Ask HN: Judging the technical skills of prospective teams
I’ve been working in the industry a few years and I’ve ended up on teams of varying levels of technical skill. I’m interviewing again and I’d really like to get a sense of my prospective teams’ technical chops before agreeing to join. I’ve been considering: 1) Asking short technical questions of my interviewers at the end of the interview when they ask if I have questions. 2) Asking for the resumes of the prospective team’s members.
If someone you were interviewing to join your team did either/both of these, what would your reaction be?
Alternatively, how do you judge the technical skills of teams you interview with? I usually ask what big challenges will they be tackling in the next 4-5 months. Then try to use that as an entry point into discussing technical details at a slightly deeper level. In many cases it works well. In some cases it does not since people say that the roadmap is sensitive. Instead of resumes, ask for the names of the senior tech people you'll be working with. Then look them up online (LinkedIn, ...). Second, ask what they're working on/what you would be working on. Ask about some of the technical challenges that bit them unexpectedly. It's usually a good way to get them to open up.