Want To Work At Google? 458
ramboando writes "In an article on the ZDNet site 'chief culture officer' and HR boss Stacy Savides Sullivan describes the kind of traits that she's looking for in potential Google employees. If you're thinking about applying, she also goes over what kind of questions one might be asked in an interview, Google's 'happiness survey' and the best perks that makes employees tick and stay with the company (Google ski-trips or paid paternity leave, anyone?). 'I think one of the hardest things to do is ensure that we are hiring people who possess the kind of traits that we're looking for in a Google-y employee. Google-y is defined as somebody who is fairly flexible, adaptable and not focusing on titles and hierarchy, and just gets stuff done. So, we put a lot of focus in our hiring processes when we are interviewing to try to determine first and foremost does the person have the skill set and experience potential to do the job from a background standpoint in addition to academics and credentials.'"
Is this a job ad? (Score:5, Informative)
I had an interview with Google a few weeks ago (Score:5, Informative)
I had an interview with Google a few weeks ago. I didn't really know what I was getting into, as I applied just for fun.
After the initial emails and phone calls, I was contacted by a local Google employee (developer) for a detailed phone interview. He wanted to ask me "some technical questions" I was told.
Great, shouldn't be a problem? I got ready for C/C++/UNIX specific questions.
He called and we did some minor chit-chat before beginning the interview. But, to my surprise, here's what he asked:
The first question:
"Imagine you have two marbles and a 100-story building. You are told that the marbles will break if they are dropped from a certain floor. Figure out a way, as effectivly as possible, how high you can drop the marbles before they break. Remember, it could be the 1st floor, it could be the 99th."
Second question:
"Let's say you have a computer with 2M RAM. This computer has a hard drive (with lots of free space) and a 100M file which you should sort. Let me know how you, as effectivly as possible, sort the file."
Third question:
"We take the computer from the previous question and replace the hard drive with a network adapter. You have no local storage but the RAM. You will receive one million eight-digit phone numbers through a TCP stream which you shall sort in RAM. You are now allowed to send any data before all the numbers have been sorted. How would you solve this?"
Needless to say, the interview didn't go very well and ended with him saying "Well.. I've heard enough. Buh-bye."
Here's my inside scoop at a google interview (Score:5, Informative)
So... You really want to work there? Yes, you get lots of money, yes you get brainwashed it seems and rather arrogant after a while. Granted, this was one guy only, but letting him onto candidates which are not necessarily computer scientists. Hm... Needless to mention, Ihad a negative email the net day. Note that I did NOT apply for a job at google. One day I had an email from a HR person in mymailbox with the Subject "Hello from Google",and that's when this story started...
Re:I had an interview with Google a few weeks ago (Score:3, Informative)
Within the first 2 minutes of my phone interview, I was asked to solve a simple story problem that hinged on recognizing the use of a logarithm on a very large number. I told the interviewer the (correct) answer as an equation, and was immediately challenged with the most absurd question I've ever experienced in an interview: "so...how would you calculate that?"
I've never been asked to be a human calculator in an interview before, so it took a few seconds to realize that I was actually being quizzed on my ability to do math in my head. I don't know why, but apparently, Google thinks that the ability to quickly mentally calculate the log of a large number correlates with developer skill.
Needless to say, I didn't impress my interviewer. I got all of the questions right, but I think it took me about ten minutes longer than the Google-mandated time, and I made a few stupid (nervous) mistakes along the way. The call ended abruptly; I haven't heard back.
From what I can tell, Google is making the same arrogant mistakes that Microsoft made when they were king of the technical hill: thinking that brain teasers and puzzle smarts are the only kind that matter to a product developer. There's a certain amount of arrogance inherent to the process, given the silliness of the questions -- if Google is hiring thousands of people a year, you know damn well that not all of them are smart. So what are they selecting?
Re:"Fit Factor" (Score:1, Informative)
That's "fewer skills". Or, you could say "they end up hiring people that are less skilled".
seems I'm not alone (Score:4, Informative)
So why does it not work with people like me? Well very simple. I don't do job interviews. I get invited to discuss specific, custom job descriptions matching my CV & ambition level. We discuss the proposal and then I either accept it or not. I suspect it is like that for most people with a decent level of competence in our business. If you want to hire me, you will need to convince me that you are any good and that it is a substantial improvement over my current job.
If you are going to contact me about a job offer, it had better be specific & well aligned with my interests otherwise I'm not likely to be very enthusiastic about the whole thing. Also I prefer to not deal with HR other than discussing technical details on contracts. If you want to hire me, make sure I talk to the right person right away and don't waste my time with people not capable of telling me anything useful.
Both times I was approached by Google, the person in question hadn't read my CV (on my website); was not aware of my research career (likewise) and did not have a specific job in mind. On the contrary, the first time I talked with a Google HR person, the person projected a months long process with lots of interviews after which I should count myself lucky to be allowed an unspecified job at an unspecified location for an unspecified amount of money. Needless to say I politely declined because if they didn't have anything specific to talk about, our conversation was quite pointless & definitely over.
Re:I had an interview with Google a few weeks ago (Score:5, Informative)
Yup, on the phone. I have 22+ years of programming on my back, and I applied for a position named "system developer". If I knew they were looking for some search engine optimizing guru, I wouldn't even bother contacting them in the first place.
BTW - the second question there was a bit meaningless - how can you 'sort a 100MB file'? Do they want the file in byte order (..)
Ah, yes. Sorry, I thought that was obvious.
IIRC, the correct answers (according to Google) were:
1st question: Start on the 14th floor. If it breaks, start with the second marble on the 1st floor and increase until it breaks. If it doesn't, go to the 14+13th floor, then 14+13+12th, etc. That gives you a maximum of 14 attempts.
2nd question: Split the file into 2M segments on disk, sort them (for example with quicksort) then use mergesort to get everything back together.
3rd question: Sort everything in RAM using bit vectors.
If you disagree with the answers, contact Google.
Re:"Fit Factor" (Score:2, Informative)
But I sure wish I knew what the heck that meant.
Instead of wishing, you should email/call back and ask. I've been rejected for a job for similar reasons, but I emailed and asked for details why and what I could do to improve. The manager was impressed and hired me for a different but parallel position because I showed I cared, and that I could take constructive criticsm and wanted to improve myself.
If nothing else, it would give you peace of mind instead of wondering "what if" -- maybe the answer would confirm you wouldn't have wanted to work there anyways.
Google's bennies are not that great (Score:3, Informative)
The "Fit Factor" goes both ways. (Score:4, Informative)
I was recently interviewed by google. I had three technical interviews over the telephone, and for each of these interviews, I spoke with at least two google "recruiters" at each stage, and I would describe this process as extremely disorganized.
At one point, one of these technical interviews was canceled on a half hour notice. When I spoke to the technical interviewer the next week, there was no apology even though I had taken time off work (and I work contract, so that was money out of my pocket). I was positively astounded that any company could behave this way.
My questions about the process became a lot more pointed after this "debacle." I learned that problems with the relocation program were common, and in the end, I didn't trust these people to sell my property and move me, and the job wasn't the best fit anyway.
Some people may have great luck with google, but I would recommend that anyone look carefully before they leap. Despite my initial enthusiasm, they did not earn any special consideration from me.
Re:I had an interview with Google a few weeks ago (Score:1, Informative)
Take the square root of the number of floors, call it n, and throw the first marble from the floors that are multiples of n (in ascending order). When it breaks, use the second marble to work upwards one floor at a time starting from the highest floor from which you know it doesn't break.
I've taken some phone interviews with them and they just invited me to one of their european offices for more interviews. I think I'll soon be working with them. Wish me luck.