The Key To Interviewing At Google

Nerval's Lobster writes Wired has an excerpt from a new book of Google-centric workplace advice, written by Laszlo Bock, the search-engine giant's head of "People Operations" (re: Human Resources). In an interesting twist, Bock kicks off the excerpt by describing the brainteaser questions that Google is famous for tossing at job candidates as "useless," before suggesting that some hiring managers at the company might still use them. ("Sorry about that," he offered.) Rather than ask candidates to calculate the number of golf balls that can fit inside a 747 (or why manhole covers are round), Google now runs its candidates through a battery of work-sample tests and structured interviews, which its own research and data-crunching suggest is best at finding the most successful candidates. Google also relies on a tool (known as qDroid), which automates some of the process—the interviewer can simply input which job the candidate is interviewing for, and receive a guide with optimized interview questions. It was only a matter of time before people got sick of questions like, "Why are manhole covers round?"

Comments

Drink the kool aide

[Spazmania]

The key to interviewing at Google is to drink the kool aide before you arrive. Download and use the core software they make available. If you're not enthusiastic enough about their tool chain to do that, mere competence won't carry you over the finish line.

Most companies couldn't get away with that but Google is Google. At least for now.

The only way to win at Google?

[bobbied]

Is not to play.. .

When they start to reduce the process of interviewing down to a standardized series of questions and tests, they remove the human from the process too. Who wants to work for a company that isn't about HUMAN interaction first, that isn't willing to treat their employees less like interchangeable cogs and more like unique individuals.

This is the end of innovation and uniqueness for Google, or at least a sign that it's falling out of favor. This is the MBA mindset of trying to remove the variables in the process, standardize on some ill fitting solution in an attempt to be efficient. This means that they won't get innovation because failure is becoming something to avoid, taking risks leads to mistakes that cost money and time. When this becomes the prevailing attitude at a company, that company then becomes risk adverse and innovation slows down.

The problem here is Google is nothing but a search engine and software development house if it doesn't continue to innovate. It will die like Yahoo, AOL and all the others if it doesn't stop this.