Interviewing

Interviewing is a difficult skill to master, but with the 50 that I’ve done at Lyft, I feel like I have a much better idea of how to do it.

Early mistakes

When I started interviewing, I mostly met with interns or new grads. I was only a few years older than them, so it made sense for recruiters to pair me up with them. I thought that interviewing meant getting the smartest candidates that could answer the most difficult questions in the most elegant way. I would interview people and base my feedback purely on the strength of their code or their background. I learned very early that this was a huge mistake. I ended up saying yes to a bunch of people that my fellow interviewers didn’t like. They never made it because my fellow interviewers all shut me down by saying no, thank God.

During these kinds of interviews, I would give a “yes” or a “strong yes” but others would give a strong no with the sentiment that, “I’d rather have a whole than an asshole.”

Times I said no when I should have said yes

There have been times when I’ve said no when I should have said yes. I made mistakes, but thankfully the other interviewers said yes and the candidates accepted the eventual offer. When this happened in the past, it would be because the candidate could not answer one of my questions, or could answer the question, but couldn’t explain why it worked etc etc. I would have pleasant exchanges with them, but (back then) I thought that we’d be bringing in the wrong people if they couldn’t answer a Leetcode question.

I was wrong. This is when I started to learn about what kind of interviewer I want to be and what kind of people I want to work with. I’ve learned that the reality is: this job isn’t that hard. If anyone has worked enough years, or been to a few big companies, they generally know what to do and after a few months, any candidate will be able to do the job. People learn, who knew.

Times I said yes when I should have said no

There have definitely been times I said yes when I should have said no. I interviewed one candidate who had just moved from Taiwan and had finished their masters. The candidate answered my question flawlessly. I got the vibe that they were a lot like me. Hard working…that’s about it. They had a gun slingers attitude and big career goals. I gave the candidate a strong yes, but my fellow interviewers gave strong nos. They had felt that their personality would clash with the culture in the office and we could cause unnecessary conflicts.

I said yes based purely on merit/drive when I should have put myself in a position where we’d be working together under stress. When services are on fire at work, I need the other engineers I’m working with to be level headed. I’ve found that working with people who don’t work under SEVs well to be…sub optimal.

Like we’re working together

During interviews, I try to simulate what working together would be like. When I interview, what would it be like to solve a problem together. That’s the harder part of the job. I’ve had candidates just not know how to answer a question, but when we work together on it, we’ve been able to make awesome progress.

When I interview more senior people than me, I try to put myself in a position to learn. What are you going to bring to the table. How are you going to mentor younger engineers? How are you going to be a technical leader on the team? What’s it like to be in an argument with you? I’ve also discovered that arguing and micro aggressions are like half of the job.

When I interview interns and new grads, I mostly focus on personality and would I enjoy teaching you. I’ve worked with interns that are an absolute nightmare (very rare). The reality is, interns don’t have a ton of experience, but can contribute great amounts with the right mentor. Just because their internship is short, doesn’t mean their impact has to be small. I try to optimize for how well they are going to learn from me as opposed to experience or how well they answer “how to invert a binary search tree.”