A practical test for a contractor?

[pmeswani]

I'd never do it, I've walked out of a few interviews because of it as well.
The first time I had a "technical " test it was by a manager who had specific answers to his questions on a bit of paper.If the answer didn't match, you fail.

In one of my stints as a permie, my manager asked me to ask the contractors a theory question on a problem we were having and couldn't solve, my manager asked in the end and the answer the contractor gave saved us over £20K!

I assume the contractor would have been employed to fix the problem?

[malvolio]

I'd never do it, I've walked out of a few interviews because of it as well.
The first time I had a "technical " test it was by a manager who had specific answers to his questions on a bit of paper.If the answer didn't match, you fail.

In one of my stints as a permie, my manager asked me to ask the contractors a theory question on a problem we were having and couldn't solve, my manager asked in the end and the answer the contractor gave saved us over £20K!

Yeah, I did something like that when I was a working VMS guru, and someone had desinged a master file with duplicate primary keys and was wondering why it goot slower the more data they added (I mean, basic or what...).

What really irked was that I didn't get the bloody job...

[stingman123]

I assume the contractor would have been employed to fix the problem?

Not at all, my boss was just after some free consultancy, he does it all the time to actually save money on hiring.

[Manic]

From my experience tests are useless. many years ago I tested two candidates for two roles, one support one dev. Whichever was suitable for both got the gig in that role (contractors). The guy who tested well got the dev job, the guy not so good got the support role.

The guy who got the dev role was booted after 2 weeks, the support guy did all my dev, to a very high standard.

Even now I'm expected to do telephone interviews with potential contractors, no point in asking complex questions because they may genuinly not know. I'm not going to insult a contractor to ask basic stuff.

[NotAllThere]

It's questions where you could look the answer up in a few seconds, yet they expect you to memorize it - that's the ones that get right up my nose. They're supposed to test ability, not memory skills.

[malvolio]

It's questions where you could look the answer up in a few seconds, yet they expect you to memorize it - that's the ones that get right up my nose. They're supposed to test ability, not memory skills.

I got my original guru reputation in the 80s because I'd learned chunks of the indexes to ICL's old technical guides (the joys of a semi-eidectic memory!), so if anyone asked a question I could straight to the right section in the relevant TP and look it up.

It's the old plumbers bill question, isn't it? £300 for turning a tap - that's 20p for doing it and £298.80 for knowing which way to turn it.

[NotAllThere]

I once put the book "VAX/VMS Internals" on the trainee's desk, with a note purportedly from his manager, saying "Read, and inwardly digest".

I didn't remember I'd done it, until two weeks later when I was in the pub with him, and he was lamenting about how difficult it was to understand...

His face was a picture, when I 'fessed up. I paid for all his beer that night as some sort of recompense.

[tim123]

I'm not going to insult a contractor to ask basic stuff.

Why not, for all you know the guy could be blagging it.

tim

[TykeMerc]

When you've got a very finite handover opportunity so you can't afford the time to redo the recruitment process a short practical test is far from an unreasonable thing to ask. Obviously springing a test on someone without warning is not on.

I've been in this situation with a permy Sys Admin who had a long planned major surgery date moved forwards by a cancellation from 6 months away to 2 weeks the handover was critical and the Sys Admin put together the test. I hadn't done Sys Admin in 5 years and I sat it along with several other contractors with no problems it was fairly basic stuff that any experienced Sys Admin could stroll through.

1 candidate refused to attend the test, 3 failed and 2 passed, we hired 1 as the Sys Admin stunt double for 6 months and the other for a project role and a bit of backup cover so the stunt double could do bits of project work too.

Of the 6 candidates they could all have been hired purely off CV and interview but a brief (25 mins) tech test weeded the sheep from the goats.

[fishtastic]

Obviously springing a test on someone without warning is not on.

Candidates were given several days notice that there would be a test and a rough outline of what they would be asked i.e. basic admin.

a brief (25 mins) tech test weeded the sheep from the goats.

It does seem to, from my experience, hence my surprise with this guy when he said no-one had ever asked before...

Fish