Re^2: Stop with the interview questions already

I think for a homework question, "This is a homework question, and I'm totally stuck" would be a perfectly good way to preface a question that would almost always get someone a useful answer here.

I don't think the preface "This is a job interview question, and I'm totally stuck" would get treated the same way without a much more detailed explanation. So, I think it's worth distinguishing the two, and responding differently.

And, in general, while not answering is an option, and sometimes an effective one, very few questions go unanswered here. I have seen a lot of these questions treated as if they were homework questions (a bit of snark, a pointer to the documentation, almost always ultimately followed by a fairly comprehensive right answer), and I think there are reasons that could be harmful when it's actually an interview question.

Comment on Re^2: Stop with the interview questions already

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re^3: Stop with the interview questions already by ig (Vicar) on Aug 31, 2009 at 20:02 UTC
While I appreciate your concern, I suspect the risk of harm is quite small - perhaps small enough that we don't need to worry. Providing answers to an interviewee during an interview might be harmful but it is easy for the interviewer to prevent this happening if effective use of Internet resources is not part of the intended assessment. Reasonably, it is the responsibility of the interviewer to set the conditions of the interview, including whether access to the Internet, the manuals or any other resources is allowed. I don't know that it helps for me to make assumptions about the intended process or to try to impose my preferences for assessment on others. There might be some people who are promoted to a position where they are responsible for interviewing and assessing others yet they are not reasonably competent to do so. There are certainly some who I don't agree with. But perhaps my limited success in life indicates that I'm not the best just judge and the relative success of some others might suggest that there are other ways than mine that are better than mine. My not answering questions related to interviews will do very little to solve such problems.	[reply]
Re^4: Stop with the interview questions already by Gavin (Archbishop) on Aug 31, 2009 at 20:27 UTC
"There might be some people who are promoted to a position where they are responsible for interviewing and assessing others yet they are not reasonably competent to do so." Therein lies the problem. People in positions of power ill equipped for the demands that those positions put them in. We see it every day in Politicians and Bankers to name just two.	[reply]
Re^5: Stop with the interview questions already by ig (Vicar) on Aug 31, 2009 at 20:40 UTC
It may be out of vogue now, but The Peter Principle was once a popular book on this topic.	[reply]