Reply to: What's the longest technical interview you've ever had?

[Bunk]

About 2 hours.

One hour was PM and lead techie asking me all sorts of nonsensical technical questions. I should have been alerted by then that they were total aholes, but something made me stay just to prove myself to the idiots.

Anyway, after the interview I thought it was done and dusted when they shove me into room, sat me in front of a laptop with no internet connection and handed me a printout which basically said I should build a shopping cart from scratch. This means, set up a DB, write the business layer, write the data access layer and then the UI in aspx.

I felt it was a joke. Anyway, rolled up my sleeves and started to write some classes and interfaces when I find that the tech lead is actually perched almost on top of me glaring at what I am typing. He would not budge, he wanted to know why I was writing an interface and why I am declaring properties that way etc etc.

I thought I would speed up coding by downloading a data access class from somewhere, no internet. Tech lead says he wants me to code without any help.

I left after 5 minutes pretending I was going to the loo

Someone did that at one client I worked at. We were getting worried so someone went off to see if he was ok, nobody in the toilets, so we asked at reception and they said he'd left and handed his visitor's pass in. Ooops

[fullyautomatix]

About 2 hours.

One hour was PM and lead techie asking me all sorts of nonsensical technical questions. I should have been alerted by then that they were total aholes, but something made me stay just to prove myself to the idiots.

Anyway, after the interview I thought it was done and dusted when they shove me into room, sat me in front of a laptop with no internet connection and handed me a printout which basically said I should build a shopping cart from scratch. This means, set up a DB, write the business layer, write the data access layer and then the UI in aspx.

I felt it was a joke. Anyway, rolled up my sleeves and started to write some classes and interfaces when I find that the tech lead is actually perched almost on top of me glaring at what I am typing. He would not budge, he wanted to know why I was writing an interface and why I am declaring properties that way etc etc.

I thought I would speed up coding by downloading a data access class from somewhere, no internet. Tech lead says he wants me to code without any help.

I left after 5 minutes pretending I was going to the loo

[lukemg]

Same as DP, at a lowpoint career wise, did an 8 hour interview from hell for a tulipe permie job on half previous contract rate.
Got it and had to take it due to lack of other options.....

[NorthWestPerm2Contr]

My last one. Went on for 2.5 hours without a break.

I think they had planned 30 minutes, but they made the unfortunate mistake of asking me "Using the whiteboard and the various coloured pens behind you, please detail the last system you worked on."

I'd been at the previous gig. over two years, and had worked on the system from inception through to production. Once I got talking, I just couldn't find it within myself to stop - at least whilst they remained awake.

Did the trick though. They'd offered me a role before I'd even left the building (in retrospect, they probably just offered the role in order to see the back of me that day. )

I must try that one next time I want a gig really badly!

[nomadd]

What's the longest interview that you've had to secure a contract?

My last one. Went on for 2.5 hours without a break.

I think they had planned 30 minutes, but they made the unfortunate mistake of asking me "Using the whiteboard and the various coloured pens behind you, please detail the last system you worked on."

I'd been at the previous gig. over two years, and had worked on the system from inception through to production. Once I got talking, I just couldn't find it within myself to stop - at least whilst they remained awake.

Did the trick though. They'd offered me a role before I'd even left the building (in retrospect, they probably just offered the role in order to see the back of me that day. )

[MyUserName]

A well-known facilitator of wagers perchance?

Yes, amongst other things. They combine news, finance etc into a BLOOMing big operation. I thought BERGer me I am glad I did not get that one.

[Zippy]

I did an 3 and a half hour interview which comprised of 8 different pairs of interviewers asking me technical questions which involved me having to write code on paper and give it them them and one pair which had a HR girl who thought I was awesome because I could explain the problems of memory fragmentation and Unicode character sets to her in a way she understood.

I had to come back the next week for interview 10 of 11 and prompty had a memory blank and fell flat on my face when I could not see the bug in some code ... the bug being two functions in a class had the same name and signature. They pretty much showed me the door at that point.

Found out later that they are absolutely horrific to work for and I was lucky not to get the job.

A well-known facilitator of wagers perchance?

[Spacecadet]

Didn't do the dog thing with the collar and the cage?

You're thinking of the NHS

[KaiserWilly]

Once I interviewed for a big bank and they waterboarded me for 3 days to see if I could handle the pressure. Didn't get it

Didn't do the dog thing with the collar and the cage?

[shaunbhoy]

I've never had one.

Janitors normally get taken on by word of mouth. You must wield quite a mean mop!!

[OwlHoot]

What's the longest interview that you've had to secure a contract?

I'm not convinced that an invite for a half-day interview reflects positively on the hiring process and the role itself, especially bearing in mind the project is likely to have only few opportunities to develop something genuinely new.

Any thoughts?

Most of a day. An hour and a half in the morning, then back after lunch for round 2 - another hour and a half.

I had to devise and sketch a design for a remote monitoring and data gathering system they wanted, and my design based on inetd was reckoned the best. Ended up based there for over two years, on a pretty good rate.

At the other extreme, after applying for another contract I received an email saying start on monday, with no phone or on-site interview required!

[MyUserName]

I did an 3 and a half hour interview which comprised of 8 different pairs of interviewers asking me technical questions which involved me having to write code on paper and give it them them and one pair which had a HR girl who thought I was awesome because I could explain the problems of memory fragmentation and Unicode character sets to her in a way she understood.

I had to come back the next week for interview 10 of 11 and prompty had a memory blank and fell flat on my face when I could not see the bug in some code ... the bug being two functions in a class had the same name and signature. They pretty much showed me the door at that point.

Found out later that they are absolutely horrific to work for and I was lucky not to get the job.

[Normie]

Never had a technical interview, but have had a 4+ hour interview with a vetting officer. Think I would have enjoyed a technical interview more.

[proggy]

Once I interviewed for a big bank and they waterboarded me for 3 days to see if I could handle the pressure. Didn't get it

[VectraMan]

I had about 2 1/2 hours mostly technical for previous permie job, and that was after an hour on the phone. That was pretty indepth multithreaded C++, and I actually quite enjoyed it.

As a graduate I remember going to a whole interview day with psychometric tests and team problem solving other such nonsense, which is probably fair enough for graduates. But I did another about 3 years later, and I really wished on that occasion I'd just walked out.