Last week I asked what one question you could ask programmers to screen out viable candidates from poor candidates in a preliminary interview. I think that the one question you should keep in mind when interviewing programmers is, “What can I learn from this person?” If you get through an interview and can’t think of anything the candidate could teach you, they’re probably not right for the job.
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5 responses so far ↓
1 Claire // Dec 14, 2007 at 9:27 am
Very insightful, Rafe. Your question goes against the grain. If you are the smartest one on the team, you have a problem. Hiring those who can teach you something is right on the money.
2 Medley // Dec 14, 2007 at 11:09 am
Put another way, if you can’t learn anything from someone on your team, then they’re redundant, so what’s the point of having them around? (Exception might be a case where you just need bodies due to volume of work, but…)
3 Dennis Savage // Dec 14, 2007 at 3:17 pm
Another exception might be where it’s a training position, where you grow someone into the local programming idiom (language, libraries, punctuation/brace style, testing, commenting/documentation, etc) by giving them repetitive scutwork. Teachers learn from students all the time.
4 Rafe // Dec 15, 2007 at 11:20 am
Even in a training position I should be able to learn something from anyone I hire. Maybe it’s not about Java or Ruby or whatever, but they need to bring something to the table that’s interesting and that I don’t already know about, even if it’s not one of their job responsibilities.
5 Howard Berkey // Dec 16, 2007 at 10:27 pm
A very good, short task to give someone in an interview is, “Teach me something.” It can be anything; it doesn’t have to be programming per se. You can learn a lot about a person’s communication skills and thought processes that way.
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