Interviewing at a Small Company
Steven Petryk
Who am I?
Steven Petryk
Full-Stack Developer
Teeps
Why small companies?
- Closely-knit team
- Fast-paced work
- Know the whole hierarchy
- Usually little or no hierarchy
- Easy to contribute
The classic interview
- Introductions
- General questions
- Coding/whiteboard problems
- Interviewee questions
Advantages
- Ensures candidates can memorize algorithms
- Really good predictor of CS2 grades
Disadvantages
- Does not determine day-to-day skill
- Leaves no room for collaboration
- Determines confidence with a narrow skillset
The Spectrum
Highly "chatty"
No technical assessment
No collab (bro?)
Too specific w/ tech
Ideal Zone™
Interview #goals
- Determining skill
- Determining culture
- Figuring out collaborative talent
- Identifying potential disqualifiers
- Provide a learning experience
- Seeking unanimous approval from the team
Testing dev skills
- Simulate real development
- "Build a RESTful API that can be used to create todos and mark them as complete."
- Highly collaborative
- Freedom to Google
- Freedom to ask questions
- Choice of toolchain
- (Severe anxiety is expected here)
Culture fit
- Far more subjective
- Determining like-mindedness to team
- Be aware of bias due to:
- Gender
- Race
- Perceived wealth
- Appearance
- Anxiety
Collaborative tact
- Mainly a test of humility
- Willingness to ask for help
- Types of questions asked
- Ability to take respond to advice
Potential disqualifiers
- Shit-talking former jobs/employers
- Objectifying women in the office
- Yes, this really has happened.
- Externalizing failures
- Lack of social skills
Note that anxiety is not on this list.
How this applies to you
- Expect questions about your process
- Show, don't tell
- Don't sweat anxiety (but sweating is okay)
- Be kind and humble to everyone you meet
Thanks.
Interviewing
By Steven Petryk
Interviewing
- 847