Leet

Ok, not gonna lie.. I’ve been feeling really frustrated lately, and I need to get this off my chest. As an interviewer at my company, I’ve always tried to keep things fair and focused on the actual work we do. But recently, that’s all changed. We’re a mid-tier company...not a big tech giant, but we’ve been seeing a huge influx of candidates. I understand we want to bring in top talent, but the way we’re doing it now feels wrong. Engineering Leadership has started pushing us to ask LeetCode hard problems. They literally told us "stuff with less than a 30% acceptance rate, and make sure it's not from a popular list". I wish I was joking. These problems don’t reflect the work we actually do here, but we’re being told to make them part of the interview process. I’m now expected to throw candidates into these complex problems with tight time limits (usually 30-35 minutes after initial discussions / small talk). There’s no time to really discuss their thought process, no room for collaboration, and no way to test the skills that actually matter for the role. It feels like the focus is all on whether they can solve these stupid ass hard problems rather than seeing if they can actually do the job. What’s really frustrating is that these interviews are filtering out good candidates. I’ve had candidates struggle through these algorithm problems, even though they would have been great fits for the role. But because they couldn’t get the solution to a random problem, we move on. It doesn’t matter if they have the right experience or the right mindset to be successful here. It feels like we’re no longer hiring for skills, but for the ability to solve tough, abstract problems under pressure. I’ve been interviewing for a while now, and I just don’t understand why we’re focusing so much on something that has nothing to do with the work people will actually be doing. The work we do here is practical. We deal with real systems, production code, and problems that require collaboration and tradeoffs. We don’t solve these kinds of algorithmic puzzles on the job. So why are we putting so much weight on these questions? I get it...companies want to stand out and find the best talent. But I’m starting to feel like we’re pushing away qualified candidates because they can’t solve these random problems. I’ve seen people bomb these LeetCode questions and walk away feeling defeated, even though they would’ve been great at the actual job. Is this the direction we’re headed in as an industry? Are we going to keep turning interviews into these algorithmic challenges that don’t even relate to the work? I’m starting to wonder if we’re losing sight of what actually matters. Has anyone else been in this position where you’re asked to make interviews harder, even though it’s not helping find the right candidates? How do you handle it when the questions don’t match what’s actually needed for the job? Thanks for listening to me vent.. I'm just fucking tired ya'll.