On 1/3/2008 9:17 AM, Gregory K. Ruiz-Ade wrote:
On Jan 3, 2008, at 8:48 AM, Karl Cunningham wrote:
We give a written test to all applicants, and say so on the job
advertisement. The test has about 20 job-related questions, with
several requiring some basic math to solve. The time it takes the
applicant to complete the test is recorded. If they pass the first
test they are given a second, more difficult test. The ones with the
best scores on both are given an interview.
We figure this puts every applicant on an equal footing and since we
only ask technical, job-related questions it reduces the chance of
discrimination. Somewhere around 90% of applicants are weeded out at
this step so it covers most of the potential discrimination problems.
While coming up with those written tests can be a very difficult and
tedious task in and of itself, it really does ensure that the person
you're interviewing hasn't simply bullshitted his or her way into the
interview chair.
The fact that the tests are a requirement to _get_ an interview interest
me greatly; that would likely have saved me a lot of time (and
frustration) when I was trying to hire another sysadmin back at my last
job. There, though, the test was given as part of the interview, so
even if they bombed the test, you still had to go through the face-to-face.
I had a very good tech later tell me that he chose to apply with us
_because_ he knew he would be tested and thought we might be more likely
to ignore his long hair. We didn't care about his hair anyway, and it
turned out he was a great worker and stayed quite a few years.
Karl
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