Google Self Evaluation - how would you grade yourself?

Casey_81

Im in the process of looking for a job at the minute, and sent off a couple of CVs earlier this week - one of which was sent to Google.

They asked me to fill in this evaluation guide... my highest was 7 for SQL, 6 for java and then a scattering of 3's and some 1's. How would you rank yourself & how truthful would you be?

Self Evaluation Guide:

10 = you literally have written a book
7,8,9 = expert, go-to person on this technology
5,6 = solid daily working knowledge. Highly proficient.
3,4 = comfortable working with this, have to check manual on
some things.
1, 2 = have worked with it previously but either not much, or rusty

---

TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)( )
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks( )
Unix/Linux internals( )
Algorithms & Data Structures( )
SQL and / or Database administration( )
C( )
C++( )
Java( )
Perl( )
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)( )
Python( )

Atomic Pineapple

Just graduated from Software development/commercial computing course last may - 3 months industry experience

TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)(3)
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks(3)
Unix/Linux internals(2)
Algorithms & Data Structures(5)
SQL and / or Database administration(5)
C(1)
C++(3)
Java(6.5)
Perl(1)
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)(1)
Python(1)

Skrynesaver

Interesting, I'd be as truthful as possible, blagging here will just mark you down in a technical interview,

Casey_81 wrote: »

Self Evaluation Guide:

10 = you literally have written a book
7,8,9 = expert, go-to person on this technology
5,6 = solid daily working knowledge. Highly proficient.
3,4 = comfortable working with this, have to check manual on
some things.
1, 2 = have worked with it previously but either not much, or rusty

---

TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)(4)
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks(5)
Unix/Linux internals(3)
Algorithms & Data Structures(3)
SQL and / or Database administration(2)
C(2)
C++(1)
Java(3)
Perl(8)
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)(7)
Python(2)

Tobias Greeshman

TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)(5)
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks(3)
Unix/Linux internals(4)
Algorithms & Data Structures(3)
SQL and / or Database administration(1)
C(8)
C++(7)
Java(8)
Perl(4)
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)(4)
Python(1)

Casey_81

Yeah thats what I was thinking... but at the same time - if you are too harsh on yourself they wouldn't bother calling you at all.

I reckon my gradings were honest/, SQL & databases are my strengths, I can do unix type stuff but have no real experience with it apart from mucking about.
I prob should have put a 0 in for shell scripting cos i've never done that at all.. but felt that I could cram 1's worth if i ever did get called for interview.

ocallagh

Casey_81 wrote: »

TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)(1)
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks(3)
Unix/Linux internals(3)
Algorithms & Data Structures(5)
SQL and / or Database administration(4)
C(1)
C++(1)
Java(4)
Perl(1)
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)(1)
Python(1)

Where's the php, javascript etc options 4 years ago I'd have stuck an 8 down for Java

Casey_81

ocallagh wrote: »

Where's the php, javascript etc options 4 years ago I'd have stuck an 8 down for Java

I don't think they care about php or javascript nor do they seem to care that I'm an expert on MATLAB....

Why the downgrading of your java? has the real world opened your eyes, or have your skills gone a bit rusty?

Webmonkey

Finished Software Dev + Computer Networking degree. Good few years experience, freelance also.


TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)(8)
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks(5)
Unix/Linux internals(5)
Algorithms & Data Structures(7)
SQL and / or Database administration(7)
C(8)
C++(8)
Java(6)
Perl(7)
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)(4)
Python(2)

ocallagh

Casey_81 wrote: »

I don't think they care about php or javascript nor do they seem to care that I'm an expert on MATLAB....

Why the downgrading of your java? has the real world opened your eyes, or have your skills gone a bit rusty?

Basically as I haven't touched in in 4 years and it is a language which is constantly evolving. I downloaded the S60 5th edition SDK to get into mobile apps development a month back and I have to admit I was a little bewildered.. I may have been a bit harsh on myself in that evaluation though. I could probably increase them all by a point or two and blag my way through them.

Webmonkey

The problem is, while people may not have looked at certain things, such as Perl/Python/SQL, they may accelerate in learning these very quickly and easily pass out someone who has experience, or claims they do.

It's impossible to judge a person until you have them on board but I guess this is a filtering process. This is why I think you should be generous with the numbers, otherwise you won't pass the filter

Casey_81

I suppose so, I'm involved in undergraduate lab demonstrating and its amazing how peoples perceptions of their ability differs from their actual ability..

In light of this i didn't mark up anything, and asked a mate that is a regular bouncing board for my technical questions what he thought.

Google are notorious for their long interview process so am not being overly optimistic about it. Have nothing to loose so decided to give it a shot anyway.

fergalr

Casey_81 wrote: »

Im in the process of looking for a job at the minute, and sent off a couple of CVs earlier this week - one of which was sent to Google.

They asked me to fill in this evaluation guide... my highest was 7 for SQL, 6 for java and then a scattering of 3's and some 1's. How would you rank yourself & how truthful would you be?

Self Evaluation Guide:

10 = you literally have written a book
7,8,9 = expert, go-to person on this technology
5,6 = solid daily working knowledge. Highly proficient.
3,4 = comfortable working with this, have to check manual on
some things.
1, 2 = have worked with it previously but either not much, or rusty

---

TCP/IP Networking (OSI stack, DNS, etc.)( )
Unix/Linux System Administration tasks( )
Unix/Linux internals( )
Algorithms & Data Structures( )
SQL and / or Database administration( )
C( )
C++( )
Java( )
Perl( )
Shell Scripting (sh, bash, ksk, csh)( )
Python( )

I'm not sure whats going on with that question. It seems really strange. Asking someone to rank the technologies in order of competence would make some sense. And maybe thats all they do - maybe they run the answers through a program that just extracts the shape of the curve.

But asking someone to estimate their objective competences in a range of technologies is a bit stupid. What number you pick depends on who you are comparing yourself too.

Ok - a '10' is pretty clear, but apart from that, its all very relative. Compared to your fellow programmers in a bank IT department you might be the go-to person for TCP/IP and Java, and hence an 8, but compared to the people writing the custom google network stack (or whatever) you might only be a 4.

So who do you rate yourself against? What scale do you use so that those numbers make some sort of objective sense?

There's just no real way of objectively evaluating yourself. Different candidates are going to use totally different reference points, which makes it pretty useless as a means of comparing between candidates.

I presume no one would just put down 1s and 2s, if they are actually applying for the job, so I imagine its not really used to turn people away.

So, either they will normalise the results somehow, or its got a use as a tool to flag people who think that they are great at everything and overestimate themselves. In which case I'd guess whether you put down 4s and 5s or 7s and 8s shouldn't really matter.

It just seems like a strange question to take at face value, to me, for a company that puts so much thought into their hiring process. I wonder what the thinking behind it is?

Edit:
Also, I disagree with the overall ethos of the question... I don't think what you have in your 'working set' is that important. I think I'm pretty reasonable at a range of technologies that I'd have to 'check the manual on some things' for, because I'm not working with them at the moment. Even though I've built extensive projects in them, and understand the harder parts, etc.

Casey_81

Thanks for all your answers... I reckon I filled in the assessment honestly, but then as the previous poster said its all subjective.

Needless to say I got an email back saying "Based on the score above and your experience you will not be suitable for the senior level roles that I am actively recruiting for currently."
Which is fair enough, but I reckon they should have known that from my CV anyway - Im a PhD student and have about a year and a half industrial experience as an application programmer. Although I program almost everyday they types of programming that you do in academia is not at all comparable with industry standards.

I spoke to some of my colleagues and they thought that I was a bit harsh on myself in some sections... I don't know, I saw little point in lying and then falling flat on my face in a technical interview.

ronivek

It seems like a pretty straightforward self assessment which is used to determine if a candidate is suitable for interview for a particular role.

If they're hiring developers who'll be working mostly with databases they'll be looking for people confident in SQL and possibly one language.

If they're hiring developers who'll be working mostly on core components for other internal teams they'd probably be looking for people who are confident in their data structures and algorithms; and possibly a couple of programming languages.

In general I think if you have more than two of those areas scored above 7/8 then that's something they might balk at.

If a 5/6 constitutes a solid daily working knowledge; then you're actively working on a daily basis with the technology in question.

If a 7/8 constitutes something above a daily working knowledge; then you've probably been working on a daily basis with the technology in question in a senior position for a number of years.

Like anything else however it really depends on who is actually looking at the information. I'd be very surprised if there's any kind of statistical or deep analysis going on. I'd be tempted to say a HR person gets a listing for a DBA and filters candidates based on whether they have 7+ for that particular item on their self assessment. It's then ignored and further tests and interviews used to decide.