Andreessen Horowitz is relatively cool

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7735251

by jqm • 12 years ago

24 20 12 years ago

news.ycombinator.com

A bit of background... I'm a self taught programmer who is not a start-up guy nor interested in the VC world. I write web apps for companies, manage some small databases and some servers. I know a bit about a lot of things but sometimes don't know exactly what I know and what I don't.

So... a few weeks ago Andreessen Horowitz posted a programming test looking for applications. I took it but didn't submit a resume. When they contacted me telling me I wasn't what they were looking for (no surprise...I didn't send a resume) I asked to see how I did on the test. They actually emailed me back telling me how I did (it wasn't as well as I had hoped but was ok for me I suppose). Not only that they gave me specific areas I should improve on, as well as those I did well on. They certainly didn't have much to gain from responding. This is pretty cool behavior on the part of Andreesson Horowitz.

cessor• 12 years ago

Getting feedback on an application would be really valuable. My girlfriend got rejected by an acting college in London just last week - they didn't tell her why or how she could improve. She was really disappointed. Everytime I had an interview and was rejected I was told the reason why and got a suggestion where to improve. Some people actually told me to go look somewhere else and mentioned places, companies and people where I could offer my services instead. I value this kind of feedback in general, even though I have no idea who these Andreessen people are.

loumf• 12 years ago

It's rough because it opens the company up to lawsuits. It's easier for HR/Management to say "Don't give any feedback" than to give proper training and oversight. You are much more likely to get the feedback from a principal of the business who accepts the responsibility.

If you are just totally unqualified, that's easier feedback to give. When it's a near miss and gets subjective, it's extremely hard to verbalize/express what the mismatch is.

One thing to do is to see if people are willing to give you mock interviews where there is no job or corporation involved -- do this for the express purpose of getting feedback. I have offered this to many entry-level programmers I have met who ask for advice on interviewing.

jqm4• 12 years ago

There's an app idea somebody...

Simulated interviews. Help companies refine their hiring process and (maybe) find a person they would not have otherwise. And help employees keep their interview skills up to date and have a better picture of how they are viewed by employers...

kordless• 12 years ago

I agree with this. It's an unfortunate thing we put a price on the legal burden that seems to occur time and time again to companies. We start practicing productive paranoia but forget the opportunity cost of doing so.

tptacek• 12 years ago

When people ask, we do our best (which is often not great) to give reasons.

It's an article of faith among HR people and, apparently, employment lawyers that explaining decisions to candidates exposes you to legal risk. There seem to be two broad reasons why:

1. A disgruntled candidate alleging discrimination could litigate the conclusions in the rejection letter, by generating a convincing amount of evidence that (a) you're wrong about the specific points you raise and (b) you didn't expend a good-faith effort to reach your conclusion, which is really a proxy for a discriminatory rejection.

2. That same disgruntled candidate, again alleging discrimination, could compel you to produce the applications for candidates that fared better, and then litigate the distinctions between the candidate; "you rejected me because I only have 1 year of Java, but then hired such-and-such who only has 3 months of it".

To that, several responses:

* A lot of other things that are de rigueur for hiring processes, such as "we'll keep your resume on file", can create other legal exposures --- some of them possibly for things other than discrimination, such as a perceived binding promise to alert the candidate to future openings.

* Presumably, an aggressive lawyer can compel production of competing applications no matter what the rejection letter says. The kind of person who interviews innocuously, gets rejected, and sues for discrimination is very likely to have an aggressive lawyer.

* Sadly, most of the protected classes which are most exposed in the interview process (disfavored race, gender) are not well represented in the candidate pool, and other protected classes (religion, say) don't tend to come up in sane interviews; you may be reasonably well shielded from discrimination claims for most candidates.

* Your lawyer (you're at the point where you're hiring, so you have one, of course) can probably up-armor your rejection letters to blunt the concerns about contractual reliance and comparative evaluation of offers.

To my mind, the bigger reason not to give detailed rejections is that candidates will litigate them informally with you. We're all nerds. Nothing bothers a nerd more than hearing someone else say something wrong. A lot of the time, if you reject a nerd, they're going to assume you're wrong. About them. Angry nerd -> unpleasant conversation -> Twitter rage storm.

amorphid• 12 years ago

Recruiter turned developer here.

Here's a few reasons it's difficult to give rejected candidates feedback:

* the application isn't competitive, and there's no good way to say "you're in the bottom half of the applicant pool"

* the reason for rejection is personal in nature, and there's no great way to say "we didn't like the Facebook photos of you launching bottle rockets from your backside"

* the candidate clearly isn't a fit, but it's hard to describe why

* many unqualified candidates try to overcome rejection, and it just gets awkward

* communicating reasons of rejection to some candidates and not others feels unfair

* there are simply too many applicants to reject, so a personal reason for each one simply isn't practical

qq66• 12 years ago

Sometimes that feedback is impossible to give though. If I was a judge in a chocolate cookie competition, I might really like all of the entries. But I'd pick my favorite. What would I tell the other bakers? I really enjoyed their cookies and I don't know enough about baking to give advice on improvement.

ohashi• 12 years ago

Is there a link to the test?

jqm4• 12 years ago

https://www.hackerrank.com/tests/530697662bd88

It's closed. You can still take the test but they won't review it. I did like the format.

rmmw• 12 years ago

Thanks for the shoutout :)

Andreessen Horowitz is relatively cool

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