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> "if you want to work here, you are going to do what I say."

I recently started pointing that out, in a roundabout way, when I run interviews.

Why? If a candidate starts arguing about xml versus JSON, the candidate misses the point when I bring up xml. (Hint, I only discuss xml because it allows discussing widely known concepts that are very general and have little to do with xml versus JSON.)

Or, if a candidate says to me, "why can't we use async-await" in a particular question, the candidate also misses the point of the question. (Hint, I'm trying to test knowledge of concepts that's easy to test when doing something without async=await.)

Interview questions are always contrived and end up as an "if you want to work here, you are going to do what I say" exercise. If a candidate can't work within the constraints of a short interview exercise, then what will happen when the constraints of the job come into play? We never get to use our favorite patterns and APIs all the time.




Wow, if I was in an interview where the interviewer was that closed-minded, I would definitely turn down an offer but I might just walk out. If they are unwilling to consider even discussing useful patterns in an interview, working there must be hell.




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