Technical interviews are used in many industries to assess the capabilities of candidates and their ability to communicate, solve problems, and apply their skills and experience. Candidates who fail a technical interview often have the relevant skills but have failed to apply them correctly, sometimes having no idea where they went wrong.
In this article, we will explore the most probable reasons why you failed a technical interview, including cognitive biases affecting decision-making, miscommunication between candidates and interviewers, and the psychological impacts of imposter syndrome.
The Purpose of Technical Interviews
Technical interviews are designed to assess a candidate’s technical capabilities and skills to determine if they can perform and excel in the available position. This process will involve the candidate answering questions based on the technical aspects of the job and is often a separate, secondary stage following the initial interview.
Questions in a technical interview are more specific when compared to the more general, company-specific, and cross-functional angle of questions in a traditional job interview. These questions focus on the tasks and goals of the specific role which can be very unique, such as using certain tools, adhering to protocols and procedures, experience in niche areas, and so on.
A technical interview may also include a technical skills assessment or simulations, such as coding exercises in a development role. These exercises make it easier to assess how adept a person is regarding the skills needed to succeed in the role.
What Job Roles Require Technical Interviews?
Technical interviews can be used in any work setting that requires certain skills to fulfill a role, however, this type of interview is most common in industries such as software development, engineering, or science-based roles.
Some industries require wide-ranging skills like data science or data engineering and it can be difficult to determine the expertise of a candidate without them answering a series of technical interviews, and possibly a practical assessment. As well as helping recruiters, it also allows top candidates to stand out from their less experienced competitors.
As a general rule, if you are applying for a tech-orientated role or a job that requires a lot of lateral or logical thinking, a technical interview will likely be included in the recruitment process.
How Can Recruiters Improve Technical Interviews?
Technical interviews can always be adapted and improved to increase their effectiveness, from removing geographical barriers by conducting interviews remotely or aligning the questioning with the short and long-term goals of the company.
Many HR and recruitment teams now use AI to improve the process, tapping into huge amounts of data that would be impossible to process manually. This can assist with everything from screening candidates to fine-tuning questioning based on specific roles. With AI, technical interviews can focus only on important skills and experience, minimizing the chances of redundant answers being given.
However, like all AI use cases, the results need to be assessed and finalized by a human to ensure the questions are relevant and make sense. Hence, you must be aware of how data will be extracted, especially if the company uses an ATS system to screen resumes, and AI to generate viable technical questions based on the gathered data.
Combining AI-tailored interviews with practical assessments and exams can narrow down a long list of candidates to a handful of the very best, but there are other factors to consider in terms of why candidates may have failed a technical interview.
Top Reasons Why People Fail Technical Interviews
Failing a technical interview does not necessarily mean you are not suitable for the role, or that your experience and skills aren’t up to par. There are several reasons why a person does not ‘tick the boxes’ in such a situation, and in some cases, the interview environment and design might not be fit for purpose.
Below are the most probable reasons why you failed your technical interview, from psychological barriers to mistakes made by the interviewer.
- A Lack of Practical or Technical Experience
The most obvious reason for failing a technical interview is perhaps your technical skills and experience aren’t sufficient enough at this stage in your career. Perhaps the role requires expertise in areas you lack experience in or the job demands specific industry knowledge.
For example, the company may be looking for novel ideas to automate their invoicing, which may require practical experience in the finance sector or a background in building bespoke applications. There may be a candidate who has developed such projects before, making them stand out to the interviewer. In these scenarios, you must always think about how your knowledge can be applied and what can give you an edge.
- Cognitive Biases
Interviewers can also suffer from cognitive bias that may put some candidates at a disadvantage. There are typically 5 types of bias that may impact an interviewer’s decision-making.
- Confirmation bias: This is a tendency to rely on information that relies on pre-existing beliefs, such as highlighting a negative or positive aspect of a person’s resume, such as standout key skills, and letting this overrule a person’s interview responses.
- Similarity bias: This refers to when an interviewer favors a candidate who displays similarities to them, including non-work-related factors such as political stances or hobbies. This means if two candidates are similar in experience and ability, the interviewer is more likely to favor the person who they have a connection with.
- Anchoring bias: Anchoring bias is when an interview relies too much on the initial details provided by a candidate such as salary expectations or previous roles, favoring or disfavoring some candidates later on in the recruitment process.
- Availability bias: This can include stereotyping or generalizing candidates based on their background, such as if they came from a certain university or are moving from a specific company. In the minds of some recruiters, they may hold some educational institutes or qualifications in higher esteem than others, even if this isn’t correct.
- Halo effect: The halo effect is when a recruiter focuses on a specific trait of a person, positive or negative. For example, there may be an assumption that a charismatic person may be more trustworthy or reliable, while a more reserved person might not excel in a team environment. This can result in overestimating some candidates and underestimating others.
- Miscommunication
In some cases, a candidate may answer a question incorrectly or not provide the relevant information because the wording of the question and its context are not communicated in a way they understand. This miscommunication can potentially make a top candidate seem unqualified purely because they misinterpreted the question.
This could be a case of a developer being asked if they might deliver a new API-first CMS platform, but instead of going into programming language specifics, they focus more on workflows and design.
- Imposter Syndrome
Imposter syndrome can be a huge psychological barrier during the interview process particularly during technical interviews when it is important to show what value you can bring to a company. Imposter syndrome refers to a person’s self-doubt about whether they are capable of fulfilling the role and being successful in their chosen career. Even if a person is experienced, qualified, and an expert in their field, imposter syndrome can make them feel inadequate compared to other candidates.
If you are suffering from imposter syndrome during an interview then it is important to remember why you have been selected for the interview in the first place – because you have the experience and know-how to do the job! Although imposter syndrome can be hard to shrug off in some cases, there are ways to overcome it such as seeing a therapist talking things through with a professional career advisor.
Conclusion
Failing a technical interview is not always a case of lacking relevant experience or skills, it may also come down to biases and miscommunication by the interviewer, meaning your value may be overlooked. There are also psychological factors that may play a part, such as imposter syndrome that could prevent you from showcasing your expertise effectively.
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