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by Keith Ray.
Original Post: On Puzzles in Interviews
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At another client, the interviewing team liked word riddles. [...] they missed bunch of people who were hired by other managers in the company [...] Several of the new hires misunderstood the logic puzzle because English wasn't their first language, and they didn't hear the puzzle correctly. Two of the new hires decided that if that's how the team evaluated potential candidates, they didn't want to work with that team. And one of the new hires had attempted to explain why there was more than one solution to the riddle, but the interviewer couldn't hear that.
Our choices of questions that are not directly related to the job (and no matter how you slice it, puzzles and riddles are only indirectly related to the job) reflect our culture. It's quite clear that the puzzles and riddles interviewers choose reflect their individual culture. And without meaning to, that culture primarily selects for people just like themselves.
Using puzzles and riddles discriminate against anyone who isn't a (middle-upper class) white American suburban male.
Girls, for example, do not have access or the alone time to spend doing books of puzzles and riddles. It is socially unacceptable for even the geekiest girl you know to do this. A girl who spends time pursuing puzzles and riddles for her own pleasure runs the colossal risk of being ostracized from all the other girls. Boys tend to discover puzzles and riddles during middle school and continue to pursue them through high school. Middle and high school for girls is much more about social ability and social connections.
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