On 7/13/20 8:16 PM, Greg Skinner via NANOG wrote:
If you ever decide to revisit this subject, I recall it was covered here in this thread started by Bill Herrin <https://mailman.nanog.org/pipermail/nanog/2012-July/149687.html>.
My general feelings on the subject of tech interviews are summarized in the “interview anti-loop” section of this article by Steve Yegge <http://steve-yegge.blogspot.com/2008/03/get-that-job-at-google.html>. Although it is targeted to people seeking software engineering jobs at FANG (and FANG-like) companies, IMO the general tone is applicable to other tech careers, even network engineering. I have seen numerous articles (and subsequent discussions) on this subject on forums such as Quora, Medium, and Hacker News.
That blog post is everything that is wrong with software interviews. It's fine to ask intricate algorithm questions for somebody fresh out of school because what else are you going to ask them? But for somebody who's years out of school and has lots of experience, the intricate details of various algorithms fade especially ones that you don't use very often, or are embedded in library routines you'd be fired for if you tried to reinvent them. Telling people they have to go back to school for stuff they won't be using on the job is offensive. My personal method is to devise a problem and actually work with them... because that's what I (or others) are going to be doing. How well can they get the requirements? How do they zero in on how to solve it? You can take this as deep or shallow as you like. Often I'd give it as a homework assignment if I liked them. My personal theory is software interviewing is basically a hazing ritual where the interviewers are trying to fluff their own privates, and it's almost to a one male. I wrote this post a while ago: http://rip-van-webble.blogspot.com/2013/07/interviews-as-hazing-rituals.html Mike
—gregbo
On Jul 11, 2020, at 11:34 AM, Mehmet Akcin <mehmet@akcin.net <mailto:mehmet@akcin.net>> wrote:
hey there,
I am hosting a live show a few times a month about internet infrastructure and today's topics were, your favorite questions asked network engineers - you can watch the recording here
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3pvikTrF0M
if you have suggestions on topics to cover helping network operations engineering that you want to see in here, please feel free to contact me off-list, and let's create unique content that can be helpful to others.
mehmet