Engineering video
1:14 · 11 August 2025
Developers should push back on requirements to negotiate a smaller, more manageable scope using the triangle of scope, quality, and time. Additionally, candidates should secure a commitment for a live 30-minute review call rather than risking a generic email rejection.
Hear it at 0:09 →Aim for simple, modular, and easy-to-read code because evaluating engineers spend very little time reviewing submissions. Developers must also include unit tests and a couple of integration tests to avoid giving the company reasons to reject them.
Hear it at 0:51 →I know developers will still do take home challenges because again it's the only interview they get. So if I'm still going to do take take home challenges then what advice would you give me? Well the number one advice would be to get a detailed understanding of what you need to deliver and some commitment from their side. Try to push back on the requirements and negotiate the scope. Remember uh the triangle of scope, quality and time. The best way to deliver something in a short time with high quality by timing down the scope.
So if they ask you to deliver three views and authentication for a front end app, tell them could we just focus on the core feature and we can discuss the other ones in the review just to keep the scope manageable. Get them to commit to a guaranted live review where you have a call with someone. So basically tell them hey um you know I would love to do the challenge. It would be great that I could review it once I'm done over 30 minutes with someone from your team. So uh you don't get just like a generic email like a rejection. Aim for modularity. So keep things as simple as they have to be. Aim for code that's
easy to read. The engineers looking at this will will spend very little time looking at it. So if it's easy to read and understandable, they'll move you through the process quicker. And make sure you add test. So you definitely need unit test and at least one or two integration tests. If not, they will use that against you. Think about what would you do if you had more time. Write it down.
