[oak perl] Fwd: [sf-perl] Puzzling Interview techniques

[George Woolley]

The following is a post by Vicki Brown to the SF Perl Mongers mailing list.
When I asked her if it was OK to forward it the Oakland.pm list,
she kindly agreed to that
and indicated she didn't want others to be unprepared in a similar situation.

Personally, I also found her related weblog entry
(referenced near the end of her post)
to be worth reading.

>----------  Forwarded Message  ----------
>
>Subject: [sf-perl] Puzzling Interview techniques
>Date: Monday 13 October 2003 10:11 am
...
>
>You may recall my posting about the interview I had a few weeks ago, wherein
>the interviewer asked "When would you use OOP?". My experience spawned quite
>an interesting discussion!
>
>As the irritation from that interview wore off, I realized that my answer
> was itself a test - one the interviewer failed. An interview is a two-way
> street. Not only are you determining if this person/company will offer you
> a job but, even more important, you are determining if you would want to
> accept that job were it offered!
>
>Had this interviewer been more the kind of person I get along with (say, had
>he had a sense of humor :-) he would have smiled or laughed, agreed, and
> then asked the question again with an emphasis on the technical merits of
> OOP (which, by the way, I had already touched on 15 minutes previous to
> this question!). However, he didn't. As he would have been my immediate
> manager and tech lead... I would not have wanted to work for him or his
> company.
>
>If anyone cares, my post-interview analysis is on my weblog at
>http://vlb.typepad.com/commentary/2003/09/interview_ups_a.html
>
>What I didn't mention at the time of my posting to this list was the
> question that _really_ irritated me. That was the fourth question I was
> asked and, apparently, the only one that really mattered to the
> interviewer. Get it wrong or fail to answer and goodbye, thanks for
> playing.
>
>      4 people need to cross a rickety bridge at night over a chasm.
>      They have one flashlight....
>
>The puzzle comes straight out of Microsoft's interview puzzle book.
>
>Shortly after my interview, I also  discussed the puzzle question on a
> couple of mailing lists, including a Unix techie hacker list. One of the
> "techie list" members recommended a book, "How Would You Move Mount Fuji?
> Microsoft's Cult of the Puzzle"  by William Poundstone. I have read this
> book and consider it to be an excellent resource.
>
>Puzzle questions at interviews may not be "new", but they were not in common
>practice until fairly recently. Poundstone's book references puzzle
> questions used by William Shockley in 1957, and by HP in 1979. Microsoft
> has apparently been using puzzles since the mid-80's. But the current "fad"
> of "hiring like Microsooft" is new within the past decade (and, thankfully,
> hasn't spread everywhere).  It's apparently been popular in software
> startups (which I have managed to mostly avoid) and on Wall Street (which I
> will continue to avoid).
>
>I consider this book to be recommended reading for anyone who might be
>involved in an interview at any time in the future - from either side of the
>desk. If someone hits you with one of these "puzzling" interview tactics,
> you need to know what to expect and how to react.
>
>My review of "How Would You Move Mount Fuji? Microsoft's Cult of the Puzzle"
>and my personal thoughts on the puzzle / stress / impossible question
>interview technique are on my weblog at
>http://vlb.typepad.com/commentary/2003/10/puzzle_cult.html
>
>Caveat Jobhunter
>--
>- Vicki
>