Poll: Do you interview 1 on 1 or `N` on 1? | Hacker News Reader

Poll: Do you interview 1 on 1 or `N` on 1?

8 pointsdavidu11 comments

What interview process produces the maximum outcome of best candidates, best questions, and best use of time? Why?<p>Do you do 1 on 1? 2 on 1? 3 on 1?

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We generally have a series of 1 on 1s, each interviewer with a different discipline with a little bit of overlap. This way it's more of a conversation rather than someone being grilled on stage.

Some may prefer the N on 1, but for me I see that I can get a lot more out of people just by myself. People are more relaxed, and I can get a feel for who I'll be working with, not just the person that showed up in the interview.

After all of the 1 on 1s, we'll sit in a room and talk about what we learned and how we felt. Everyone gives a gut-reaction rating and go from there. It takes more time and resources, but for us our hire-quality is... well... higher.

At OpenDNS, especially for engineering hires, we almost always do 2 on 1 or 3 on 1. I try never to let it get above 3 on 1 unless it's a second or closing interview.

Do you have 2 or 3 managers per employee?

One on one, with several different "ones" from our side, sequentially, then a small group, usually 4, including the candidate, who we don't think of as "3 on 1".

How is it that not 3 on 1?

Because we get together and solve a design/implementation problem and hack around the issues. It's as close to a real issue as we can get, and the objective is to get the candidate to lose himself/herself in solving the problem with us. If they can then we get a good feel for how they work and communicate, if they can't then we put it down to interview stress.

My work can be pretty stressful anyway, though, so it gives us an indication either way. If someone gets to that stage we are looking for reasons to hire them, and no longer looking for reasons to exclude them.

n on 1 is a waste of resources. If you do 1 on 1, you can get into a much deeper line of questioning, because you can weave a thread of conversation lead by one person. You can then serialize the process to n - 1 others.

Can you explain your last sentence? I don't understand how you serialize a process into a 0 on 1 interview. (Or is it a 1 on 0?)

I have always seen 2 on 1 or 3 on 1, that way noone is bias.

agreed. Often times folks will "hear" an answer differently, so it's good to have multiple sets of ears, imho.

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