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Comment by fecak | Hacker News Reader

I sometimes consult to clients on improving their hiring process. Candidate experience is now a topic that at least some companies consider.

This isn't your typical candidate experience - applying for a vague job ad, being asked to answer 6 puzzle questions, invite to an open house, two days of free training and then left alone for three weeks, followed by a vote by the tribe to see who will get the job.

It's definitely a plus that many of the students were hired elsewhere, but this is likely a method that would only appeal to the unemployed. I hear quite a bit of negative feelings towards companies that ask for extensive amounts of time commitment during the hiring process, and this is probably the highest level I remember.

If most companies asked candidates to go through this process, I expect they would want (and feel entitled to) some explanation at the end of the process.

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Good points here. Some of those who left the process in the beginning may have simply had better things to spend the next month on, not because they were inferior candidates. I like the tone of the article in general, but it does smack of a certain entitlement on the employer's part whereby they feel justified in extracting many thousands of dollars of free work from unemployed job seekers. Despite the admirable intentions, the caveat that some of those who didn't receive a job immediately were later hired elsewhere is only meager consolation, as I'm sure there were significant contributors who were not proportionally compensated.

>extracting many thousands of dollars of free work from unemployed job seekers I didn't get the impression that they provided any value to the person hiring them. To me it just seems like they got some interesting, hopefully fun training in APL over a couple weeks. If I was unemployed and had the spare time (Like I was a couple months ago) that sounds like something I would have loved to do.

This is very true. I was invited for a company with pretty interesting problems. Here's their entire hiring process:

* Initial phone screening, 30 minutes

* One two-hour problem, via e-mail

* One over-the-phone interview, one hour

* One five-day problem (yes, five days)

* One final in-person interview

I had an offer already on the table, and when it was obvious that they were unwilling/unable to accelerate their process (e.g.: had to wait three days for the over-the-phone interview, meanwhile the clock is ticking on my live offer), I decided that it wasn't worth it; mostly because I always crash and burn on the in-person "let's see if we like you" interview (I'm not an asshole, I'm simply uninteresting to most people because I'm expected to share everything about me within 2 hours with people I've never met before). Ultimately, I went with the offer on the table. No regrets yet.

"I hear quite a bit of negative feelings towards companies that ask for extensive amounts of time commitment during the hiring process"

YES

Time, Money (traveling for interviews, for example), too many/too long screening tests, etc

As someone who's already employed, if someone asks me to spend more than 30 minutes doing an assignment or test before an interview, I'm just going to pass.

My experience has been, 95%+ of the time when I do the test or assignment, I don't even get an interview (much less an offer). It's even more ridiculous because I really know my stuff; at my current job, I do all the tasks where someone else gets stuck.

Suppose you hire 1% of the people you interview, and you expect them to spend 10 hours before the offer. You're wasting 1000 hours collectively (half a year of work) of your candidates' time.

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