Writing

Our articles and podcast episodes on software engineering, management and collaboration.

Interviewer Skills Part 2/??: How to create interview questions

This is Part 2 of a multi-part series covering some of the topics introduced in our RailsConf 2018 Interviewer Skills workshop. Part 1 covered how to know what would make a candidate the right addition to your team, and why single-word descriptio...

Interviewer Skills Part 1/??: Why set specific goals

This is Part 1 of a multi-part series covering some of the topics introduced in our RailsConf 2018 Interviewer Skills workshop. You’re hiring - yay! How would you describe what kind of person would be an ideal candidate to hire? Beyond experie...

Return from RailsConf + Interviewer Skills Part 0/??: Intro

We’re back from speaking at RailsConf, and what an incredible experience! The conference organizers did a fantastic job at running a smooth event despite never-relenting weather challenges. We were constantly learning from our fellow speakers, and...

Twenty minutes

Recently I was chatting with a friend, and the topic turned to my upcoming workshop on Interviewer Skills at RailsConf. My friend’s not in software, but is in a technical field: she’s an engineer! a real engineer! as in buildings and bridges and s...

Tell me about a time when...

Here’s a question I got recently: “Doesn’t it work to ask a candidate what they would do? couldn’t I present a situation to them and ask what they would do?” My first impulse was to jump into an answer about behavioral interviewing, and explain h...