I’ve had occasion to be interviewed for positions at a variety of technology companies. Sometimes the position actually exists, other times it might exist and even other times, the folks are just fishing for solutions to their problems and hope to save a little from their consulting budget. In all cases, the goal of the interview is primarily to find out what you know and how well you know it in a 30 to 45 minute conversation. It is interesting to see how some go about doing it. My experience has been that an interview really tells you nothing but does give you a sense of whether the person is nice enough to “work well with others“.

But now, finally folks at Google used big data to figure out something that has been patently obvious to anyone who has either interviewed for a job or was interviewing someone for a job. The article published in the New York Time details a talk with Mr. Laszlo Bock, senior vice president of people operations at Google.  In it, he shared that puzzle questions don’t tell you anything about anyone.  I maintain that they tell you if someone has heard that particular puzzle question before. In the published interview Mr. Bock, less charitably, suggests that it merely serves to puff up the ego of the interviewer.

I think it’s only a matter of time before big data is used again to figure out another obvious fact – that even asking simple or complex programming questions serves as no indicator of on-the-job success.  Especially now in the age of Google and open-source software.  Let’s say you want to write some code to sort a string of arbitrary letters and determine the computational complexity, a few quick Google searches and presto – you have the solution.  You need to understand the question and the nature of the problem but the solution itself has merely become a matter of copying from your betters and equals who shared their ideas on the Internet.  Of course, such questions are always made more useless when the caveat is added – “without using the built-in sort function” – which is, of course, the way you actually solve it in real life.

Another issue I see is the concern about experience with a specific programming language. I recall that the good people at Apple are particularly fond of Objective C to the point where they believe that unless you have had years of direct experience with it, you could never use it to program effectively.  Of course, this position is insulting to both any competent programmer and the Objective C language. The variations between these algorithmic control flow languages are sometimes subtle, usually stylistic but always easily understood. This is true of any programming language.  In reality, if you are competent at any one, you should easily be able to master any another. For instance,  Python uses indentation but C uses curly braces to delineate code blocks.  Certainly there are other differences but give any competent developer a few days and they can figure it out leveraging their existing knowledge.

But that still leaves the hard question.  How do you determine competency?  I don’t think you can figure it out in a 45 minute interview – or a 45 hour one for that matter – if the problems and work conditions are artificial.  I think the first interview should be primarily behavioral and focus on fit and then, if that looks good, the hiring entity should then pay you to come in and work for a week solving an actual problem working with the team that would be yours. This makes sense in today’s world of limited, at-will employment where everyone is really just a contractor waiting to be let go. So, in this approach, everyone gets to see how you fit in with the team, how productive you can be, how quickly you can come up to speed on a basic issue and how you actually work a problem to a solution in the true environment. This is very different from establishing that you can minimize the number of trips a farmer takes across a river with five foxes, three hens, six bag of lentils, a sewing machine and a trapeze.

I encourage you to share some of your ideas for improving the interview process.

Back at the end of March, I attended O’Reilly‘s Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco. As usual with the O’Reilly brand of conferences it was a slick, show-bizzy affair. The plenary sessions were fast-paced with generic techno soundtracks, theatrical lighting and spectacular attempts at buzz-generation. Despite their best efforts, the staging seems to overhwelm the Droopy Dog-like presenters who tend to be more at home coding in darkened rooms whilst gorging themselves on Red Bull and cookies. Even the audience seemed to prefer the company of their smartphones or iPads than any actual human interaction with “live tweets” being the preferred method of communication.

In any event, the conference is usually interesting and a few nuggets are typically extracted from the superficial, mostly promotional aspects of the presentations.

What was clear was that every start-up and every business plan was keyed on data collection. Data collection about YOU. The more – the better. The goal was to learn as much about you as possible so as to be able to sell you stuff. Even better – to sell you stuff that was so in tune with your desires that you would be helpless to resist purchasing it.

The trick was – how to get you to cough up that precious data? Some sites just assumed you’d be OK with spending a few days answering questions and volunteering information – apparently just for the sheer joy of it. Others believed that being up-front and admitting that you were going to be sucked into a vortex of unrelenting and irresistable consumption would be reward enough. Still others felt that they ought to offer you some valuable service in return. Most often, this service, oddly enough, was financial planning and retirement saving-based.

The other thing that was interesting (and perhaps obvious) was that data collection is usually pretty easy (at least the basic stuff). Getting details is harder and most folks do expect something in return. And, of course, the hardest part is the data mining to extract the information that would provide the most compelling sales pitch to you.

There are all sorts of ways to build the case around your apparent desires. By finding out where you live or where you are, they can suggest things “like” other things you have already that are nearby. (You sure seem to like Lady Gaga, you know there’s a meat dress shoppe around the corner…) By finding out who your friends are and what they like, they can apply peer-pressure-based recommendations (All of your friends are downloading the new Justin Beiber recording. Why aren’t you?). And by finding out about your family and demographic information they can suggest what you need or ought to be needing soon (You son’s 16th birthday is coming up soon, how about a new car for him?).

Of all the sites and ideas, it seems to me that Intuit‘s Mint is the most interesting. Mint is an on-line financial planning and management site. Sort of like Quicken but online. To “hook” you, their key idea is to offer you the tease of the most valuable analysis with the minimum of initial information. It’s almost like given your email and zip code they’ll draw up a basic profile of you and your lifestyle. Give them a bit more and they’ll make it better. And so you get sucked in but you get value for your data. They do claim to keep the data separate from you but they also do collect demographically filtered data and likely geographically filtered data.

This really isn’t news. facebook understood this years ago when their ill-fated Beacon campaign was launched. This probably would have been better accepted had it been rolled out more sensitively. But it is ultimately where everyone is stampeding right now.

The most interesting thing is that there is already a huge amount of personal data on the web. It is protected because it’s all in different places and not associated. facebook has all of your friends and acquaintances. Amazon and eBay have a lot about what you like and what you buy. Google has what you’re interested in (and if you have an Android phone – where you go). Apple has a lot about where you go and who you talk to and also through your app selection what you like and are interested in. LinkedIn has your professional associations. And, of course, twitter has when you go to the bathroom and what kind of muffins you eat.

Each of these giants is trying to expand their reservoir of data about you. Other giants are trying to figure out how to get a piece of that action (Yahoo!, Microsoft). And yet others, are trying to sell missing bits of information to these players. Credit card companies are making their vast purchasing databases available, specialty retailers are trying to cash in, cell phone service providers are muscling in as well. They each have a little piece of your puzzle to make analysis more accurate.

The expectations is that there will be acceptance of diminishing privacy and some sort of belief that the holders of these vast databases will be benevolent and secure and not require government intervention. Technologically, storage and retrieval will need to be addressed and newer, faster algorithms for analysis will need to be developed.

Looking for a job…or a powerful patent? I say look here.

My world is about to change but I fully admit that I don’t get how. That’s right…everything changes this Saturday, April 3rd when the Apple iPad is released. Am I the only one who looks at it and thinks of those big button phones that one purchases for their aging parent? Yes, I know Steve Jobs found the English language lacking sufficiently meaningful superlatives to describe it. And, yes, I know there will be hundreds of pre-programmed Apple zombies lining the streets to collect their own personal iPad probably starting Friday evening. But, I don’t understand why I would want an oversized iPhone without the phone or the camera or application software or a keyboard and why and how this gadget will change civilization. Don’t get me wrong, I know it will. But I don’t see how the iPad will revolutionize, say, magazine sales. Why would I buy Esquire for $2.99 when I get the print version for less than $1 and throw it out after reading it for 30 minutes (full disclosure: I am a subscriber – I admit that freely)? I also know I can’t take the iPad to the beach to read a book because it will get wet, clotted with sand and the screen will be unreadable in sunlight. But, I’m sure the iPad will be a huge hit. And I’m sure my life will change. Just tell me how. Someone…..please….?