Job Opportunity: Box Services hiring a full-time Cocoa User
Interface Developer, New York City
Michael Latta
lattam at mac.com
Fri Mar 21 16:26:04 PDT 2008
So far all I have heard about Box is that they are better than average
in creating a hard interview. More power to them on that. I have
found very few willing and able to do technical interviews that are
truly going to test the candidate. The hardest case was a company
that used an old NCR programmer aptitude test (programmer oriented IQ
test really). What made it work for them was they had stats for all
employees and found a strong correlation between the test results and
performance. But, that was a grueling 3 hours.
Jason seems to have no axe to grind, and his description of the
process was far more enlightening.
The original and second rant by Mike were far more emotional with less
detail, and some overly general bias showing.
Just as with any interaction in business every party is out to get
what they want out of the process. Box may just be very very
demanding. Or, they could pump the unsuspecting candidate. I doubt
however this second method would work all that well, since they would
need to have enough understanding to both pose the question and
understand the answer. Google and presence on dev lists would be far
more effective, especially for phone interviews (the original case).
It could be an issue that an interview crosses the line from testing
competence to consulting, but it is up to the candidate at the time to
assert that line. Otherwise, it does not exist. I have seen whole
proposals taken from one submitter and given to another for cheaper
implementation. I would not call that ethical, but it certainly
happens, and short of an Apple quality NDA I would be cautious about
how much I offered to any prospective client before a contract.
Michael
On Mar 21, 2008, at 4:00 PM, J. Todd Slack wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I was going to let sleeping dogs lay, but I was phoned by Box twice
> for a position that I applied for when I lived in NY and I must
> agree that their interview questions are very out of the ordinary.
>
> They are not typical questions about programming fundamentals,
> sorting, optimization, etc common things a programmer gets. These
> questions were deep into Open-GL, GUI Toolkit type questions for
> multiple platforms, etc.
>
> Needless to say I did not get the job either......and I answered
> their questions and ran through possible scenarios of when to use
> what.....
>
> *sigh*
>
> So I moved to California....
>
> Jason
>
> On Mar 21, 2008, at 2:41 PM, Mason Browne wrote:
>
>> But the drama! It's so exciting...
>>
>> I was pleased to see Mike back up his previous accusation. Whether
>> this is the right place for such conversation... could be argued.
>> If it's considered acceptable practice to drop job openings on the
>> list, it should be acceptable for those with "special knowledge" to
>> share their thoughts. If Box truly is as Mike describes them, then
>> he's doing a great service by protecting his fellow Apple
>> developers. If Mike is wrong, then Box can take it up with him
>> through legal action, and we'll have all been reminded that places
>> like this do exist, and we would be wise enough to be wary of them.
>>
>> If nothing else, it's fun to see a heated discussion during an
>> otherwise monotonous week. =)
>>
>> He'p da peeps!
>>
>> Mase
>>
>> On Mar 21, 2008, at 2:48 PM, Eric Peyton wrote:
>>
>>> This is absolutely not the correct place for a diatribe like
>>> this. You have made your points (more than clearly) and Marc has
>>> made his points as well. Now it is up to those who want to follow
>>> up with Box Services to take your points into consideration (if
>>> they deem them worthwhile).
>>>
>>> Now please - take this off the list.
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> Eric
>>>
>>> On Mar 21, 2008, at 3:43 PM, Mike wrote:
>>>> All the spin in the world will not change facts.
>>>>
>>>> My TWO phone interviews were in Oct. 2006 so that was after you
>>>> became manager. After the second "interview" it became clear to
>>>> me that your company has no interest in hiring a seasoned 16+
>>>> year Mac veteran and author of 18 successful commercial Mac
>>>> products. If those qualifications are not good enough, then your
>>>> goal is obviously something other than hiring the best.
>>>>
>>>> The fact is, like so many companies today, you run a cheap
>>>> imported labor sweat shop and when your cheap, inexperienced,
>>>> third-world programmers can't do the job, you "interview" people
>>>> like me to get the knowledge you need to give to your people who
>>>> can't otherwise do the work. Your compatriot, Tenzen Wild
>>>> informed me the two "programmers" the candidate would be working
>>>> with where imported from China with little experience.
>>>>
>>>> Any company which conducts exploitative interviews is committing
>>>> fraud and fraud is a criminal act. Criminal and "legitimate" do
>>>> not go together.
>>>>
>>>> You claim to have hired "4 full-time Mac developers". Will you
>>>> please tell the list their names, nationalities, and how we can
>>>> contact them? Put your money where your mouth is and prove it to
>>>> us. I am willing to wager $1000 that at least 3 of them are
>>>> imported cheap-labor foreign nationals. Do you have the guts to
>>>> accept a $1000 bet? In fact, I have notified DHS, ICE, BCIS and
>>>> the FBI that you are conducting visa fraud because you are
>>>> pretending to hire Americans, when in fact you are doin the
>>>> opposite. Do you think we are all stupid?
>>>>
>>>> I see that you yourself are from Belgium. One can hardly imagine
>>>> a more America-hating socialist European nation than that.
>>>>
>>>> I don't doubt your work has been on the covers of major fashion
>>>> magazines - it's not surprising given the corrupt nature of the
>>>> fashion industry. Just because you are successful does not mean
>>>> you are honest.
>>>>
>>>> I would warn all serious American Mac developers to stay as far
>>>> away from Box as possible because they have no intention of
>>>> hiring you. They only want to gain your knowledge for free and
>>>> give it to their cheap imported programmers who are incompetent.
>>>>
>>>> This is the age of exploitative interviews. And Box is the master
>>>> of that.
>>>>
>>>> Mike
>>>>
>>>> Marc Van Olmen wrote:
>>>>> Dear all,
>>>>> I was shocked to see Mike Amorose's response to my job post on
>>>>> this list today. Box Services, LLC, the company that I work
>>>>> for, is indeed a legitimate company. Box Services, LLC has a
>>>>> workforce of about 70 people and is a leader in the fashion
>>>>> photography industry. Their work is on the front page of almost
>>>>> every major fashion magazine like Vogue, etc. The photographers
>>>>> they work with are considered to be in the top 100.
>>>>> I joined the company after Mike's interview so I can't comment
>>>>> on what happened. The only thing I can say is that I'm sorry
>>>>> that he had such a bad experience. Since I became the manager
>>>>> of the software department at Box Services LLC two years ago, we
>>>>> have hired four full-time Mac developers and 2 freelancers. I
>>>>> feel strongly that the knowledge in our team is high. The
>>>>> person that will join us will have the opportunity to learn a
>>>>> lot from this talented team about topics including: CoreImage,
>>>>> OpenGL, OpenGL Shader Language, Graphical User Interface design
>>>>> and development, and advanced server client technology.
>>>>> If anyone has any more doubts or comments please respect list
>>>>> etiquette and email me directly.
>>>>> Sincerely,
>>>>> Marc Van Olmen
>>>>> Senior Software Architect
>>>>> Box Services LLC
>>>>> 412W 14th Street,
>>>>> New York, NY 10014
>>>>> http://www.boxwork.com
>>>>> http://www.boxstudios.com
>>>>> _______________________________________________
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