A good interviewer won’t be looking for a single solution to the problem. I’d expect them to entertain the Google Sheets answer - it’s good signal that the candidate will consider what already exists in the world. I’d rather extend the problem: the team is spending considerable time iterating with manual entry, what would you do?

▲

EthanHeilman 2 hours ago | parent [-]

Complete agreement. "Excellent answer, that is what I would do as well, now what if we wanted to build it in-house?"

▲

SteveNuts an hour ago | parent | next [-]

> "now what if we wanted to build it in-house?"

"Well I would probably go home and work on my resume because that's a fool's errand."

I hate going to work and reinventing wheels all day because the company I work for thinks it's so special that every business function needs a 100% tailored solution to solved problems. I much prefer working somewhere that's able to tailor business processes to conform to existing standards.

But maybe that's just me.

▲

maccard an hour ago | parent | next [-]

I’ve interviewed a few hundred people. Probably approaching a thousand, if not already. An interview is a scenario, and if you aren’t willing to engage in the scenario that we all agreed to partake in, that’s a huge warning sign that you’re going to be difficult later down the line. The point of the question is to have something remotely understandable for both sides to talk about, that’s it.

▲

Quarrelsome an hour ago | parent | next [-]

but also maybe its a green flag in that this employee might see the wood for the trees and save the company a lot of money later down the line. In my experience, a lot of engineers can waste a lot of time dicking around re-inventing wheels and whatnot.

While you consider it a huge warning sign, have you ever employed someone who would answer that way or are you assuming that you're not capable of making hiring mistakes? I can't help but think this "huge warning sign" might simply be a cognative bias where the interviewer is misdirecting their frustration in the poor design of their own process at the candidate [0].

For reference, I think both answers are fine and both perspectives (its a positive or a negative) are equally valid. Its just that I don't think we can confidently state either way.

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZ3ETK7-ZM8

	▲	rat9988 3 minutes ago \| parent \| next [-]
		if you answer ""Well I would probably go home and work on my resume because that's a fool's errand." You probably are missing the wood and the trees.
	▲	pibaker 6 minutes ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		I think you missed the point in GP's post. Not all organizations optimize for problem solving. Some organizations prefer subordinates who follow orders (or better, is able to read the mind of the boss to decipher what order he is actually making) than those who breaks out of the box and says ”just use gsuite, boss."

▲

AntiDyatlov 28 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

I think the contrived scenarios you come up with need to not have a trivial solution. Everything about my brain is optimized for KISS, it breaks everything to turn down simple solutions to reach for something more complex.

▲

Tepix an hour ago | parent | prev [-]

Setup Etherpad

▲

9rx 23 minutes ago | parent | prev [-]

"That does sound like something nice to have. However, recreating Google Sheets is a substantial undertaking. First, we need to evaluate the business case for duplicating something that already exists to ensure that there is a net benefit in doing so. Second, we need to determine if the business has sufficient capital to see the project through."

	▲	rat9988 2 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		There is a difference between being smart and acting smart.