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An interactive whiteboard / live coding session is by far greater than any homework assignment, in my opinion. W/ an interactive session, you get instant feedback (either verbally or via emotional cues) into what they are expecting. With a homework assignment, it's hard to determine which path to optimize for. If a homework assignment is necessary, it would be better if that were more of a "probationary employment" type scenario, perhaps at a very reduced amount of pay, to only imply that both parties actually have skin in the game. Even better, for helping me judge if it's a decent fit? Show me some code you're using in production so that I can code review it on the call. Surely it's not all hyper sensitive.

> In the hiring process there has to be some kind of skill test. No there doesn’t. There isn’t one for the CEO is there?

I've tried to push my employer(s) to offer the dual paths. Like you I prefer the HW-style process (and think they are a truer judgement) but I understand why some don't like it. I wish more companies would support either path.

> it is because some people have worked at very impressive jobs... they actually can't do the job > In the hiring process there has to be some kind of skill test Thats a contradiction: 1 - 90% of companies do skill tests 2 - you cannot trust the CV of a candidate even if the company they worked on previously also did a skill test 3 - you think your skill test will enable you to hire the right candidate So everyone is doing tests and everyone is hiring shit candidates anyway? That's literally proof that these tests are worthless. Maybe if the recruiters actually knew what they need from a candidate, companies were clearer about what the job involves, they would stop hiring the wrong people for the wrong job.

The better way is to treat people's time as important as you treat your own and your resources at your company. There is a large company based in NYC that interviews thousands of developers a year, but only hires a few hundred. Each of those devs do a take home project that takes about 16 hours to complete. The project requires nothing to ask, so this company asks everyone. 30,000 hours is a lot of time - it's about 3.5 years of someone's life - and at least this time is spent each year by this company (and they pay nothing for it), not counting the rest of the interview process, because it is cheap for them to do this. And we wonder by productivity is down :) Respect people's time. If it is hard, figure it out. That is your job if you want to hire people and feel good about it.