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Job Interview Strategies
[This is part 1 in a 3-part series]
If you've been reading this space, you may have formed the impression that I don't hold the typical job interview process in my highest regard. :-) As a co-worker of my sister's observed (and I discussed) a few months back, getting a job offer is in some ways analogous to getting a marriage proposal after only one or two dates. And that's under the best of circumstances.
It's no wonder companies are leery of job candidates, especially the deluge of candidates they are exposed to in the current economic market. These companies keep looking for new ways to pre-screen candidates, to save themselves from the all-too-likely prospect of hiring "the wrong sort" or person.
Many companies now hire recruiting agencies to play the role of "troll at the bridge". Many have also taken the game of Resume Buzzword Bingo to a new (and often ludicrous) extreme. They start listing every possible tool, application, or language the candidate might need in the job.
2+ years experience as a software technical writer — Adobe FrameMaker, Microsoft Word, Quadralay WebWorks, Adobe Acrobat, Adobe InDesign, Microsoft Visio ...
Yes, those are all useful tools... but can the candidate write??? Here's one where they do want the candidate to be able to write... but it's an engineering job.
The appropriate candidate must have a minimum of 6 years experience in software development, and should have strong knowledge of TCP/IP networking, UNIX (Solaris & Linux) and Shell scripting. You should be a strong Java coder, expert with JUnit, and familiarity with ant and log4j. You should also have strong design pattern experience, strong multi-threading experience, and should have experience in testing server applications, and a proven track record of developing test plans from engineering specifications. You should also be familiar with jPOS, have experience with CVS, and have technical writing skills.
I guess this company doesn't feel that it needs a separate technical writing group. It's become popular to "double up" job descriptions in this sort of fashion, hiring one person to do what used to be the work of two or three. But if programmers need the skills of technical writers, technical writers often need as many skills as programmers.
The best candidate has knowledge of PHP, Perl, and other enterprise web development and management technologies; knowledge of SQL and other database technologies; knowledge of C++; and proficiency with Visio, HTML (by hand and via editors like Front Page or Dreamweaver), Framemaker, Acrobat 5.0, and WebWorks Publisher.
The above is part of the description for a 3-6 month contract technical writing position. Then, some job descriptions just throw everything into the hopper and ask for the best result.
- BSCS plus 3 to 8+ years of industry experience
- Fluent with C, Perl, Tcl, Python, Java, HTML, CGI, JavaScript, SQL, and Microsoft Excel including macros and VBA
- Fluent with use and basic system administration of Windows, Linux, and UNIX computers, including make, cron, TCP/IP, services, sockets, and shell scripts
- Track record of being clever, responsive, resourceful, and an excellent problem solver
It's not necessarily enough to be merely clever, responsive, and resourceful, either. Some job postings include rather specific (and possibly daunting) cultural qualifications.
Your wacky sense of humor, ability to work with local and remote team members and skills that enable you to juggle many things at once will be required to mesh in this environment.
Or how about this one?
Can you identify key players/contributors in a complex and political environment? Need highly self disciplined individual who thrives in fast paced environment.
Even all of this doesn't help. An engineering manager I know asks, "if the resumes I see are being pre-screened so carefully, why don't the candidates I interview know their stuff?" I don't know the answer, but I'll hazard a guess. Buzzword Bingo isn't the best way to pre-screen.
In response to the "failure" of their pre-screening tactics to provide a small list of highly qualified candidates, managers and potential co-workers turn to new and strange interviewing techniques in an attempt to weed the best candidates out of the pool of choices. Unfortunately, most managers and individual contributors (especially many engineers), have never been taught how to conduct an interview. They're inventing new techniques as they go and the techniques they choose are frequently unrealistic.
More interviewers (or so I'm told) are turning to puzzle questions or stress interviews in an attempt to discover how a candidate thinks or works under pressure. Unfortunately, not all smart people think alike and an interview situation is a highly artificial environment. A good candidate may "fail" such a test while a poor one "passes" through sheer luck or advance study. No job interview should appear to hinge on whether you can get the people across the gorge before the zombies arrive.
April 23, 2004 in category Career Center | Permalink
