> they often give a very good and reasonable signal that often has a high corollary to work performance
Do you have any statistically significant data to back this claim?
Do you have any statistically significant data to back this claim?
That whiteboard interviews are actually testing how you perform under stress rather than how good you are at your job.
Additionally, in my opinion, it measures how good the interviewer is. If you get a bad interviewer or even just one in a bad mood, just pack your bags because you aren't getting it.
Whiteboards are incredibly arbitrary in my opinion, if taken alone. If it is part of a complete assessment, ehhhh.
Interesting study and really good discussion on HN at the time, but the opposite of "[Whiteboard interviews] often give a very good and reasonable signal that often has a high corollary to work performance" would be something like "People who do well at whiteboard interviews tend to be worse performers at work." I don't think that's what the study said at all; rather that people do worse at whiteboard problems when they're being watched vs. not being watched.
Not. All. Anxiety. Is. The. Same.
Ask a firefighter to give a speech in front of 1000 people. This is an entirely different kind of anxiety than running into a burning building. Ironically, it may be the former rather than the latter that makes the firefighter sweat.
Writing code is generally not a performance art. We're not stage performers. Interviews are an unusual situation that aren't anything like our daily jobs. Stress on the job is not the same as interview stress. Work emergencies are not the same as interviews.
We need to take into account human psychology. These factors are all well known, but the tech industry seems to act in deliberate ignorance of humanity.
One you are getting paid no matter what, the other you aren't and are 'performing' in the hopes of getting paid.
Assuming the study’s results are valid, that’s really all the justification we need to get rid of these tests.