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Comment by pnathan | Hacker News Reader

> There is no room in the Amazon interview process to "try out" a candidate for a week or two in a real world setting to see how they perform.

When looking for work, I have no room for companies that want to do this: I already have a job and commitments. Also, I might not even be in the same state as the company I am talking to.

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This is such a popular and I think corrosive meme that I think it's a service to the community when people pipe up and point out the obvious, which is that many/most people can't even afford to do try-outs, let alone be happy about the idea. Thanks!

How is trying out a practical for anything other than unemployed new grads? I see this constantly suggested but I don't know a single person who would even consider quitting or taking vacation time to go work for a prospective company.

Although this would work for people who are unemployed. I took a 3 months contract position, and I was hired full time after 1 year. It's been 2.5 years and I'm still at the company.

Depends a lot on the person. If somebody has done consulting or contract work, it's a pretty natural thing. I've done it both as an employee and an employer.

The only way I'd consider doing this is taking vacation if I'm being paid a rate that is significantly higher than my current rate.

Otherwise, just ask for a coded solution to some specific problem or user story and I'll work on it after hours and send it in.

I barely even have time for the 3-6 technical interviews most companies want to do, let alone multiple days/WEEKS of "try out" period.

I think the comment is just being misunderstood, but Amazon (at least AWS), doesn't do any try before you buy type stuff. It is usually an hour long initial phone screen, than an all day long 7 hour interview with multiple people over the course of a single day in Seattle.

I used to live about 8 hours drive from where I'm currently working (rural australia to Sydney). When they found out where I was, they arranged the normal 4 interviews to be arranged back to back rather than spread out over a few days.

Just the fact they were willing to do that meant a lot for me (because no one else had ever bothered how inconvenient it was for me to do interviews).

Still here 3 years later and the attitude shown during the interview process extended right through the company.

Although there are definitely logistical problems with this approach, I've had a couple of jobs now where I wish I would have been able to "try it out" for a couple of weeks. Having done so, I never would have accepted the offer (saving me a lot of frustration and a couple of large relocations).

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