm). I amn’t afraid of your test but I knows I can’t pass your exam. Why ? Because I took many times for learning the lastest technoglogies, applying them in my projects, thinking how to use effectively, resolving many real problems…My mind stores many deepest knowledge of my farvourite technoglies that the jurnior developer doesn’t know. We have experience in resolving quickly the hard problems. What do you hire me for ? What do you think a biggest difference between Jr Developer and Sr Developer ? Why do you need to test a IQ logical when Sr Developer can adapt it with their experience ?. Can I give you a one question ? “What do you think if you did the IQ test in the upper level ( like Technical Architecture or Principal) when you were hired ?”