I think it depends what kind of company you are interviewing for. I know that at my last job, one of the reasons I got the job was because we got into a somewhat heated discussion about why I disliked Java.

But I think you're right...be yourself in the interview. Ask the tough questions, and provide strong opinions. In the end, if it's a job that you want to have, it won't hurt you.

Here's my reply to this matter:

Short answer: Yes. Robot good for Corporation, Rebel bad.

Long answer: http://www.beernut.ca/roy/archives/004640.html

I think that it depends on how bad you need that job. If your going on 3 months without any work, then you probably want to cause as little disruption as possible. However, if you're happy with your current job, but just checking to see what else is out there, and if there's anything better, it's probably in your best interest to be a little disruptive. In the end, being a little disruptive, and asking the hard questions will get you a job that you will be more likely to enjoy. I'm a little disruptive on the job, because I want to make sure things get done right the first time, and sometimes you have to ask people, and yourself, hard questions to ensure that you aren't going down the wrong path.

As someone "on the other side of the table" I have to weigh in. Successful organizations will have a healthy mix of disruptive team members and workhorse team members. Without someone to question the status quo and to introduce new ideas the organization gets stagnant and loses any competitive edge. At the same time you need people who can churn out work with a high level of reliability and consistency.

Workhorse team members ensure you can pay the bills today, disruptive team members ensure you can pay the bills in the future. Any org without a mix of both has either deep VC filled pockets or taxpayers footing the bill.

I have been helping other organizations with their technical hiring and one came to the interview for a web position with a detailed critique of the technical flaws with the current implementation. That takes guts, but boy does it ever set you apart -- he was subsequently hired.

The only other comment I have is that it is easy to point out *why* things are not ideal when you interview, but it is much harder to have an informed discussion about *what* needs to be done to fix them.

Seems to me that "disruptive" is just another word for "flopped".

How could meeting with one or two members of an organisation for one hour (or less) give any candidate a high resolution view of the company (culture, people, projects, process, day-to-day, etc...)? And the same question can be asked in the other direction.

Employers AND candidates are expected to make a significant decision based on a first impression and very little information. It's fundamentally a leap of faith by both parties and once the dust settles you re-evaluate your decision (that's what probation is for).

As far as the interviewer is concerned, a candidate must always remember that there's a fine line between genuine curiosity and smart assity. How would you feel if some guy with visibly few credentials (let's face it in engineering experience is gold) showed up at your door to critcize your work? I guess in the end it all depends how the candidate formulates his questions.

There are no perfect software development organization there are only organizations that work hard or work harder to ship product on time.

Seems like JP is one of those robots. He's saying you fail the interview if you start asking too many questions. I think that the employer shouldn't look too harshly on employees who try to figure out if they really belong there. If they end up hiring the wrong person, because the person didn't ask enough questions, then that person may leave after 2 months, or not work as well, or with as much enthusiasm as they wish. It's in the employers best interest to make sure that the person who ends up taking the job is as sure that they want to be there as the employer is sure that they want them to be there.

Also, about the 1 hour (or less) thing. That's something I believe you see for many entry level positions, but if you've ever talked to anybody who did interviews for high ranking jobs, you'll find that more of the time, there are 3,4 or more rounds of interviews, with many different people that you'll end up working with. They don't just give you a half hour interview and then let you sign a contract for $150,000.

Also, to Geoff, I would like to point out that the disruptive people can be the work horses as well. People who are disruptive aren't disruptive 8 hours a day, and aren't incapable of sitting down at their desk and coding for 8 hours straight when the need arises. However, people who are disruptive may make the planning stages of your projects longer, as they may shake things, and ask hard questions to make sure things are getting done right. However, I believe that most of the time, that lost time will be made up for later in the project, because you won't have to backtrack because you went down the wrong path.

Lots of different opinions! This is what disruptive people like -- stirring the pot -- and I'm no exception.

It's hard to sum up an issue like interviewing in a single blog post. I have to agree that it's hard for either side to really judge in that little period of time, whether the interview is 1 hour or a combined 6 hours. The only way to know is to jump in the team and do 4-8 months of real work. Then both sides can decide whether or not to continue.

And I should clarify: I'm not disruptive all the time or just at the start of the project. When I feel I need to be disruptive, I am. The rest of the time, it's best to be a "Team Player". In fact, I view being disruptive as being a Team Player because I see it as doing what's best for the team. Just because you're disruprive doesn't mean logic, or education or experience goes out the window. But maybe "conventional wisdom" or the "status quo"...

Right... a robot... So for expressing my opinion on this subject I get labled... man I feel like I'm on fox news criticizing an unpopular president.

Taking the high road now: I figured that most folks commenting on this blog would not get a high ranking job or contract but would go for entry level to mid level position (you can get so much experience 3 years after graduation and coop).

For this category of candidates, I know that most organizations can only afford to give 1-2 hours or less per candidate, they get tons of applicants for a lot of open jobs. This is the reality in the current market. If one of the many candidates stick out the wrong way they'll immediately be put on the bottom of the pile regarless how much they think they're smart.

There are tons of different factors, different organisations and different people. You can't assume that by taking this "disruptive" approach you'll wind up in the perfect job. I'm tying to demonstrate that this approach may in fact reduce your chances at getting that job.

It's all about being street smart in the end: manager A wants a new developer, manager A has successfully shipped product for 5 years using process B. Candidate C in his INTERVIEW questions the validity of process B pissing off manager A. Of course Candidate C doesn't get the job.

Candidate C could have answered the questions and smiled (I'm of course exagerating here Kibbee) gone in and then tried to make things better for manager A. By improving process and productivity Candidate C made manager A look good to Director D and giving Candidate C who is now developer C a promotion to process guru P with better salary and respect from upper management.

Welcome to the jungle.

I'm going to have to concur that JP is indeed a robot. I know that because I currently work for him. I dont think he ever interviewed for his job, he won it at a poker game (or was a coop student that never left).

I won't label JP a robot since I don't know him. It good to have your comments. But I will say that what you just wrote JP in your second comment is basically "How To Attempt To Succeed In The Corporate Ladder." Please note the word "Attempt" because nothing is guaranteed in the Corporate Ladder.

I for one don't enjoy the current rules that are in place and would rather change them than follow them. Although, that is not guaranteed either, and can lead to problems in said job.

I understand what JP is saying, and that I may not want to hire someone either if they showed up to the interview, and started telling us how to do things, when the way they were being done was working out already. I don't think that's what we're talking about though. I think just asking questions is the disruptive part. You aren't necessarily trying to change anything at that point, but rather trying to figure out their process and trying to see if you'll be happy there. If I ask the interviewer what development processes they use, and they say XP, even if I'm not a big fan of XP, at least I know they have a process in place, which is better than working somewhere with no process. If I ask what they use for source control and they say Visual Source Safe, that may be a very good solution if they are a Microsoft shop, because it's the only thing that will integrate well with the IDE, even though I've never heard anything good about it (corrupt databases, high network usage, hard to use offline). The point is, not to attack their methods of operation, but rather figure out what the methods are, and try to figure out if those methods would be something you could work with.

I wrote a short response on my blog:
http://www.beernut.ca/jim/archives/004650.html

;-)