While I understand your logic, I can absolutely assure you that, although I am a very inclusive employer, if I received that letter from you, your résumé would go straight in the round file. I also know for a fact that many good employers would respond the same way.
Allow me to explain why.
Contributing to open source is an excellent benchmark, and there are, I think, many scenarios where that indeed COULD replace a coding challenge, especially a fizz-buzz! I already look at the GitHub profiles of any potential candidate.
However, the decision to still assign a coding challenge depends entirely on the interviewer's discernment, and for good reason:
1) A good coding challenge is designed to focus on specific technical and logical skills, not just "can you code". I'm not talking about a fizz-buzz here. We're not choosing any random puzzle here. A good hiring manager is going to deliberately select one.
2) The solutions and possible obstacles in a coding challenge are well known to the interviewer. This is extremely important in our evaluating the important points in (1). We don't know anything about your project, and we'd have to spend many hours we don't have in attempting to extract the same information from your GitHub. (We probably have less time to spare than you; we're usually interviewing many candidates.) In my case, I can directly compare the results of previous successful applicant's coding challenges to the ones I get from the new candidate; that has proven to be a surprisingly useful metric, when taken in concert with several other points.
3) If a candidate can't bother to put in extra effort at the late stage of the interview process, when they're still trying to impress, I doubt they'll put in the extra effort where it counts on the job, when they've already shed their "Great Candidate" act. For me at least, half the point of the coding challenge is in watching for qualities that have nothing to do with technical skill!
4) I'd also be concerned whether such a candidate could follow instructions as an employee. I've known wayyyy too many mavericks who, instead of respectfully discussing their points of concern with their employer, just decide to dig their heels in.
Besides all that...
Coding assignments are a thing of the past and in most cases they don’t prove much, as they are quite generic and most of them lack innovation.
That's a bit generic. The coding challenges I use, and the ones used by many fellow hiring managers whom I respect, actually tell us quite a lot. You won't even find the solution to mine online!
I won't deny that there are many coding challenges which are too generic to be useful, but that doesn't invalidate good ones. That would be like saying "Web servers don't really serve a purpose, since they crash all the time," based on seeing a few that crashed, and having little experience with an IT setup that worked. Don't confuse your perception with reality.
P.S. I once interviewed with a company that had you present something you'd created, rather than do a coding challenge, and then they'd grill you on it. It took me four hours to prepare for that, and was far more nerve-wracking than a coding challenge. Given the technical nature of the position, that made sense...but be careful what you wish for! That approach is harder to complete than a coding challenge.
Hey, thanks for taking the time to write such an elaborate response. What I can tell you from the start is that the company has presumably agreed that their assignment wasn't needed as they have invited me to an on-site interview - I didn't go, but that's another aspect.
I understand your points and I can tell you I don't find your views surprising. I can speak from my experience from interviewing in several different jobs across Europe. I have completed coding assignments for all kinds of companies and organisations in countries like Romania, Cyprus, Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Norway, UK, Australia, Switzerland. They're always dull and inconclusive time wasters. I even interviewed at CERN and their coding assignment (JavaScript and Python) was very generic, easy and dull.
I've only suggested to make this coding assignments useful for the Open Source community. They could be like small issues to solve on GitHub and maintainers could submit them on a platform like CoderPad where companies could pick them up from.
And I reject this whole "we probably have less time to spare than you", as a business. My own time is just as important as theirs. Maybe even more important because when I am interviewing I will probably have lined-up several interviews and coding assignments and it won't help anybody if I am going through a living hell.
I also reject this idea that you need to have a specific set of skills and your assignment should look for those skills. This would only be valid if you are looking to hire an expert consultant on a 3 month project and you need them to have those specific skills. You all other cases, you would hire people who have a good track record of proven experience and ability to learn and adapt. It helps of course if they have the skills that you need and they can be productive right away, but this is not that important if you're looking to build a team that would stay together for a few years to come.
While I understand your logic, I can absolutely assure you that, although I am a very inclusive employer, if I received that letter from you, your résumé would go straight in the round file. I also know for a fact that many good employers would respond the same way.
Allow me to explain why.
Contributing to open source is an excellent benchmark, and there are, I think, many scenarios where that indeed COULD replace a coding challenge, especially a fizz-buzz! I already look at the GitHub profiles of any potential candidate.
However, the decision to still assign a coding challenge depends entirely on the interviewer's discernment, and for good reason:
1) A good coding challenge is designed to focus on specific technical and logical skills, not just "can you code". I'm not talking about a fizz-buzz here. We're not choosing any random puzzle here. A good hiring manager is going to deliberately select one.
2) The solutions and possible obstacles in a coding challenge are well known to the interviewer. This is extremely important in our evaluating the important points in (1). We don't know anything about your project, and we'd have to spend many hours we don't have in attempting to extract the same information from your GitHub. (We probably have less time to spare than you; we're usually interviewing many candidates.) In my case, I can directly compare the results of previous successful applicant's coding challenges to the ones I get from the new candidate; that has proven to be a surprisingly useful metric, when taken in concert with several other points.
3) If a candidate can't bother to put in extra effort at the late stage of the interview process, when they're still trying to impress, I doubt they'll put in the extra effort where it counts on the job, when they've already shed their "Great Candidate" act. For me at least, half the point of the coding challenge is in watching for qualities that have nothing to do with technical skill!
4) I'd also be concerned whether such a candidate could follow instructions as an employee. I've known wayyyy too many mavericks who, instead of respectfully discussing their points of concern with their employer, just decide to dig their heels in.
Besides all that...
That's a bit generic. The coding challenges I use, and the ones used by many fellow hiring managers whom I respect, actually tell us quite a lot. You won't even find the solution to mine online!
I won't deny that there are many coding challenges which are too generic to be useful, but that doesn't invalidate good ones. That would be like saying "Web servers don't really serve a purpose, since they crash all the time," based on seeing a few that crashed, and having little experience with an IT setup that worked. Don't confuse your perception with reality.
P.S. I once interviewed with a company that had you present something you'd created, rather than do a coding challenge, and then they'd grill you on it. It took me four hours to prepare for that, and was far more nerve-wracking than a coding challenge. Given the technical nature of the position, that made sense...but be careful what you wish for! That approach is harder to complete than a coding challenge.
Hey, thanks for taking the time to write such an elaborate response. What I can tell you from the start is that the company has presumably agreed that their assignment wasn't needed as they have invited me to an on-site interview - I didn't go, but that's another aspect.
I understand your points and I can tell you I don't find your views surprising. I can speak from my experience from interviewing in several different jobs across Europe. I have completed coding assignments for all kinds of companies and organisations in countries like Romania, Cyprus, Netherlands, Germany, Sweden, Norway, UK, Australia, Switzerland. They're always dull and inconclusive time wasters. I even interviewed at CERN and their coding assignment (JavaScript and Python) was very generic, easy and dull.
I've only suggested to make this coding assignments useful for the Open Source community. They could be like small issues to solve on GitHub and maintainers could submit them on a platform like CoderPad where companies could pick them up from.
And I reject this whole "we probably have less time to spare than you", as a business. My own time is just as important as theirs. Maybe even more important because when I am interviewing I will probably have lined-up several interviews and coding assignments and it won't help anybody if I am going through a living hell.
I also reject this idea that you need to have a specific set of skills and your assignment should look for those skills. This would only be valid if you are looking to hire an expert consultant on a 3 month project and you need them to have those specific skills. You all other cases, you would hire people who have a good track record of proven experience and ability to learn and adapt. It helps of course if they have the skills that you need and they can be productive right away, but this is not that important if you're looking to build a team that would stay together for a few years to come.
Well, you are naturally entitled to your opinion. It is a different story when you've actually done extensive hiring.