Today is the first day in my career at Vecna that I get to give an interview.
I have given interviews in the past, hiring for my earlier companies, ByME (all technical employees) and Illume (the sole other engineer). But I have never done anything in this respect here at Vecna. I view this as a great opportunity to further my skill set as a leader, innovator, and a resource for myself and my employer. I have given great thought on questions I will ask and things I want to carry out in getting to know the people that I will talk with. I have to conclude that, considering they are MIT undergrads, I can put a solid foothold on the fact that they will have basic understanding of OOP (Object Oriented Programming) and it’s patterns. However, I can NOT necessarily say that these people will make good coworkers in our environment.
Who doesn’t want to work with someone who they enjoy talking to, someone who they would like to bounce an idea off (work related or otherwise) and see what comes back. Some of my favorite people with whom I have had the pleasure to work with are not just brilliant minds in software engineering but also; moonlighting at a homebrew emporium, an avid small skit actor, a car enthusiast, and a lover of all things scotch. These people peek interests that I, at one point or another, have interested in or admire.
I want to give off perception of respect and openness to the person so they will feel that they can truly share what they love in their life.
There is much that The College of St. Scholastica taught me but the thing I value above any lessons taught by my teachers is that of the Computer Club. I learned how to lead, to be a well-rounded person, to have fun. This is very important and I think a lot of the technical world forgets how to do it some time. If you get the chance to bring some fun into your workplace in some form DO IT!