If you’re in charge of hiring people in a tech-adjacent area, chances are you’ll find yourself interviewing candidates for technical positions at some point, even if you’re not a tech whiz yourself. It’s important to grasp what makes a good engineer in a job interview, regardless of whether you’re on the same page technically as the candidate. Here is a guide to approaching technical interviews for jobs that involve coding.
Key Software Engineer Interview Questions
A combination of technical and soft skills-based topics is common for software engineer interview questions. When it comes to hiring for a technical lead, app developer or any other type of software engineering role, asking each candidate the same set of questions will help you compare answers effectively.
Of course, the set of questions will vary depending on your organisation’s requirements, and there are more generic questions that are as equally important to ask when you’re aiming to hire software developers.
Here, we’ve included a few effective examples that can help you cover all the important bases of an interview, with room to expand on certain technical specifics.
‘Can you describe your experience with relevant programming languages, frameworks and tools?’
Asking this question allows candidates to outline the basis of their technical knowledge and the tools they are most comfortable with. Employers and tech recruitment agencies treat this as a foundational question for determining a candidate’s basic fit for the role.
The candidate’s response will help you understand how their skills fit with the organisation’s code base. Reflect on the response to determine candidates’ suitability for current and future projects.
‘What projects have you worked on in the past, and how did you contribute to their success?’
This question provides insights into the candidate’s hands-on involvement with live projects, indicating their ability to apply their skills in practical situations.
It enables hiring managers to delve into the candidate’s leadership attributes, how they work with others and their problem-solving abilities. Listen for clues about the candidate’s time management, communication skills, and ability to work under pressure.
‘What is your understanding of debugging, unit testing and version control?’
Many software engineering jobs involve debugging, testing and quality assurance responsibilities. Including this query is important to assess a candidate’s skill in finding and correcting flaws. If the position involves technical lead responsibilities, the candidate will need to prove they can spot their team members’ errors, too!
When answering this question, candidates should also be able to describe their experience with automated testing frameworks or tools. As maintenance is a significant part of professional coding, it is important to evaluate the candidate’s understanding of best practices and how they collaborate with other engineers in the testing process.
‘Give an example of a time when you had to quickly adapt to a new development environment or project requirements.’
This open-ended behavioural question assesses how well a candidate adjusts to sudden changes in a project and how they may handle joining an existing development team.
Asking this allows you to assess a candidate’s ability to identify and overcome challenges when faced with unfamiliar situations. It helps you gauge their analytical thinking and their capacity to find innovative solutions.
‘What is your understanding of software development methodologies, such as Agile, Scrum or Waterfall? Which one do you prefer and why?’
Software engineer and technical lead jobs often entail working with different methodologies, depending on the teams involved in a project and the scope. As each methodology has its strengths and weaknesses in addressing various project scenarios, engineers need to know which approach best suits the workflow.
Understanding the likes of Agile, Scrum, and DevOps helps software engineers manage timelines and tackle potential roadblocks. When engineers are well-versed in more than one of these, they can easily collaborate with colleagues who may be following a different approach. This helps keep a project from veering off the rails and ensures everyone is coordinating their work effectively.
‘How do you stay up to date with industry trends?’
Platforms, frameworks, and best practices are constantly evolving. Asking this question uncovers insights into a candidate’s interest in continuous learning and professional growth. It also reveals a candidate’s engagement with developer communities and other resources for growing their skillset.
People who stay informed about industry trends are more likely to adapt to emerging technologies, incorporate new tools into their workflows and stay ahead of the curve. These are critical attributes for software engineering roles.
Get Hiring Support from One of Australia’s Leading Tech Recruitment Agencies
Selecting the most effective interview questions can significantly impact the success of your hiring process. Remember, communication abilities and other soft skills are often just as important as coding prowess.
Before you hire a hire software developer, understanding the project and team environment will allow you to adapt interview questions and ask essential follow-up questions as needed. For more complex roles, such as those with senior technical lead responsibilities, it’s also worthwhile using psychometric testing that can help you more accurately predict a candidate’s performance in the role.
Providing employers with guidance on software engineer interview questions and assessments are part of our broad toolkit for hiring here at Exclaim IT. As one of Canberra and Brisbane’s longstanding tech recruitment agencies, we are deeply versed in the needs of public and private organisations. If you’re looking to hire software developers, analysts, project managers or technical leadership, we’ll help you get the right outcome. Contact our friendly team to get started.
