May 15, 2012 at 7:46 am
Jeff Moden (5/12/2012)
Elliott Whitlow (5/12/2012)
As a further point, I dislike most aspects of technical interviews purely because in MANY cases they are very subjective and if you don't give them the answer THEY are looking for, you answered wrong, regardless of the fact you might have given an answer that was right on.. Some are less subjective than others like whats the diff between clustered and non-clustered index if any..That's why I let them know how and why their questions are wrong. 😀
That's something that I have given a lot of thought to over the years, and I finally settled into not trying to correct people or give them answers in interviews.
I'm not there to instruct them or help them with the next interview; I just want to see if they are suitable for the job. Plus, having a discussion about why they their answer is wrong just uses the limited time available for the interview without helping me with my goal.
I sometimes ask followup questions where I might point out a difficulty with their prior answer to see if they can come up with something better. And I may ask a followup if I am not sure they really understood what I was asking the first time, especially if there may be some language problem.
For example, I once asked someone several different questions to try to determine if they knew what a user defined database role was because their native language was Spanish and I couldn't believe that someone could work for nine years as a DBA and not know that.
I would be interested on the opinions of others on this.
May 15, 2012 at 8:28 am
Michael Valentine Jones (5/15/2012)
That's something that I have given a lot of thought to over the years, and I finally settled into not trying to correct people or give them answers in interviews.I'm not there to instruct them or help them with the next interview; I just want to see if they are suitable for the job. Plus, having a discussion about why they their answer is wrong just uses the limited time available for the interview without helping me with my goal.
I believe you may have misunderstood what I said. I wasn't talking about when I was interviewing someone. I was talking about when someone was interviewing ME! 🙂
When I'm interviewing someone for a positition, I rarely argue or agree with the candidates answers whether they're right or wrong and I give no clue as to whether I agree or not for the very reasons you state.
When I'm the one being interviewed for a job, I'm not the only one being interviewed. 😛 I want to see how the people asking the questions deal with possibly being wrong so I know whether or not I'm working with egos or people. 😉 If they get cocky and abusive, I pretty much know I don't want the job and will "throw them on the floor" with the correct answer and verifiable references and then leave. I've actually had one group call me back and apologize for being a bunch of weiners after they took the time to verify my answers only to find out just how wrong they were. I still didn't go to work for them, though, and I actually did need the job at the time.
--Jeff Moden
May 15, 2012 at 8:33 am
Jeff,
You gotta give 'em cred for calling back that takes some stones.
CEWII
May 15, 2012 at 8:34 am
JamesMorrison (5/14/2012)
It has been my experience that most IT people have no business even conducting interviews.Many lack the understanding of the real goal of the interview.
Often it becomes more about establishing technical dominance as the top IT guru in front of the potential new guy.
This is very common at Microsoft.
i had this for an ms exchange job years ago. guy was asking me questions straight out of the MCSE book and was doing things a slightly different way with different software. a lot of this stuff is easily looked up online too
May 15, 2012 at 8:39 am
i haven't interviewed for a while but i made up this process that worked a few times in the past.
for the week or so before the interview make a list of everything you have done in the last few years. a basic outline.
next step is fill in the technical details about what you have done
at the interview start talking about it including technical details and everything else you did on a daily basis and what it accomplished
a lot of things i read here on a daily basis like LEN functions or row_over i rarely see. i rarely write queries longer than 10 lines. but i end up troubleshooting a lot of queries hundreds of lines long. so before i start answering every question I don't know, i start talking about things i have accomplished like fixing a replication topology with a few hundred jobs that used to error out every few days. or setting up a backup audit system to make sure that backups are taking place without spending 3 hours every day looking at logs and other things just to check up on things
May 15, 2012 at 5:55 pm
I recently had to conduct interviews for my own replacement. I had conducted interviews before, not many but a few, and basedthem arround technical questions. Just kept on hiring the wrong person. They were good, but just not a good cultural fit in most cases. I really enjoyed working with my direct manager, so I wanted to getthe right person this time.
So instead of going for the tech questions, I just started relating stories of what I had experienced in the role over the previous 5 years. No holds barred, full of jargon. If the candidate could keep up and engage me intelligently they got a point. If they were eager to jump in with their own storied and they were relevant in the flow of the conversation, another point. If they offered better ways of approaching one of my problems, another point.
While they were giving me some of their experiences, I would take the odd note. I would then follow these notes. Usually a question to get more detail about an approach they mentioned. Some more specifics, sometimes technical, sometimes about the politics of getting things done in a large organisation.
I found that I got the best person from the pool of candidates. He did not have the most years experience, but he had the right experience, the best attitude to problem solving and the best fit for the culture of the company. He is still there, we communicate regularly and I still lunch with my ex-manager every now and then.
May 15, 2012 at 6:42 pm
C64DBA (5/15/2012)
So instead of going for the tech questions, I just started relating stories of what I had experienced in the role over the previous 5 years. No holds barred, full of jargon. If the candidate could keep up and engage me intelligently they got a point. If they were eager to jump in with their own storied and they were relevant in the flow of the conversation, another point. If they offered better ways of approaching one of my problems, another point.While they were giving me some of their experiences, I would take the odd note. I would then follow these notes. Usually a question to get more detail about an approach they mentioned. Some more specifics, sometimes technical, sometimes about the politics of getting things done in a large organisation.
I'll have to try this technique, right after I get past "I haven't done that for years" from a candidate when it's the first bullet point on his resume for his last four positions.
Never stop learning, even if it hurts. Ego bruises are practically mandatory as you learn unless you've never risked enough to make a mistake.
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May 15, 2012 at 6:47 pm
Not sure if I get your meaning Evil, if that is your real name :P. Why would you get someone in if their resume doesn't even contain recent experience relevant to that which you seek?
May 15, 2012 at 7:00 pm
C64DBA (5/15/2012)
Not sure if I get your meaning Evil, if that is your real name :P. Why would you get someone in if their resume doesn't even contain recent experience relevant to that which you seek?
Nah, my real name is in my signature line, Craig Farrell. 😉 Though if my mother named me Evil it'd probably have been a more interesting childhood...
Nono, it was the other way around. They came in with their resume showing me all sorts of SSRS experience goodness and then didn't have the implied experience. Consulting Firm modifications with a rubber stamp approval from the consultant in question when we received it.
Never stop learning, even if it hurts. Ego bruises are practically mandatory as you learn unless you've never risked enough to make a mistake.
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May 15, 2012 at 7:09 pm
Ah, I get it now. Funnily enough, that was what I said to get my current job. A lot of "I haven't done that for 5 years" or "I have read about that and done some home study, but never actually in production". SSRS and SSAS specifically, in that order too. And they threw SharePoint admin on top of those.
May 15, 2012 at 8:17 pm
I had an interesting experience recently where I was being interviewed by someone without the technical experience to be able to evaluate my skills at a company where I would be the first database guy.
The question that the interviewer asked me was "What questions would you ask someone like yourself to determine if they had the technical skills for this job?" I was caught a bit by surprise by this, but I realized that it was actually a very good question. I gave some questions that I would ask in an interview and explained what I would want to hear as an answer. It was a bit different, kind of like I was interviewing myself.
I think the question was good, because it enabled me to both answer technical questions and to demonstrate that I had the communication skills to be able to explain the subject to someone who was not deeply technical in the subject.
May 17, 2012 at 6:30 am
Michael Valentine Jones (5/15/2012)
I had an interesting experience recently where I was being interviewed by someone without the technical experience to be able to evaluate my skills at a company where I would be the first database guy.The question that the interviewer asked me was "What questions would you ask someone like yourself to determine if they had the technical skills for this job?" I was caught a bit by surprise by this, but I realized that it was actually a very good question. I gave some questions that I would ask in an interview and explained what I would want to hear as an answer. It was a bit different, kind of like I was interviewing myself.
I think the question was good, because it enabled me to both answer technical questions and to demonstrate that I had the communication skills to be able to explain the subject to someone who was not deeply technical in the subject.
Good interview technique for a skillset you can't screen yourself. Shows an ability to think outside the box.
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May 17, 2012 at 6:43 am
Elliott Whitlow (5/15/2012)
Jeff,You gotta give 'em cred for calling back that takes some stones.
CEWII
Heh... gotta give me some credit, as well. It took some stones of my own to tell them "no" a second time while being out of a job. 😛
--Jeff Moden
May 17, 2012 at 6:43 am
GSquared (5/17/2012)
Michael Valentine Jones (5/15/2012)
I had an interesting experience recently where I was being interviewed by someone without the technical experience to be able to evaluate my skills at a company where I would be the first database guy.The question that the interviewer asked me was "What questions would you ask someone like yourself to determine if they had the technical skills for this job?" I was caught a bit by surprise by this, but I realized that it was actually a very good question. I gave some questions that I would ask in an interview and explained what I would want to hear as an answer. It was a bit different, kind of like I was interviewing myself.
I think the question was good, because it enabled me to both answer technical questions and to demonstrate that I had the communication skills to be able to explain the subject to someone who was not deeply technical in the subject.
Good interview technique for a skillset you can't screen yourself. Shows an ability to think outside the box.
It's an excellent technique for a skillset you can screen yourself too; you can follow up by asking one or two of the questions suggested, or change it slightly to be "what questions would you ask and what answers would you expect a good candidate to provide?"
Tom
May 17, 2012 at 11:48 am
Jeff Moden (5/17/2012)
Elliott Whitlow (5/15/2012)
Jeff,You gotta give 'em cred for calling back that takes some stones.
CEWII
Heh... gotta give me some credit, as well. It took some stones of my own to tell them "no" a second time while being out of a job. 😛
I'll give you that..
CEWII
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