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Comment by biztos | Hacker News Reader

> You can however assess how smart somebody is

Are you saying the Leetcode-style interview assesses how smart someone is?

Not OP, and I don't think it directly indicates how smart you are, but it does show you are at or above some smartness threshold (i.e. smart enough to get the answer).

If you don't get the answer, you might still be above that smartness threshold, but didn't get it for some other reason (didn't have time to study, didn't sleep enough the night before, interview anxiety, etc.).

Yes, being able to understand and apply algorithms and data structures requires some intelligence.

I know we try to stay away from the “we’re smarter than you” vibe here because it’s gross, but pretending leetcode style questions don’t require some degree of complex thought is absurd.

You can memorize a lot of them and forget everything in a year.

If enough people are doing it higher iq folks will bubble up in calibration

Which at the end of the day still doesn't test that you can do the job.

Ok but it does tho - all other things being equal and you better believe it they do have other type of interviews not just lc

Ok, tell me what other types of interviews do they do other than system design, leetcode, and behaviorial for engineering?

Lol yeah apart from sanitation, the medicine, education, wine and public order what have the romans ever done to us? In your view that’s not enough to make an informed eng hire?

Exactly. If you have a candidate who can design good systems, solve complex algorithmic problems, and play nice with others, then I’d say that’s a pretty strong candidate.

Lol. So you can't give me any concrete examples. Got it.

Nothing tells me more about someone that is full of it than simply being dismissive of others. I ask for an example to support your argument, instead you chose to be defensive and give me attitude.

Personally, I need to practice leetcode style questions pretty regularly in order to perform reliably without reference materials. If more than a couple of months go by, the details of particular algorithms begin to fade.

I think it's unreasonable to expect people to spend their off time practicing these sorts of problems, in the same way we think it's unreasonable to require everyone interviewing to be working on personal development projects over the weekend. I suspect most working people simply do not have the time.

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