If there was an award for the most unconventional job interview, I’m pretty sure this guy just won it. Max Rosett did an online search for “python lambda function list comprehension,” which refers to a specific programming language, and was met with a little black box at the top of his search results which contained a message from Google, saying: “You’re speaking our language. Up for a challenge?” After accepting and subsequently completing the challenge, which was programming related, he was contacted by a Google recruiter and eventually landed a position at the company.
Three months ago, I thought I wasn’t ready to apply for a job at Google. Google disagreed. I was in the midst of a career transition. I had spent three years working as a management consultant and then at a startup, but I wanted to become a computer engineer. I was earning a Master’s in computer science through Georgia Tech’s online program. I knew that I was slowly developing the skills that I would need in an engineering role, but I still lacked the confidence to apply for a full-time software role. One morning, while working on a project, I Googled “python lambda function list comprehension.” The familiar blue links appeared, and I started to look for the most relevant one. But then something unusual happened. The search results split and folded back to reveal a box that said “You’re speaking our language. Up for a challenge?” I stared at the screen. What? After a moment, I decided yes, I was most definitely up for a challenge. I clicked through and landed on a page that called itself “foo.bar.” The page resembled a UNIX interface, so I typed the command to see the list of files. There was a single one called “start_here.txt”.