I was interviewed for a Full-stack MEAN developer position. This was supposed to be predominantly an Angular full-stack position, which is basically JavaScript and TypeScript, which I have over 5 years work experience in.
The interview started off with a Director, then a Back-end developer, and then 3 other developers.
The Director was more interested in processes, and wanted to know about my Agile Scrum background, there is more on this part later.
Then the Back-end developer, basically was not interested in much except for the technologies I have used.
Then, the bizarre interview part was with the 3 developers, who were more concerned with JavaScript fundamentals, but didn't understand the fundamentals themselves. First, they asked me very basic Angular Qs. I know Angular 1 and 2, very well, as its been the core of my work experience. They started asking me questions like What is an Observable, but then when I gave my answer, they seem confused. To this, I was surprised, as they weren't understanding what I was telling them. Then it went on to Promises, then it jumped to React all of a sudden.
Next it was time to "white board". The self-described tech-lead basically wrote a for statement, and just wanted to know what the value was of “i”, after it’s called outside of the block scope. Very basic white board challenge that was scribbled on the board, and a very nonsensical approach to solving was decided on their own. I wasn't given much time to answer, before one of the members would interrupt and gave their own take on it. The level of testing was very basic, and things made sense afterwards on this.
What made sense afterwards, was the part when the tech-lead tells me, that their last Angular project failed, and that therefore they are looking for improving the team dynamics. These guys didn't know what the differences between a Promise and an Observable was. They also didn’t ask any TypeScript questions, other than using the keyword "any" when initializing new variables lol. They also went on to ask me a lot more React questions, when React is a Functional approach and Angular is a Class based approach. Very bizarre technical interview at this point.
Finally, I was not forwarded to meet with the hiring manager, and instead walked out after this technical. The Director walked me out, nice guy, and made some comment like how I had to drive so far, and they could‘a gave me a better time.
A few days later, I was contacted by my Recruiter who had some fake positive feedback:
"Regarding Openlane, they liked you and thought you are very impressive, but you didn't go down to the level of details as they expected out of their senior position."
This comment I found to be very bizarre. Not sure what it means, and how deep I was supposed to go? This is an interview; you need to ask me relevant questions. I can't go any deeper than what is asked.
But then...
The Recruited Also said.
Oh hey, they think you might be a very good Scrum Master!!
Wow, you just interviewed a veteran developer, who obviously knows Scrum inside out, and you think it’s a good idea to offer a Scrum Master position, which I was still to be interviewed for! I told them to get lost.