In observing an interview practice for pair programming for job interviews, I saw and enjoyed a really wonderful process between two of my respected colleagues. They discussed, argued and bargained from the start, and they soon made compromises and began to work. During the coding stage they discussed and overcame every unintended problem they met; […]
Abel Shen
Blogs from this Author
ORID-A must have in your toolbox
“What is the use of a book,” thought Alice “without pictures or conversation?” Last week in the Agile Tour 2010 Hangzhou stop which was hosted by Perficient, the keynote speaker Jean Tabaka introduced a great method called ORID from a book titled “The art of focused conversation”, (the title contains both “Art” and “Conversation”:) From my […]
The big difference between “can” and “can’t”
Me: I have received Jason’s mail, and I can get his points. The other side: …..Do you say you Can or you Can’t?.. Me: I have tested the new account, and I can access the web site. The other side: …..Do you mean you can or you can’t? These two paragraphs of exchange both happened […]
How distance impacts pair programming
Last week, by great chance, I observed two of my respected colleagues practicing pair programming for a job interview. Sitting two meters away, I noticed that during the process of implementation, they didn’t interact frequently. The interviewee was writing code on the computer, and the interviewer was contemplating the best way by drawing some sort […]
When overseas teams cannot fully understand US colleagues
I joined a conference call this morning and was quite happy because I understood much more of what my U.S. colleague was saying than I have on other calls. One of my Chinese colleagues recorded the meeting so that we can play it back to avoid missing any important points. When I listened to this […]
What’s your first question when Pair Programming for a job interview?
As an interviewer using Pair Programming when interviewing potential candidates, apart from the warm-up chatting what’s the first formal question you will ask and what kind of reply are you expecting? I want to share my opinion. Several years ago I read a book written by Weinberg [1986], which lists three main obstacles to innovation: […]
The IM abbreviations I usually teach my American and Chinese Colleagues
We frequently use IM as an online tool for communication, so I have a lot of chance to talk with colleagues from both China and America via IM. To save time, we use a lot of abbreviations when chatting. For example, we all know the meaning of “c u”, which is popular in both China […]
Why PP is over AA?
During the past year, we’ve began to use Pair Programming (PP) as part of our interview process. Having interviewed many candidates using this approach, I have begun to prefer this method to the traditional approach of asking and answering (AA) because: Traditional interviewing skill emphasize on asking behavioral questions. Since it is so, why not take […]
“Pair programming” for successful job interviews
From last year, the Global Delivery Center (GDC) at Perficient has been interviewing prospective intern developers using pair programming. I am very glad to have had the opportunity to interview many candidates during this time. I would like to share a series of interesting experiences with you in this article. What is a successful Job […]