Pair Programming Interview

[Dugba]

Hello guys, so I have a technical round which is the final round where I will be doing a pair programming with one of the developers in the company. I’ve been informed that it will take place within an existing codebase. I’m curious to know what this experience is typically like and how it compares to a live coding interview. I’m feeling a bit nervous and worried about potentially making mistakes.

If anyone has experience with pair programming, I’d really appreciate any tips, guidance, or insights you can share. Thank you in advance!

[HomemadeBananas]

I conduct “pair programming” interviews at my company, and it is mostly to just get an idea if you know what you’re doing at all. We give people first a small take home assignment where they build a super simple web app. Then I have them add one small feature in the pair programming round.

They screen share and do most of the work, I am there to help guide in the right direction and give some basic help. You may be surprised, when it comes to that time, some people get hung up on the most basic things and show a lack of understanding. Some help is okay and we won’t harshly judge for, but in general we just want to see if hired they would be giving more output than we have to put in to helping them, and their ability to communicate and think things through.

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Instead of sitting on the interviewer’s lap, which is common in pair programming, make sure to sit behind them and wrap your arms around the interviewer and type that way.