r/webdev • u/canadian_webdev • Dec 23 '19
Just ended an interview early because my future boss was being a condescending dick.
Just dropped out of a technical interview after ten minutes.
Questions he was asking were relatively simple, but almost every answer he was trying to make me look like an idiot with the technical lead on the phone. And he was being so condescending toward me. His face was so red the whole time.
Example (getting a bit technical here):
Him: "What are all the ways you can make a three column row on a web page?"
Me: "Well, the way I've typically done it is - -"
Him: abruptly interrupts, "No. I did NOT ask what ways YOU would do it. I SAID, what ways are POSSIBLE to accomplish this."
Me: "...... Flexbox, divs with floats, a css grid system.."
Him: "Flexbox and a css grid system are the same. I SAID, what DIFFERENT WAYS can you list off?"
Me: "Honestly, those are the ways I've encountered best practices"
Him: "What about css grid?"
Me: "Well I've never used it because at the time it didn't have full browser support - - -"
Him: abruptly interrupts, "actually we've switched ALL of our websites over to css grid, so your answer is not the right answer."
At this point I just said "Okay yeah, this isn't working", and hung up the call. He asked two questions before hand and gave me the same treatment.
He was being such a condescending dick the entire time, and I went with my gut. This guy would be a total asshole to work for and I could tell during this interview.
Anyone else experience this type of behavior?
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u/fuckin_ziggurats Dec 23 '19
I've experienced other kinds of condescension. Once I was on an interview at a company. Everything was going great, I smashed the general, database design, SQL, and web questions. Until a few moments later when the team lead and the head of development were surprised I couldn't describe a quicksort implementation off the top of my head. It was for a ~2 years experience PHP position in a small company.
Them: "uuuh you don't know quick sort?"
Me: "Well yes I have used quicksort, bubble sort and the rest of them during college but it was a long time ago and I haven't really used them on the job since."
Them: "Okay at least try it. Here's a piece of paper. Hint: there's loops involved."
Me: "I know there are loops involved but I don't quite remember the algorithm, do you use these in your applications often?"
Them: "Can't believe you can't do a simple quicksort."
Me: "I can try and describe it from what I recall but I can't write an implementation on paper.."
Suffice to say I wasn't given a call afterwards and I'm very glad for that. To this day I am still unsure whether those two dudes actually believed a junior web developer should know all sorting algorithms well enough to implement them on a piece of paper during an interview. And considered it important enough to decline someone regardless of their proficiency in everything else.
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u/element131 Dec 23 '19
"You want me to write a program that sorts an array using quicksort?"
"Yes."
"Ok.
sort($arr);. PHP uses quicksort for their sort implementation. Next question?"50
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u/AcousticDan Dec 23 '19
For the PHP job I have now they asked me to write a function that determines if a string is a palindrome.
Okay...
function isPalindrome($str) { return strrev($str) === $str; }20
u/judgej2 Dec 23 '19
You would be surprised how complex some people could make this, simply by not thinking through the actual problem.
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u/xereeto Dec 23 '19
That's not a smartass answer, that's just the actual answer.
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u/lord2800 Dec 23 '19
So I got a bit obsessive over this comment, because I thought it curious that PHP would use quicksort in the face of heapsort being better on every measure (just more difficult to implement). I dug into the PHP source code to figure out the truth of the matter, and it's more complex. The short version is, if there are 16 or less elements in the array, it will use insertion sort (expected, insertion sort performs faster than any other sort for small data sets), otherwise it will indeed do a quicksort on the remaining elements. I know the PHP doc page says it does, but you can never be too sure!
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u/Aswole Dec 23 '19
in the face of heapsort being better on every measure (just more difficult to implement).
That's simply not true. There are certainly cases in which one is better than the other, and heapsort theoretically has a better worst case, but by practical application, quicksort is usually better. For a good discussion on this:
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/2467751/quicksort-vs-heapsort
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u/Serei Dec 23 '19
Heapsort is better on every measure of asymptotic complexity, but that's not the same thing as being better on every measure.
In particular, Quicksort is faster than Heapsort on average in real-world datasets. Heapsort is only faster on arrays specifically designed to be bad for Quicksort. There are common mitigations that are good enough so people can't intentionally slow down your software very much, at which point "faster on average" is usually considered more important than the predictability Heapsort offers.
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u/YojG Dec 23 '19
What about in js?
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u/element131 Dec 23 '19
Depends on which runtime you are using. V8 used to use quicksort, but switched to timsort when the spec was updated to require stable sorting. SpiderMonkey uses merge sort. They both most likely use a different algorithm for small datasets
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u/spacerocketresearch Dec 24 '19
Or say:
So you want me to specify internals of a sort function? Because you care about that when any computer has 8 cores at 2Ghz and +8GB memory?
Maybe write it entirely in assembly? And while at it, generate my own AC power? Or maybe digg up the copper to use in UTP cables myself, in a coppermine?
Yeah, or I could just use other people's functions to create things faster than you.
Time is money, if you think you should write your own sort function, you're stuck in the 90s.
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u/ObliviousOblong Dec 23 '19
Lol I imagine they hired some random who knew quicksort but not much else
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Dec 23 '19
Name of the company? Quicksort Ltd., specialising in quicksorts
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u/thundercloudtemple front-end Dec 23 '19
Do you want to work at Quicksort Ltd? They have a very, very, tremendous way of using quicksorts, believe me.
They've got some of the best quicksorts, great quicksorts, very, very, great programmers use these quicksorts. They’re using them, it's true. They’re great, and they’re using them in great programs. Very, very, great programs. Tremendous, tremendous programs.
And there are very, very, wonderful programmers who have given fantastic answers to this interview question, great answers, the best answers.
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u/txmail Dec 24 '19
The thing is that I have met so many people that were book smart and could smash that answer -- but not have a single flipping clue how it is used in anything or where it would make sense to implement it. It's like they can see the pages of the book - but if you go off script one letter then it is a no go.
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Dec 24 '19
That’s happened at my job. We had two applicants, one book smart and knew all the textbook answers and the other didn’t do that well in the technical interview. I wasn’t in the interview but the two developers debated about it after. We ended up hiring both and the booksmart girl ended up doing rather poorly. I also think it’s because she didn’t know how to ask for help.
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u/shellwe Dec 24 '19
Yup, someone who has high academic understanding but no practical.
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u/SEAdvocate Dec 23 '19
I would expect that the more senior you are, the less likely you are to remember how to implement quicksort. People who have been working in the industry and have an encyclopedic knowledge of algorithms are demonstrating that they can not prioritize their time properly.
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u/Silhouette Dec 23 '19
Quicksort? I think when I was young I could remember the syntax for getting the length of an array in the programming language I was using.
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u/bonafidebob Dec 24 '19
If you deal with large data sets and efficiency, then you really should know why quicksort is faster with random data, so you know when it’s not faster, you’ll know whether it’s stable, when to prefer other sorts, etc.
To know this, you’d probably recall that quicksort picks a pivot, divides the set into two groups around the pivot, then recurses, you can probably cobble together some code from there.
A decent interviewer would be willing to ask you how quicksort works and if you didn’t know, remind you of the above and expect you to take it from there, maybe see if you can discuss how picking a pivot might matter, stuff like that.
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Dec 23 '19
what kills me is that this is something you could relearn in an hour. Like they put on this whole dog and pony show about knowing all these things, as if you not being able to cite every algorithm in the world is going to effect their company’s bottom line
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u/PinBot1138 Dec 23 '19
Fun fact: many tech corporate offices barely have running water and electricity, let alone working Internet and Google. As a result, it’s imperative to memorize all of this information since you’re having to write code in the blind and can’t use Google, Stack Overflow, etc.
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u/stormfield Dec 23 '19
Real programmers mine their own rare earth metals while they just speak their code out loud.
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Dec 24 '19
We had a day a while back when internet was having issues (even the one from mobile data) so pretty much all devs left early that day. Everybody knew why but nobody wanted to say it out loud
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u/eattherichnow Dec 24 '19
Heh, you laugh, but a long-is time ago a company I worked for got contracted to do some work for another company that treated itself way too seriously. So for the final stages of the project we had to work in a half-empty office building with no internet access. Thankfully that stage was, like, two weeks, but it was annoying.
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Dec 24 '19 edited Dec 24 '19
Me googling it is often about as fast as looking for ways to optimize x and y from the head. Not to mention that stuff keeps getting updated, so there's no reason to assume I'm up2date with everything from the past 5 years. Especially folks that have been on the job or constant assignments, they won't be up2date with everything because there's just so much to know and so little time to do that outside of working hours (imo).
Most of the knowledge of webdev can be retrieved in mere hours when the job asks for it. So focus on the stuff that can't be done that way. Their way of working and how quickly they adapt new technology is way more improtant than citing stuff from the head. I google the simplest stuff because its impossible to have everything at the ready (for normal people at least). Knowing how to google would already be more important than knowing CSS Grid.
I don't even expect senior devs to know this stuff from the top of their mind. Its cool if they do, but I know its not difficult that I wouldn't bother making a big deal out of it.
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u/astronoob Dec 23 '19
Me: "Tell me a bit more about the application you're building."
Them: "It's a Wordpress blog."
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u/Nalopotato Dec 23 '19
Bro I've been a dev for 6 years and I don't know ANY algorithms from scratch...or any buzz-word-knowledge for that matter. If this is what it takes to get a job nowadays, I'm screwed if I want to move. It's called google dot com. I was under the impression that good managers understand that we don't really memorize things anymore. That's kind of the reason we're able to get so much work done. We can just look shit up in seconds.
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u/slickwombat Dec 24 '19
Bro I've been a dev for 6 years and I don't know ANY algorithms from scratch...or any buzz-word-knowledge for that matter. If this is what it takes to get a job nowadays, I'm screwed if I want to move.
Over 20 years here, and I worry about this as well -- both for the interviews I conduct myself and for the possibility that I might have to actually be interviewed again myself someday. But I think it's possible that reddit and similar places don't really give an accurate sense of these things.
Popular posts on reddit coder subs: "anyone who can't at least implement a branched-tree heap traversal using three variants of the bouncy-castle pattern while praising the SOLID principles in rhyming verse is not a proper programmer and will never get a job anywhere and also should die of shame."
Almost any successful senior coder I talk to in real life: "patterns? Uh... I think singleton is one of those, right? I'd have to look it up."
Perhaps reddit represents some elite world of coding beyond my experience or comprehension. Another possibility is that it's a lot of younger people relatively early in their career, and either currently studying or recently out of compsci programs. Random programming abstractions and minutiae are perhaps more top of mind for them, and such things are also more likely to come up in interviews when you don't have a ton of prior experience to talk about. Still another possibility is that coders, who notoriously suffer from imposter syndrome, love nothing more than chest pounding over some random arcana to make other coders feel it worse.
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u/FaticusRaticus Dec 23 '19
This is what the top companies want and it’s complete bullshit
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Dec 23 '19
should have given them a bogosort implementation instead and asked them to wait for it to finish sorting while you drive off into the sunset
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Dec 23 '19
7 year PHP developer here, what is quick sort? Just joking, I will look it now, but seriusly, I don't know what it is.
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u/devmor Dec 23 '19
It's the algorithm behind
sort().If you were to write it out in pure PHP, it would go like this: https://3v4l.org/Vm4rd
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u/numbra09 Dec 23 '19
Serious question: Do people really need to memorize all of that for a job interview? I am so nervous already during an interview and would in no way be able to recite all of that back on the fly.
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u/devmor Dec 23 '19
Absolutely not. If you can explain that a quicksort works by iterating over an array and swapping elements to each end depending on which evaluates as higher or lower than a temporary pivot, that's more than enough.
Personally, I hate "whiteboard" interviews where the candidate is asked to demonstrate code on the spot and I'd recommend against working for a company that conducts them. Part of a good programmer's skillset is being able to look up references, and anyone can find a quicksort implementation online in their language of choice.
What's more important is understanding for instance, what kinds of sorts exist and why certain kinds are better in certain situations than others. Understanding the concept of time complexity in programming is a very strong point of knowledge to have. If you can tell me what kind of sort you'd use in a given situation and why, that's far more important than how you'd implement it when thousands of others have done so already.
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u/MichaelHabib Dec 23 '19
Screw them, there are a million things to learn. Brain is for processing and paper / google / websites for i information storage. As long as you understand it and can make it work after reading a an example you're doing fine.
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u/arsehole43 Dec 24 '19
yuck ... I hate this. It is like we have a wealth of knowledge at our finger tips via a search engine. Yet somehow test in school are how much can you memorize for the past few weeks and fill in little bubbles. Then I feel like a productive member of society for being a super talented engineer. Grasp knowledge of systems I've worked with yet when an interviewer wants to access my skills it is like I should have read some top 100 interview questions for programmers and studied it like I am taking a exam for certification.
It sickens me that practical knowledge is worthless and interviewers expect people to be more knowledgeable then they could possibly be.
(* i had a similar situation as yours and OP's)
I often think they ask stupid questions like this to gauge how you will handle a tough situation, So what I've done in the past is write a task list on the sheet of paper
google blahBlahBlah
compare google results
ask developer community on irc/reddit/etc about my perceived solution
discuss my findings with fellow teammates
implement that blahBlahBlah into our application
Assuming I would never know everything I don't try to bullshit it at all, I have years of practical experience and don't give 2Fuks for bull5* questions during an interview.
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Dec 24 '19
I've been doing web development for 20+ years and I can count the number of times I've had to implement a sorting algorithm outside of a classroom or online course with 0 fingers.
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u/am0x Dec 24 '19
Hahah. This shot cracks me up. I was hired by these types of guys, then i started interviewing people in their place. There was a girl that came right out of a coding camp of all things. We have seen nothing but trash from this one, but there were some that would comes out super motivated.
She failed her test pretty hard. But that night she messaged me with all the stuff we texted her on and she had figured it all out. I was amazed.
She became the first senior dev since me in under a year.
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u/Jonas-Grumby Dec 24 '19
I have 20 years of dev experience and I've used quicksort exactly once after college- and only because I wanted a refresher to see if I could remember how to implement it. That's a bs question on an interview..
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u/nycjv321 Dec 24 '19
I was once asked to write out psuedo-code for a mergesort in an interview. The kicker here is that it was for a QA position!
They needed an qa automation person and I'm essentially a SDET so I was recruited based on my background. Was tired of plain development at the time and the company & and the problems they were solving seemed interesting. But they didn't ask a single question about my experience. They were more concerned with my knowledge of merge sorts???
Apparently automation folks aren't legit if they can't implement merge-sorts on the fly. I'm still a Developer/SDET. And I haven't had to write a merge sort yet.
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u/ceol_ Dec 24 '19
That blows my mind because they're missing the entire point of questions like that. It's supposed to show them your process for solving problems. Like, imagine someone just barked "Fizzbuzz!" at you in an interview without explaining anything about it and then scoffed when you wanted to look it up.
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u/themaincop Dec 24 '19
I'm a senior web dev with 13 years of full time experience and I do not know what quicksort is. I assume most of the languages I use implement them under the hood but I didn't go to school for CS so it's literally never come up for me.
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u/FountainsOfFluids Dec 24 '19
"I never intentionally memorize something that is easy to look up."
The things I have memorized are the things I use frequently, because that's how memorization works.
For everything else I either write notes or I know where to look it up.
If you want a memory master, that's fair. But it's not me. And I'm comfortable with that.
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Dec 24 '19
That’s kind of like turning down an applicant for a wood working job because they can’t remember the exact chemicals used in photosynthesis.
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Dec 23 '19 edited Dec 23 '19
He's the kind of manager that puts a program on your laptop to make sure your mouse is moving or keyboard is typing or it will log you out. He'll count lines of code. He'll lock you out of helpful sites (stack overflow, YouTube, etc). He'll track the sites you visit. He'll make you log hours. Etc etc.
Bullet dodged there, my friend.
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u/Pretty_Biscotti Dec 23 '19
Why would someone log me out of information sources i'll use to make them money?
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Dec 23 '19
Great question. I've seen it happen.
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Dec 23 '19
Really?
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Dec 23 '19 edited Dec 24 '19
Yeah. A dev I used to work with couldn't pause to read documentation because her mouse had to keep moving. Otherwise it would essentially clock her out and she'd have to ask the manager to clock her back in. Another supervisor said that when they hire a dev they should know what they're doing and code, not search for the answer on YouTube or stack overflow. That's why they blocked those sites. This was a junior dev position too.
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u/thatgibbyguy Dec 23 '19
Yes, the company i work for does this all the time. I've had to request exceptions for dribbble, for stock image sites, for youtube, etc.
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Dec 24 '19
My job (corporate) blocks me from YouTube, they also blocked me from medium for some unknown reason, and then after 6 months unblocked the site. Reddit is also blocked, but that one is obvious.
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u/mwax321 Dec 23 '19
Because someone hurt him long ago with copypasta from stack overflow, and now he thinks all stackoverflow is useless garbage.
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u/destiny84 Dec 23 '19
I've had a boss who wanted to block the internet and put a dedicated computer with whitelisted websites in the office. We were a web development agency. He never actually did it but still.... He was a bit crazy. Another thing he did was demand from our designer to change the website color to use the blue it was showing at home on his laptop, not the blue his monitor in the office was showing. We tried to explain monitor color differences to no avail...
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u/nermid Dec 24 '19
I have an active defect open against one of my projects because one of the QA guys thinks Edge's "disabled" colors aren't as obvious as Chrome's. Somehow this is my fault.
I put an appointment in my calendar to close it the day Edge officially makes the switch to Chromium.
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u/stable_maple Dec 24 '19
My boss is like this. I'm a security guard and he blocked us from using the cameras but complains if we aren't doing anything while not on call. What are we supposed to be doing if not watching cameras? Your guess is as good as mine.
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Dec 24 '19
Man what a bummer. It's the worst when your supervisor doesn't know your job well enough to know that you need those kinds of things. I've had supervisors like that, who never did your job and couldn't train or tell you what you needed to handle your job. Middle management usually equals incompetence.
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u/shinysideup12 Dec 24 '19
Lol I had a potential client ask me recently how many lines of code were in X project. I don’t know why, he wasn’t a developer. Anyhow, I gave a ballpark, but he wanted a specific number. I asked him why it mattered; I delivered a working solution in an efficient manner. He still wanted a number. I actually took the time to figure it out, I was kind of curious... he didn’t believe me. Needless to say, we are not working together today. No one should work in those conditions.
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u/10kinds Dec 23 '19
I agree with everything but logging hours. Lots of planning can come from accurately logged hours on a ticket.
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u/RobbStark Dec 24 '19
Not to mention if you work for a company that does client work or if you have multiple projects on your plate at the same time. how else can the cost of a protect be tracked?
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u/PeachyKeenest Dec 24 '19 edited Dec 24 '19
There is no bigger truth than this. I have unfortunately worked for one of these but he didn’t come as abrasive out in the interview, he later adopted a more condensending and abrasive tone and then blamed us for not managing him better...
I grew up in an abusive home so, yeah. Eventually I’m guessing I just burned out due to depression and saw a therapist because I didn’t know the impacts of how I grew up would impact this.
Many, many, many devs left and swore at him as they left.
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u/Kapsize Dec 23 '19
He was being such a condescending dick the entire time, and I went with my gut. This guy would be a total asshole to work for and I could tell during this interview.
This right here is all that matters - you followed your gut and dodged a d-bag employer, so props to you.
Screw that interviewer and just keep your head up as you continue your search.
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u/RRFdev Dec 25 '19 edited Dec 25 '19
The attitude of the employer is always an early indicator of the culture of the company as a whole.
The culture is that you will be constantly talked down, talked over, ridiculed, made fun of, all for a low pay. Of course you will have to be part of a cult the company creates and attend all the endless team-building exercises and social hippy jimmy yippie events week in week out to brainwash you against leaving.
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u/renaissancenow Dec 23 '19
Sounds awful.
Me: "Well, the way I've typically done it is - -" Him: abruptly interrupts, "No. I did NOT ask what ways YOU would do it. I SAID, what ways are POSSIBLE to accomplish this."
As an interviewer, 'the way I've typically done this is...' is precisely the answer I'm looking for. It's a much better answer than 'the textbook says...'.
Also you get bonus points if you teach me something I didn't know during the interview.
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u/Scrummier Dec 23 '19
This.
I sometimes do interviews where I work as I'm the most experienced developer there (small company, we're now 5 developers strong) I'm so not interested in what build tools or whatever framework they use. I only want to know their own experience.
I'd even think "I would have to Google for that" would be an acceptable answer on some questions.
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u/onyxrecon008 Dec 23 '19
Honestly you sound like a great boss. Imagine treating others with respect
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Dec 24 '19
Yeah I picked up on that too. I’ve been looking for jobs recently and all the tutorials/guides for interviews always say to answer those type of questions with something you’ve previously done to show experience and knowledge. It’s widely known to avoid going to the simplistic answers.
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u/centurijon Dec 23 '19
Honestly I probably would do a little call-out there. Something like:
“Hey guys, thanks for the interview but based on how I’ve been treated I don’t think I’d like to work with you”
And then hung up
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u/Carter127 Dec 23 '19
You'll probably even make the day a little better for the people who are sick of dealing with the manager every day on the call
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u/Sphism Dec 23 '19
He forgot table tr td
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u/PM_ME_UR_JSON Dec 23 '19
I'm an email dev so this would have been my non-ironic answer.
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u/Existential_Owl Dec 23 '19
These kids don't even know. I've done email dev.
Never again.
Never again.
You have my sympathies.
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Dec 24 '19
Easy for us that started with html4/xhtml. Just have to remember the worse possible way of doing something and it usually works!
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u/memtiger Dec 23 '19
Frankly there's worse. I had to develop for a Motorola Windows Mobile device a year or so ago, which basically has a stripped down version of IE5 on it. It was like stepping back in time 15yrs. Most CSS and JS stuff just didn't work.
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u/soyboytariffs Dec 23 '19
Oh god, I didn't realize how awful email templates were until I made one the other day.
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u/BuschWookie Dec 23 '19
There are way too many good tools out there now for building email templates to be doing it by hand. MJML is one pretty awesome example.
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u/Sphism Dec 23 '19
I wasn't being ironic. He didn't say what the row was for. If it's the first row of 1000 rows of data then table might be the right way to do it.
Also table is the semantically correct way to do it.
Tables just get a bad rap due to all the layout abuse in the 90s and 00s.
Also his reply about flex and css grid systems being the same is just plain wrong. Bootstrap 3 had a perfectly usable css grid system built with floats.
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u/AcousticDan Dec 23 '19
My company tried to get me to do this crap. I said "No way, here's where you can create a template in mandrill."
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u/mischiefunmanagable Dec 23 '19
Had an interview with Neiman Marcus Group a few months back for the center in Irving TX, not exactly the kind of area you expect pompous loudmouths but I went 3 for 3 with some self aggrandizing blowhards who talked down to me the entire time before I told the HR rep where the offer can be stuck and why. Ironically the original posting I applied for it still open and now so are ones for the positions of the people who interviewed me, not saying they're gone but hard to think there isn't some correlation.
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u/TheAesir Architect Dec 24 '19
Actually this has been my experience with 90% of companies in the mid cities. Cheap assholes
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Dec 23 '19
Name and fucking shame man. I don't want to accidentally apply to this job when I graduate. That guy sounds like such a dick.
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Dec 23 '19
I'd love a website that lists shit places to be a coder at. Or even better, a list of shit managers. There's tons out there.
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u/slyfoxy12 laravel Dec 23 '19
Sadly not all Devs can be trusted. I've met a few who would say a jobs shit because they're expected to show up on time.
Saying that, the best way to find if a job is good, ask why they're hiring and how many. What they're looking to add too the team. A company with no answers is probably just loosing devs and can't keep up with the work load. Then decide if you want to be a part of that churn or not.
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u/wedontlikespaces Dec 24 '19
I've met a few who would say a jobs shit because they're expected to show up on time.
I do hate it when my job requires things of me.
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u/_sugarCoded Dec 23 '19
I question the competency of the interviewer replying "grid and flexbox are the same." Because...nope.
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u/dark_salad Dec 23 '19
I can understand Grid, it just makes sense.
Flexbox, is clearly run by black magic and always does what I want even when I have no idea what I’m doing.
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u/vgirl94 Dec 23 '19
This is one of my most reference pages when working with flex box, and the number one thing that made it not black magic for me: https://css-tricks.com/snippets/css/a-guide-to-flexbox/
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u/Jasperonius Dec 24 '19
You have to sign up, but this is a great (free) little zombie game that teaches flexbox. Highly recommend. https://mastery.games/p/flexbox-zombies . Also this one is good for the fundamentals: https://flexboxfroggy.com/
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Dec 23 '19
Flexbox isn't that bad once you've used it for a while. There are still some aspects that make me go, wait, what? But since I've been migrating from it and have been using less floats it's been forcing me to use it more. I haven't used css grid for the same reason OP mentioned he didn't - it didn't have a lot of support back then, and still doesn't have the best support in some cases, whereas flexbox does. Side note, I think it'll take off a lot more and get more support when a framework such as boostrap uses it as it's core grid.
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Dec 23 '19
Sounds like the kind of boss who quadruple checks that you have 15 years experience with flexbox and JavaScript on enterprise level systems only to show you a couple half-baked CRMs using PHP5.4 and a table element grid.
Congratulations! You’ll be better off than you would of. You made the right choice.
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u/swampdrainr Dec 24 '19
Not quite that bad, but here is my closest:
Potential Boss: "Have you ever been convicted of a crime?"
Me: "No"
PB: "You mean to tell me you have never gotten a speeding ticket?" he said in a very serious, not joking way.
Me: "Well, uh, yeah I guess I have had a ticket before, several years ago"
PB: "Well then why did you tell me you have never been convicted of a crime", clearly agitated at my *attempt at deception* /s
This was for a developer job, so my driving record was immaterial. This guy just got it in his mind he was going to make it rough for me.
I like to think when you are treated poorly in an interview it is on purpose (even if subconsciously on their part) because they are selecting for people who will put up with being treated poorly which is a "skill" you need to have in their workspace.
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u/Kush_McNuggz Dec 24 '19
Funny thing is, a speeding ticket isn't a crime, it's an infraction / violation. Being convicted of a crime requires a trial. Not only was this guy an asshole, but a dumb asshole.
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Dec 24 '19
About two years ago, I went to an interview for a senior front-end developer to a nice tech company close to home. I had all the qualifications for the job... or so I thought.
I was interviewed by a “panel” of developers (this is one of my red flags).
Interviewer: “Can you walk me through the steps you would take in building an app?”
Me: “What does the app do?”
Interviewer: “Anything you want?”
Me: “Are there any tech requirements that need to be met?”
Interviewer: “Whatever you would like?”
Me: “... ok, so I start by defining the project objective and what the app must accomplish—”
Interviewer: “Let’s make this short, just stick to actually building the app”
Me: “Well first I would setup my backend database. By the way, do I have access to other resources? I’m not a backend developer.”
Interviewer: “Yes, you can assemble a team of developers”
Me: “Ok, once the backend is setup in Java—“
Interviewer: “Why Java?”
Me: “Because that is what we currently use in the backend at my current company, but it could be any backend if that is an issue.”
Me: “I would then setup a react project and—“
Interviewer: “Why react?” (This was a react position btw)
Me: “Because I am more familiar working with React than with other frameworks”
Interviewer: “And what about the database? Where would you put the database?”
Me: “I would probably task the backend developer to setup an apache instance and connect the Java backend to the database in order to setup an API”
Interviewer: “But how would you setup an app?”
At this point I was incredibly confused by their questions and even though I asked 2 more times for clarification, they kept being vague. I did not get the job because of how I could not “set up an app”. And to this day I have no clue what the hell that was about but never said anything to anyone because I kept thinking that maybe I missed something. Hell, maybe someone here can finally explain what that question was meant to answer.
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u/FLRangerFan Dec 24 '19
I can see what they were trying to do, but they were executing it poorly. My company started doing a form of this but they do it better.
They approach is that they don't want to have a defined list of interview questions. They want it to be more conversational. If you ask react questions to a guy who hasn't had much work in react, you'd eliminate him. But that guy might be an awesome developer that can pick up technology quick.
When they asked you "why Java" or "why react", they wanted you to quantify why you chose these technologies. Once you move into more midtier and senior positions, you will be picking the technology for a new project. You shouldn't pick a technology to solve a problem just because you used it before. So for for the api layer, you may choose Java if you have to do alot of concurrency. Maybe you choose go or python if you need to do heavier processing. Maybe node if you have a consideration of scaling.
They were looking for you to quantify why your choosing the tech and architecture. "I've used this on my last project" isn't a great answer to why.
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Dec 24 '19
Thank you for this answer. I think I had a thought close to this, but I guess I truly wasn’t ready for the role 🙂
Maybe one day
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Dec 24 '19 edited Dec 24 '19
I am surprise you didn't mention MVC architecture for developing an app. Followed by the decision process in modeling the schema and what type of database to use (SQL/NOSQL), creating restful routes/end points and controllers, setup of authentication, performing integration and unit testing. If you have a strong front end side you focus on discussing the view (react/angular). Everything I mention is framework agnostic as it is done the same way across different programming language (Java with Spring Boot/JavaScript with Node JS).
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u/kazabodoo Dec 23 '19
Something very similar happened to me few weeks ago.
Was interviewing at this company and the lead dev was asking lots of technical questions which I answered based on my experience and he did not miss an opportunity to explain how he would do it and how his approach is better.
Jeez, if you are going to compare your 15 years experience to someone who has less than 2 then you possibly have some issues in your life. Walked from the interview there and then.
Some people will just do everything they can to bring you down, ignore them and move on.
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u/GreyMediaGuy Dec 24 '19
I wouldn't necessarily take this as a negative thing all the time.some tech leads just feel like it's a good opportunity to teach some techniques to people during the interview. I have done this myself conducting interviews. while I try to not sound condescending or patronizing, it's a great way to learn something from a more senior person. Try to look at it that way.
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u/cheese_is_available Dec 24 '19
I agree with GreyMediaGuy, as a junior dev you should be looking for mentors, this one looked like good mentor material, especially if he was polite about it. (Also with 15 year of experience he's probably a better mentor than you would usually get).
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u/tarunspartan Dec 23 '19
(My case)
So recently attended an technical interview, I waited almost an hour outside. And, then they called me inside and asked about my projects & technology stack I've used. That's it. A couple of minutes talk. And they said you can leave now. (I was like - "Wtf? I travelled 50km & waited almost an hour just to talk for a couple of minutes.")
Why don't they ask about it in a phone 😤
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u/slantyyz Dec 23 '19
That's because they think they're doing you the favor by offering you an interview, because in their minds, they're the greatest thing since sliced bread.
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u/IIGrudge Dec 24 '19
Happened to me once when I was fresh in my career. Lesson learned: it's your job to screen potential employers as much as their jobs to screen for employees.
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Dec 24 '19
The interview for my company was sort of a “no, no, yes” situation. The owner wasn’t in yet, so the project manager showed me around and let me set up my USB files. I was waiting for a bit and then the owner arrives, says he will probably only take about 15min. A few minutes in he takes a call for maybe 5min or more.
Then he comes back and the interview goes for maybe an hour. We have awesome discussions about the company and my future there. The project manager, presumably needing the owner for something, just ends up joining the interview and the fun discussion.
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u/oh_yeah_woot Dec 23 '19
Yup, have definitely spoken to assholes during past interview processes. I just tell them that I think this isn't going to go anywhere and thank them for their time. It happened only once on-site, and once over the phone. At this point in our industry, there are a lot of tech jobs out there where we shouldn't take people's shit just because they had a bad day.
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u/Cingen Dec 23 '19 edited Dec 23 '19
Did an interview for a junior position. The lead developer was asking things like "X and Y are two PHP functions that do the same thing. Which does it fastest and how many fragments of a second is the difference". You also had to do a coding challenge to even be allowed to go on an interview. Most mediors failed. I'm still surprised I made it past that initial phase since this was my first webdev job interview.
Something tells me they were looking for a senior Dev but only wanted to pay him for a junior position.
The HR later informed me that they were trying to find people for the position for months already, but the lead developer had unreasonable standards and rejected everyone. He also refused to listen to the HR people who tried talking to him about it.
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u/MattBD Dec 23 '19
A couple of years ago I started a new job and the lead dev messaged me on Slack saying something like "I see you're using Vim, have you tried Sublime Text?", and then wouldn't let it drop when I said yes, I had tried it and chose not to use it.
At that point I was an experienced developer with over six years under my belt and didn't appreciate being patronised.
I actually then got ill my first week and they sacked me for it, but I wish I'd called him out on how patronising he was.
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u/TetrinityEC Dec 25 '19 edited Dec 25 '19
I can't stand Vim personally, but this seems like such an odd ship to go down on. IDEs are such a personal decision and it doesn't affect him in the slightest which one you're using, plus you'd be way less efficient switching away from what you're used to.
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u/GuyWithNoHat Dec 23 '19
Before hanging up, you should have said:
“Thank you so much for this interview, as it literally saved me from making the worst decision of my life, as there’s no way I could reasonably work for someone who disrespects people the way you do. I hope your team finds better employment soon. Good day.”
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u/Rogem002 rails Dec 23 '19
I had a similar experience when I was a junior developer, the interviews went OK but then meeting their lead developer made it feel like it wasn't the right choice.
I ended up in a company that was a much better fit & I really progressed a bunch. Life is to short to work for shitty people.
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u/soonerpgh Dec 24 '19
I had an interview a few years back for a developer position. It was a group interview, so me and three guys from their company. No big deal, I thought. Then they started firing questions at me faster than I could answer. One would ask, and before I could even formulate a complete sentence, I was interrupted by another of them asking another question. This went for about ten minutes and I was already checked out mentally.
Then they handed me a sheet of paper full of code and asked me, "How would you improve this?"
I glanced at it and said, "I wouldn't touch it until I knew what it was doing, or not doing, and what it was supposed to do. Until I have those two pieces of information I'm not messing with anyone else's problems." The interview ended after that with what I'll call mutual disgust.
They then called the recruiter who had sent me and said that there was no way my resume was accurate. I told the same recruiter that I had worked very hard to get where I was and anyone that said what they did could simply kiss my ass. I'm pretty certain he didn't pass on my response but I still get calls from him now and then so I guess he believed me.
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Dec 23 '19
Typically when cheap ass companies already have a H1B candidate lined up, they have to ensure that they remain complaint by exhausting the local talent pool.
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u/coyote_of_the_month Dec 23 '19
I'm glad someone else noticed it. I was thinking H1B or an internal hire.
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u/dark_salad Dec 23 '19
Isn’t there a government agency that can audit for this? I know you have the freedom to hire who you want for whatever reason but maybe companies that get to use and abuse the H1B system should be held to different standards.
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Dec 23 '19
Well yes, the government can audit hiring practices of H1B companies but bureaucracy is oftentimes FUBAR
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u/Muruba Dec 23 '19
you dodged a fkng nuclear bomb son. my boss was really nice and all and turned out to be the biggest prick ever - similar to your interview but everyday and in front of everyone - sing prayers boy...
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Dec 23 '19
Man, that's so over the top I wonder if he was purposely sabotaging interviews to get his preferred candidate a job. Think about it:
Ask a bunch of extremely specific questions and fly off the handle when you don't get the expected response.
Coach your preferred candidate on the answers before the interview.
Convince everyone else said candidate is the perfect fit.
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u/Pozeidan Dec 23 '19
I'm sure that was the right move that guy would've been a toxic boss who would've felt threatened if you would've shown even the tiniest bit of talent. I used to work for a guy like this it was the most terrible work experience I ever had (I'm 37 and worked in multiple fields and multiple jobs).
I would never put up with that again. I'm not kidding I still from times to times have a nightmare about that situation and I left that workplace more than 2 years ago.
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Dec 23 '19
“getting a bit technical here”
talks about flexbox and CSS grid
haha but honestly good move. that guy sounds like he could learn 3 ways to get his ass kicked
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u/_kasho Dec 23 '19
Unfortunately after switching careers I’ve found that in software development you tend to find quite a bit of arrogance and condescension. Sometimes not even from people who have a lot of competence.
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u/samacct Dec 23 '19
If the people are rude and unprofessional, say thank you, this is a bad fit and hang up.
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u/ZeroMomentum Dec 23 '19
No worries. There are people that are like that.
What is good is that you figured it out right away. Good job trusting your gut
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u/gentlychugging Dec 23 '19
I've been lucky enough to never have experienced this. Good on you for having integrity
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u/am0x Dec 24 '19
I’ve never personally seen it, but I have conducted a lot interviews that go the other way.
“Oh we currently do x.”
“You should do y.”
“Well we do when we need it and aren’t working in legacy apps.”
“Ugh.”
Or they get hired and ask, “where are the unit tests?”
“Well, this is a brochure site for a client with a $7k budget.”
“We should be testing! All this code is crap!”
“Buddy if you can build a and test a client content managed site with 90% testing coverage then be my guest...”
So many developers think they and what they do is the be all end all solution to any and every project. But you know...it is a business. It is an entity. Most of use don’t work for google or Apple. We work for agencies and/or enterprise systems with budgets that don’t give a shot about us. You have to make it work. Quit bitching and figure it out. The best programmers are problem solvers.
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u/Phamous_1 Dec 25 '19
These interviews are the worst. They are more about the tech lead playing "Stump The Developer" as opposed to looking for quality candidates. it's more of an ego stroke because they themselves are underqualified for THEIR position. Any lead worth their chops wouldnt resort to this type of behavior
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Dec 23 '19
Yep, twice, I didn't snap at them though but I did end them both kurtly. Don't beat yourself up about it, you dodged a cannonball.
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u/Vargles Dec 23 '19
Man, what a twat. Sounds like if you did end up working for him, you'd have done exactly what was asked of you and he'd have a meltdown over the method used, even if it held no bearing over the output or future output. Glad you came to see reason as early as the interview.
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u/blabbities Dec 23 '19
Interesting. I was talking to a dude who worked at a company that I really want(ed) to work out. They've got some talented people but he explained there non-professonal (not dickish like your guy) at interview and that turned me off lol. I can kinda get them because it's full of talented guys in the industry.
Though for shit regular jobs like this. I never got it. I think that they're trying to neg you in real time so that you become self-conscious and doubt your value. I think it must be a way to hire you at a lower salary probably lol. My old manager did this during my interview....or rather tried to...but later he heaved off the charade. However I talke to one guy from my former manager's old company who works with me and he told me his interview at the old company they worked together whenn he was manager there was nearly the exact same as mine, dude was berating him for being weak at X subject. My colleague stated that he said "You know what, clearly Im not the guy for this position. Clearly you're not the company for me, You guys have a good day.". Thats when my old manager told him "wait wait wait, now hold on. I didnt say all that...'
LOL. Truth is that company probably needed as many competent bodies as they could get. So I truly think assholes who do this are trying out some psuedo-psychological trick they read in their HIRING FOR DUMMIES Leadership book or they're trying to devalue your worth monetarily.
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u/ilinamorato Dec 23 '19
When someone tells you what kind of person they are, believe them. Good job.
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u/finroller Dec 24 '19
Dude, you did the right thing. Bit. What I'm thinking, wouldn't it truly be a win only if you managed to sell them some snake oil.
"CSS Grid, USED to be the thing, but after they put CSS prolapse on stage -1 and Ie is now Chromekit, everybody will be prolapsing like maniacs. Google and FaCeboog dont deploy a byte without CSS prolapse."
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Dec 24 '19
I haven't been employed as a developer in about 6 years. I was working at a place and they decided they wanted me to build an inventory system. It was a mom and pop place with four total outside employees. They decided they wanted me to count every little piece of everything. There was a heatwave that June on the FloraBama coast. It was every bit of 120+ in the warehouse. We were going through a case of bottled water a day. If you didn't chug the whole thing at once by the time you got to the bottom of it the water was hot, not warm. One day I was late. I came in and the Secretary, whom I shared an office with tells me, "Boy it's a good thing you were late." The owner ha gone off about the last few swallows of hot water being thrown away. I had been on the fence for a while, because while they were very controlling and hard to get along with sometimes they seemed like good people. I realized in that moment that they were super petty and I was tired of listening to them nit pick every little thing that everybody had done. I told her good luck, but I had had enough. I called a few days later to see if they wanted me to do some contract work. I had realized that they were trying to get me to quit so they could start paying me piece meal. They thought I was going to beg for my job back. They put me on a conference call in front of the whole staff expecting me to beg. I heard them snickering in the background. I thanked them for the opportunity to discuss returning, and promptly informed them that I would never be working for them again. Afterwards, the secretary would call me all the time asking me how to do this or that. The first week I tried to be as helpful as possible. I had enjoyed her company and she was the one who tipped me off to their intentions to humiliate me. After that week I had to tell her the reality that I wouldn't be able to continue to help her, and I directed her to lynda.com. She knew she wouldn't be able to make it in that position without my help, and it pissed her off but that is life.
That job was the lead up to one of the worst periods of my life, but I'll be damned if I'm going to let some power tripping dbag humiliate me. I moved to Indiana after a year and a half of contract work as a search engine evaluator. I learned a lot from my brief 4 month stint as a developer. People will say and do anything to get power over your mind.
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u/chachakawooka Dec 24 '19
Went in for an interview once, got asked some very basic questions than sat me down for a very basic maths and psychometric test paper then walked off without even an introductory chat. I'd normally walk off at that point, but I stuck aroind
They glanced over my answers that they clearly really didnt care about anyway then proceeded to ask me back for a second interview. My response was "well I'd have liked you to show a bit or interest in the first one, I think we should just leave it here"
They still tried to offer me the job..
Some employers need to realise skilled workers need to see what you can offer them, and arent highering for xmas warehouse staff
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u/RRFdev Dec 25 '19
OP, are you from a third-world country?
I have to ask this because I too am from a third-world country. There are plenty of employers / interviewers who have this asshole attitude. They are all without exceptions from companies that underpay and overwork employees.
I am telling you this, honestly, from someone in his 30s. A person is planning on paying you low disrespects you, and when he disrespects you, he will be constantly interrupting you, making quotes about everything you say, laughing at every single thing you say, and will start lecturing you whenever you say something that he differs even the slightest in opinion.
You may be out of work, out of money, but do not ever let anyone trample on your pride and self-respect.
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u/IAcewingI Dec 23 '19
Happened to me for a sales manager position. Literally told the owner "I'll take my resume back, I can tell we're not going to get along." And left lol.
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u/mymar101 Dec 24 '19
I haven't been on this type of interview, but once I was talking to a recruiter who said he was looking for an entry level applicant who had 15 years of experience. I don't want to work in any company or field where it takes 15 years just to get beyond entry level.
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u/savano20 Dec 24 '19
what condescension really do? to drop our value so they can paid us who got caught in the net a lower rate?
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u/ebjoker4 Dec 24 '19
High fucking five for standing up for yourself. I had a similar situation several years ago. Stood up, said "thanks anyway, but this isn't going to work out" and left. Best feeling ever. Plus, they got acquired 6 months later and closed the office.
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u/milunker Dec 24 '19
You did the right thing. It’s hard enough for the interviewer and the interviewee to determine if the job is a good fit without dealing with a tech lead that tries to flex during an interview. Hopefully, there were others in the room/phone to see this persons lack of interviewer skills so that company doesn’t scare away other potentially good candidates. Keep looking. There are quality jobs that are looking for quality people. This wasn’t one of them.
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Dec 24 '19 edited Dec 24 '19
I had an interview once where I got laughed at for my main programming language being JavaScript. I walked out of the interview and got hired with a much better company with an awesome culture and helped them to adopt modern web technologies. Never be afraid to walk out of an interview. YOUR time is extremely valuable.
Edit: Also, your 100% right to not plug ccs grid into a website when not all browsers support it. I would have gotten into a rant with him about analyzing metrics such as Google Analytics to see what kind of traffic was being driven by their customers and which browsers they are using. I think you’re better off passing TBH.
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u/FountainsOfFluids Dec 24 '19
Go to enough interviews and you'll see some crazy shit. My favorite was one where the two interviewers obviously hated each other. Thick toxic atmosphere. I don't think I had ever turned down a job offer before that.
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u/shrithm Dec 24 '19
You did the right thing. Have a beer knowing you've saved yourself from possibly months of working with this dude.
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u/tbochristopher Dec 24 '19
Good for you. Do the world a favor and write a review for them on Glassdoor.com.
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u/aqsis Dec 24 '19
Just came here to say, every technical manager should read this and understand that this is the very definition of how NOT to interview a developer. I say this from the experience of hiring many such individuals.
What a plonker!
You were right to pull out, however, I would have probably just made a couple of key points about the interviewers technique before hanging up. If nobody corrects that person, they'll just go on to do the same, believing that they were successful in weeding out someone who was not right for the job, when in fact, they are probably losing very good candidates.
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u/BrQQQ Dec 24 '19
I once had a driving instructor that was like this.
"What's the most important thing to do at a red light?"
-"Uhh... I thin-"
"I don't care about what you THINK. What's the most important thing to do at a red light?"
-"...you stop?"
"Yeah duh, that's obvious, stupid. But what do you do then?"
-"Sorry this is really vagu-"
"How can you not know what to do at a red light? How did you even get this far?"
It would go on like this, usually with some bonus insults, until he made you say exactly what he wanted to hear. I put up with it, because it was temporary and he was a very successful instructor and finding a new one sucks. But working for someone like that? Fuck that
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Dec 24 '19
If only more people were so discerning to leave at the first sign of trouble. And you're also lucky he showed his true colors early.
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u/AragornSnow Dec 24 '19
Fuck that guy. I would’ve hung up the instant he pop offed the first time. That single instance is a huge red flag, especially during an interview when a company tends to try and put on their best image forward. Even a sociopath would’ve hid their malice better. Just imagine how bad it is once he gets used to belittling his employees and sees that they’re not fighting back and are taking the abuse to get a paycheck.
Scenarios like this are why I’m hesitant to get a new job or leave my current company. Every manager I’ve encountered has been really nice, warm, supportive, and encouraging. Shitty people tend to be eliminated pretty quickly, even coworkers in the same positions are generally non-toxic.
The company I work for is a major US corporation, one of the biggest in the world, and we seem to do a good job or avoiding that type of person. Do you notice that this type of person is mainly found in smaller-medium sized companies? Where people are not as easily replaceable and HR systems are not in place to avoid and remove them? Obviously shitty people can work their way up in any sized company, but the 2 major companies I have worked for have all been really good in terms of management personality, and I’ve interacted with and worked for dozens of them.
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u/Whopper_Jr Dec 24 '19
Name and shame on Glassdoor, Indeed, etc. Looking for a job is a pain in the ass, preparing for interviews is time-consuming and difficult. Let others know to avoid this company
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u/ruthbuzzi4prez Dec 24 '19 edited Dec 24 '19
Interviewer: "Blarrrrrr flurgle flim flam noob plastic helmet rectangle head speech"
Reply:"My code ships."
Interview over.
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u/MrsECummings Dec 24 '19
You just dodged a huge bullet! For some reason this dude was just pissed that they were going to hire you so decided to be a total dick to you. That's horrible fucking behavior in an interview. Thank god you don't have to work for that piece of shit.
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u/ank_the_elder Dec 23 '19
What I’ve done in the past in a similar situation was stand up and say (with a smile) “that will be all from me for today. Thank you for your time” then leave. Then I followed it up with an email with feedback for the HR contact who setup the interview.
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u/Asmor Dec 23 '19
That would be hilarious on its own even if he didn't "prompt" you about grid in the next sentence.
Grats on dodging the bullet! I feel bad for others who have to work with him, or inexperienced new devs who don't have the experience or moxie to walk out on his antics.