[humfrz]

Originally Posted by Dadhawk

I'm not a fan of these type of practical tests, particularly if they are done under an unreasonable time constraint or, worse, done live with people watching. Most people, particularly coders, don't work that way.

Well, unless you are on some CSI/NCIS type show on TV where you can stop massive attacks or hack into an government system with a few dozen key strokes.

I started off my career as a programmer. My second job I wrote a series of quasi-stand alone software packages for the hospital industry that sold relatively well for my company. The fact that I could prove my skills just on my resume should be good enough.

(Well, not now, I haven't written a full program in 15 years or more, and most of it was in languages that are no longer in vogue, not that matters, a programmer is a programmer, give them a reference book and they can figure it out).

If hiring Level 1, the person probably can't do this stuff under pressure because they are new outside academia. If they are a higher level, then their resume and references should tell you if they are good enough. Make them talk at a higher level about the code they've written, the bug that it took them the longest to squish, that type of thing and you can get a good feel for them.

Even now, where I'm hiring network engineers, data center system engineers, end user support techs, and service desk techs, I have my team spend less than 25% of the interview on technical knowledge and 75% on cultural fit, professional background and "conversation".