[Chicago] Sanity Check

[Peter Fein]

Hiya-

Need to sanity check with a broader group... I've had a few phone 
interviews lately, which have been followed by demands for programming 
tests. I am THIS CLOSE: || to telling the next company that asks to 
shove off.

The actual content of the tests has ranged from the trivially easy to 
straightforward but annoyingly difficult. The former at best indicate 
whether I'm totally lying about knowing the language at all. Most of the 
later have been ripped straight from Code Golf or a sophomore algorithms 
textbook. In no case has the test had anything discernible to do with 
the actual job. Being a person of integrity, I don't just go look up the 
answers.

I'm particularly ticked off because:

* I have ample open source code, which I've pointed people to. In fact, 
one company got in touch with me because THEY LIKED MY OSS CODE, then 
demanded I do a coding test anyway.
* Some of the companies are startups, which have explicitly prided 
themselves on their low-bureaucracy/bullshit factor. Hypocrites.

I've been coding in Python for eight bloody years already. Marketers 
don't take marketing tests, do they?

Should I tell them to bugger off? Am I on crack?

--Pete

PS - I have a blog post on this and other frustrations titled: "IT 
Hiring: You're Doing it Wrong (or) The Author Sinks His Career Prospects 
for Fun and No Profit"