

Ask HN: Why do interviewers not give you feedback upon rejection? - kapilkaisare

Why do interviewers end most rejection rounds with a "You're not a fit for what we're looking for" when they could be giving you constructive feedback instead?
======
mechanical_fish
I'm tempted to just tell you to rent the classic Dustin Hoffman movie
_Tootsie_ and watch the first few minutes.

The basic reason why it is polite to give people flat, euphemistic turndowns
-- not just at the end of interviews, but in lots of breakup situations,
including exit interviews, declining of contracts, and breakups with SOs -- is
that you don't want to prolong the agony or send mixed signals. You don't want
to appear to be negotiating. You don't want to appear to be trying to cause
excessive pain. You certainly don't want to provoke the person to burst into
tears, physically attack you, stalk you for weeks, months, or years, or file a
lawsuit.

You also don't want to tell a person that they're hopeless and will never
succeed in the industry and then wake up to find out that they're Steve Jobs.
That happens. It happens all the time. Interviewing is a mistake-prone,
statistical process and decisions are based on hunches that cannot be
explained, only rationalized, even to oneself.

There is a reason why constructive feedback is so valuable. People won't give
it to you up front. I myself am much more direct online than in person -- in
person I'm a hopeless softie, until you get me into an engineering situation
or otherwise give me hints that you can take it. Not everyone has the
emotional stamina to withstand the full force of MIT-style, anonymous-peer-
review style power criticism.

~~~
umjames
Also, interviewing is a weeding-out process. If they tell you what you did
wrong, then you (and anyone else you share that information with) will become
better at gaming that process. This makes it harder for them to tell whether
they have a good candidate or someone who can game the system well.

~~~
base10
A good interview process should be resistant to gaming. For instance, multiple
interviews. Multiple people doing the interviewing. Asking the candidate to
demonstrate a capacity to do the work.

But, let's say the candidate does successfully game the interview and gets
hired. Your company should absolutely use the first N-days of a new hire to
check fit. Many I've seen explicitly say the first three or six months is a
probationary period. The problem is when companies aren't honest with
themselves about making a bad hire (capability or fit) and letting the new
hire go.

Particularly for internal job candidates, I highly recommend being direct and
saying, "Here's where you're short. Here's what you can work on over the next
year or so to get into a better position. It's not a guarantee, but you'll be
better prepared." Give them homework.

If a candidate is really and truly interested, they'll follow through on the
advice and follow-up on it. That gives you a better candidate to look at for
your next req.

------
mceachen
I spent > 2 years of my life doing a face-to-face technical interview (ramping
up the staff for a prior startup) literally every day. I've also been a hiring
manager for a large tech company. I've given a _lot_ of interviews.

The problem with interviewing is simple: all you can determine during an
interview is whether the person is good at interviews.

That skill is not necessarily a good indication of doing well at any given job
(especially with software engineering). The "constructive feedback" would be
at best, superficial, but more likely, it would be based on the "blink
response" of how the interviewer perceived you as you walked through the door
-- so it's not only dubiously-based advice, it's advice that most people find
hard to deliver.

The large tech company also explicitly told managers not give negative
feedback due to legal reasons.

------
MartinCron
One thing that I haven't seen mentioned yet.

A lot of hiring decisions come down to personality fit and likability,
especially if you're hiring for a small team. Telling someone that you just
don't like them is a pretty difficult thing to do for most people.

I know that I couldn't say it and have personally fallen back on the "we got a
lot of good applicants and it was a tough decision" non-answer.

------
maxdemarzi
Because it does not benefit them in the short run and to eliminate the
possibility of saying something that could land them in legal trouble.

~~~
byoung2
_the possibility of saying something that could land them in legal trouble_
When I worked for Kaplan (a subsidiary of the Washington Post), we were
trained to not give any feedback after interviews or teacher auditions
specifically for this reason. There was a situation where a potential teacher
was not accepted after an audition and he asked why. A Kaplan representative
told him that it was because he had a thick accent and that students would
have trouble understanding him when he spoke. He filed a lawsuit alleging
racial discrimination and in the end Kaplan settled out of court. Pretty much
any reason you give for not hiring someone could be interpreted as
discrimination of some kind. It may not be enough to win a lawsuit, but it is
enough to force you to settle to avoid the bad PR.

~~~
btilly
And, sadly, that is actually a good reason not to hire someone to teach a
class. As many unfortunate students can attest.

~~~
philwelch
I had a TA once who had an incomprehensible accent. When people complained,
some honcho from the department came to class and berated everyone for
complaining because she had passed all the qualification tests to lecture in
English, despite the fact that _actual students couldn't understand her_.

This was in the business department. Apparently, the people who are supposed
to be teaching how to run a business valued their own a priori qualification
tests over the experiences of actual customers[1]. While the situation pissed
me off even then, the irony did not occur to me until years later.

[1] Academics don't like the implication that students are customers, but in
this case the analogy holds.

~~~
snotrockets
And those academics are right. Let me sidetrack for a bit, because this is an
important point, that not everybody thinks of:

If students had to pay the actual cost of their education, it'd be much
higher, even in Ivy League schools. Universities complement the tuition fees
by getting public funding.

And (in theory, at least) tax money should be given for a good reason. The
public as a whole does not care about the personal benefits that some would
get by gaining a degree. That's the private interest of those people, and
we're talking public good here: it should help all.

Tax money is given to universities so they would create inventions and
innovations in science and art, which are in the public interest. And to
create those we need well-educated people to invent and innovate.

Thus it's not the students buying education. That's a byproduct, and they're
not the customer, just a beneficiary. It's the public buying educated people.

Of course, this is all pinko-think, and it's true that some academics are just
old farts who keep wondering how dare those students interrupt the academics
very important nap time, and who thought of letting students in campus anyway?

~~~
glenra
> If students had to pay the actual cost of their education, it'd be much
> higher, even in Ivy League schools.

That seems really unlikely. The fact that it's expensive to provide this exact
bundle of services doesn't mean that's what would get provided without the
subsidy. What's more likely is that the services that mean the least to the
customers would get cut until the tuition was more reasonable. Without tax
funding you'd get schools that were focused primarily on teaching. Like high
school, but with more accomplished teachers.

~~~
snotrockets
And then we won't have research. So the material taught will stagnate, just
like in high schools. If we treat students as customers, then they want the
best -- so to improve, the student-oriented university would hire teachers
that are also great researchers, so they'd have something new to teach, that
isn't taught by the competition. And that research is costly; and we come full
circle to the research-oriented universities.

~~~
philwelch
How much does an undergraduate really learn that's from the latest research?

~~~
copper
Not too much (and that's particularly true if you look at the older
engineering disciplines.) The goal of an undergraduate education would be to
learn how to learn.

------
middlegeek
They don't have the time, they don't want lawsuits, they can't tell you that
they ended up hiring Jeff the tax guy's cousin because many of the staff
already knew him and he's a good dude as well as a good coder...etc.

------
nmueller
In my experience almost all candidates can figure out for themselves why they
didn't get the job. Some of that is from giving plussed/non-plussed signals
during the interview but mostly people know when they don't know the answer to
something.

The few people who have ever asked me for feedback were simultaneously the
least qualified and most confident candidates people I've met. No matter the
answer the next step always seems to be pissed off replies, demands for a
second chance or thinly veiled threats. I've stopped giving feedback because
there's just no value in spending my time on it and the people who want it
don't seem equip to use it.

------
bengl3rt
I've found that when you're rejected, it's okay to write back asking for
specific guidance as to how you might improve for next time. I've gotten
valuable insight > 50% of the time this way.

~~~
spokey
I often ask for feedback _during_ the interview.

If I'm interested in a position, I'll typically ask the hiring manager what
reservations or concerns she may have about hiring me. Factual errors aside I
make it a point not to debate those concerns at the time (and I make it clear
up front that I'm not going to try to talk them out of their concerns), but
I've found:

A) You typically get fairly honest answers this way (in part because the
question catches the interviewer off-guard, which is generally a good way to
get an honest response).

B) The feedback is useful for adapting your presentation and pitch at another
firm.

and

C) If you get the job this is _very_ useful information to have. It tells you
what your new boss views as important and what skills she thinks you are
lacking, often with a candor you won't get if you ask the same question on
your first day on the job.

EDIT/PS: I'm trying to think how I'd react to this sitting on the other side
of the desk. I've done a lot of interviews but I don't think anyone has ever
asked me this question. I certainly give vague non-answers when I'm rejecting
a candidate after the fact (typically something like "we've found someone who
is a better match...") but if I was asked in the interview I'd probably give
an honest answer but it would be focused around the work instead of the
candidate, which probably makes it easier to deliver.

------
msredmond
There are times when I've really, REALLY wanted to be able to give that
feedback -- usually when a candidate came in second in a close race and I
wanted them to know they did really well, but there's been other times when I
thought specific feedback would really help someone (I interview a lot of
fresh college graduates) -- but HR has told me every time not to do it, not
even if they review the language first.

What's funny is the one time I got such feedback myself I thought it was
because the company I interviewed with did it _because_ they were paranoid I
would sue: About 12 years ago I interviewed when I was 4+ months visibly
pregnant (and I openly talked about it too -- I don't hide anything), and
afterward the person I interviewed with sent me an extremely nice note that
they liked me at lot, but they had to go with the more qualified candidate,
although if she didn't work out, they'd hire me. I blew the letter off as them
being paranoid about getting sued, but a few weeks later I got the call -- the
other person didn't work out and I was hired. Go figure.

------
keeptrying
I've done a lot of interviews and the reasons are:

1\. They dont want to hurt the interviewees feelings.

2\. They want the interviewee to feel good about the company even if they
didnt get the job. (Marketing?)

3\. There might be legal reasons.

But one thing I advise now is to ALWAYS ask for feedback. You can do this by
getting an interviewers email during the interview and emailing them after.
Something of the form:

\---------------

Hi,

Thank you very much for taking the time for interviewing me yesterday. I was
notified that I wasnt a fit by HR.

I was wondering if you could let me know: 1\. Which questions I got wrong in
the interview and what answers you were looking for? 2\. What areas you feel I
need to work on? (ie an open ended question which lets them give you any type
of feedback)

Regards,

\---------------

Asking for feedback is HARD. But nothing brings out more respect in me than
someone who wants to know why they failed and who takes steps to fix those
issues in the future.

------
kloncks
Usually, the number of rejects are much much more than the accepted. Time is a
big issue.

Take YC. 1000 apply; 40 get in. How long would it take to individually let the
960 that didn't get it why they couldn't get it?

It's not a perfect system...but I don't see how that would change given that
it's about time.

------
motters
From experience searching for jobs in the last year it seems to be
exceptionally rare to get any sort of feedback after an interview -
constructive or otherwise.

My guess is that this reticence is mainly due to the laws surrounding
employment, since it costs practically nothing to send a brief email. If
anything which was written as part of a response could be construed as being
racist/sexist/etc then in theory the company could face lawsuits. Also in the
current economic situation some people might react badly to a negative
response, especially if they have made exceptional efforts to get to the stage
of having an interview.

------
FiddlerClamp
Another reason is that you get into an arguing match.

Interviewer: "I don't think you have the skills for the job." Interviewee:
"Sure I do! Etc."

------
zck
Why would they? There is literally no benefit to interviewers to do so --
they've already rejected you, so improving your performance won't help their
company, and it could help their competitor that does hire you. It could cause
problems ("would you have considered my interview more impressive if I was
race/gender/nationality/height _X_? Time to lawyer up").

------
wpeterson
Interviewers don't give most candidates tangible feedback/criticism because
the vast majority do not want it.

People who just bombed an interview usually know it, and aren't in a place to
receive constructive feedback.

The rare few who handle that well should explicitly ask for feedback or
critique.

I always give this when asked, but never offer it unasked.

------
omarish
One time, I got a call from a hiring person at a company telling me that I
wasn't selected for a specific job I had wanted. I turned around and asked him
why and asked a few feedback questions, and the guy ended up changing his mind
and extending me an offer. So at least from my experience, it's always good to
ask for feedback on how you did.

------
gamble
How valuable would the answer be?

Most interviews come down to how much the interviewers liked you and whether
your bearing in the interview matched the company's image of itself. They
might come up with a variety of justifications if you pressed them, but it's
never going to be the truth: they just liked the other guy more.

~~~
boomka
That is the truth that is often overlooked.

Feedback is not entirely useless, but good managers know that how useful a
person ends up being, is not a function of his knowledge at the time of the
interview. And that is true even for highly skilled professions like
programming.

Performance/productivity is dominated by human factors, psychological factors,
office environment, team synergy etc etc.

Even when I do technical interviews, people assume I am interested in getting
the right answers out of them. In truth, while I am somewhat interested in
what answer they give, I mostly watch _how_ they answer the questions.

------
daemin
It's also the point that it's easier and safer for a company to say 'no' to
hiring someone than to say yes, especially if there's any doubt what so ever
in the candidate's abilities. This is true for the financial and time cost, as
well as the resulting lost productivity and chaos created when having to hire,
fire, and find a replacement.

Therefore given how "picky" companies have to be in hiring someone, they often
have an order of magnitude more people to say no to than yes, and the earlier
in the process you go the more orders of magnitude of "no" they have to reply
with.

Thus it makes sense for them to only provide feedback if someone requests it
explicitly, and because it also shows them that you are still interested and
put some extra effort into the process.

------
petervandijck
The real answer might be because very few applicants can take it gracefully.

------
slantyyz
Most interviewers don't have wear poker faces when they're not discussing
salary. You can often tell by their response if they liked or disliked your
answer.

Most good interviewers also have a list of questions they formulate based on
what they think might be your potential weaknesses to assess whether they are
a real liability or not.

So in a nutshell, if you pay attention to the verbal and non-verbal cues
during the interview, you probably don't need to ask for feedback.

~~~
msredmond
This is a good point: although it does depend on the interviewer, I know I
personally am _horrible_ at not showing what I think when I'm talking to
someone (esp. as I'll usually ask a follow-up question to an answer I don't
like, just to make sure they really are saying what I think they're saying).
And if someone can't figure it out from there where they got it wrong, maybe
they don't have the interpersonal skills we'd want in the first place...

------
spooneybarger
Their reasons aside, if you ask, you can usually get it.

~~~
byoung2
I usually gave an indirect answer when interviewees asked. For example, when
hiring part-time employees, most of whom were current college students, all I
really cared about was their ability to show up on time, follow directions,
and be familiar with standard business practices. So anyone who showed up late
to the interview, wore inappropriate clothing for a business setting, answered
cell phones during the interview, etc. was cut. If someone asked why I would
usually frame it as "I can't discuss the decision to hire or not hire you
specifically, but generally companies look for candidates who show up on time
to an interview, dress appropriately, and don't answer phones, etc."

~~~
TeHCrAzY
Gosh, people must be bad at interviewing...turning up in business attire (no
matter the company culture), turning your mobile off and arriving (reasonably)
early are fundamentals.

I've never had a problem once getting to the interview stage and have been
quite proud that I tend to be seen as valuable, but if thats the competition,
I'm less impressed with myself...

~~~
msredmond
We once (8 years ago?) had a woman pull a beeper out of her bra in the middle
of an interview. And that was not, by far, the weirdest interview.

------
markkat
Time, and they don't owe you one.

------
RDDavies
Time.

