Details of our interview and assessment process is at the bottom of each job listing: https://www.level12.io/careers/
I clicked the first job listing and didn't find anything about the interview or assessment.
They do have a weird note about the company's "Biblical principles" though:
> Level 12 was founded on biblical principles and has biblically informed Values.
Can you please write out your process here instead of making us search for it on your website?
> We exist to serve our customers, our employees, our partners, and our community in a way that brings them genuine benefit, honors Jesus Christ, and advances the Kingdom of God.
Well, that's not what I expected from a software development website. And I can't speak for others, but this alone would be a reason I wouldn't even apply.
I don't hide my faith or the biblical foundations for my worldview, as my posts here on HN will show.
But, I can say I've received way more discriminatory remarks and hassle because I don't hide those views than I've ever given out. I've also had people express a lot of surprise at the fact that I'm in software and have such a worldview. I don't want anyone to be surprised by it so I let it be known. If people think it's inappropriate or decide they don't want to work with us because of it, I can't help their attitude. But I'm not the one being biased.
Yeah, thought the "12" might be a bit of that, but didn't want to assume.
See the bottom of: https://www.level12.io/about/
Honestly I thought this is just another Level N technology company.
Church IT is supprisingly complex these days. Apparently churches use all kinds of demographic and social media data to identify and contact people who are crisis and recruit them into their flock.
Pasted verbatim without taking time to format:
The Rest of the Process
Our application process is outlined roughly below.
But, before you get there, we want to apologize in advance if this process seems...imposing. We have put considerable thought and refinement into each one of these steps in an effort to make sure our hiring process is as well crafted as our software. And just like software, hiring is a lot more complex than it might seem on the surface. Our hiring process is far from perfect (like our software), we are still learning and tweaking, but we want to assure you that each of these steps gives us crucial information regarding you and your development abilities that is essential for helping us to determine if this is a good match.
Consider this: our entire process is less than a week's worth of effort to make sure that where you spend the next 1-5 years of your life is a good fit. Isn't that worth it? Keep in mind that we have deliberately structured our process so that the earlier stages require less effort. Our hope is that if you make it to the later stages of our process, where the time commitment increases, you will have had a chance to get to know us a bit better so you can decide if the time investment on your part is worth it. We care about your time (and ours) and do our best not to waste it! Application Steps
Evaluate resume and initial email correspondence
Technical skills questionnaire
Skills evaluation: 60-90 minute work simulation exercise
Zoom interview(s): 45-90 minutes in one or two interviews to get to know you & your technical abilities
Skills tests - phase I: three real-world programming challenges, no trick questions here (paid)
Skills tests - phase II: project-based skills test: we give you a small project description and you build the best app you can (paid)
Skills tests review interview: 2-3 hours on a Zoom meeting with our dev leadership team to get to know you and review your skills test results
Collaborative work day:
As close to a typical work day as we can get. We just want to see what it's like to work with each other.
We'll assign you work based on a previous real-world project we performed This is a sample project, we're not using candidates for free or cheap labor.
We will be available via Slack or Zoom throughout the day to talk through the work and assist you as needed.
If you are timing limiting candidates, your process is not evidence based and I question how serious you are about making efforts to mitigate or limit the effects of anxiety on applicants.
You can't give someone an unlimited amount of time to take an assessment and still expect to meaningfully be able to compare results. One person does a good job in 1 hour another person does a good job but it takes them 10 hours. Time limitations are a fact of life. Interviewees are only willing to give so much time to the application/hiring process and we have similar constraints. The time constraints are reasonable for the tasks given.
We are working to mitigate anxiety in our process, I don't think we can ever completely eliminate it.
Software development cycles are generally weeks in length for a reason: real software does not involve problems that can be done quickly in an hour.
You are using time limits to minimize your own work, not improve your hiring process. A short, time-limited technical problem is easy to evaluate. The candidate will have correctly solved the problem in the time allowed, and their code will be short and easy to examine for code style and pattern. However, while the signals that this process provides you will be clear and easy to compare between candidates, ultimately you are searching under the street lamp: the signals you receive are poorly correlated with candidates' actual acumen and value.
IME, this is generally done in order to push as many candidates through the pipeline as possible, in the intention of failing many decent candidates in order to avoid a 'bad hire'. However we have reams of evidence that this cynical and destructive approach does not have the outcome that people expect. It selects for people who are good at technical interviews, and against people for reasons other than their technical ability. It disproportionately selects for people coming from places of adversity.
You should really stop making personal insinuations. Have you actually done a significant amount of hiring? Can you suggest a better process that works in our current hiring context?
I don't disagree that the process we have developed is not ideal. Feel free to post a few of the best articles/resources you have from the "reams of evidence" you mention. But, just demonstrating that the process has problems isn't enough. Is anyone showing a better way that a small company with limited resources can actually execute on? Really, can you show us how to do it differently in a way that fits the practical realities of our current context?
The truth is, I'd absolutely love to work with someone for a month or two before making a hiring decision. But most good software developers already have a job. They aren't going to spend a couple months working with you to give it a shot. They also want a level of certainty that there is a good fit in the organization before they leave their current post.
And, on top of that, I already get flack b/c of how involved our process is. Lots of candidates don't want to put in that much time/effort. And with 10-20 places willing to hire them, I would assume a lot don't even take the time to apply. But I can't afford to have people on our team who can't perform at the level we need. And I hate firing people. So some kind of evaluation that fits all these parameters is necessary. Otherwise, no one gets hired and we eventually go out of business. Who does that serve?