The activities that happen during Happy Hours would vary from those focused on craftsmanship (e.g. pair programming), through those that validate how one thinks (e.g. design workshop), to those that tackle soft skills (e.g. a chit chat about candidate’s stories of teamwork).
Below you can find some examples of activities we propose to our candidates. Note: we come up with new ideas every year and this is not a definite list. Don't overprepare!
During the creative workshop, the group of 3-5 people analyzes an imaginary problem and tries to find possible solutions to it. The form is different every time. There will be plenty of time for you to influence the direction the workshop will take. We don’t expect you to have knowledge of product/problem discovery and design. What we’re looking for are great teamwork skills, general orientation in the elements constructing web and mobile interfaces and creativity.
We were brainstorming and doing rapid sketches of solutions to different problems. This allowed us to get to know the candidates a little bit more, give them a creative boost at the beginning of the day and see how they behave when they’re part of a team. Some of the problems that we solved were: assigning emergencies to superheroes, deciding how to find a perfect plant for your home or what to cook with the ingredients from your fridge. It was a fun time filled with some great ideas and positive energy.
Brainstorming, building mockups, user story mapping.
General knowledge of lean methodology and design thinking practices.
Internship candidates, testers, product owners, designers.
During storytelling conversation, you’ll spend time sharing stories from your experience. The conversation is moderated by one of us, but usually more Lunar folks will pop up to listen to your stories and contribute with their questions.
Often my part during Happy Hours is storytelling. Storylistening actually. I ask candidates to tell lots and lots of stories about different things. What do I look for? Mostly I want to sense how they think about collaboration, teamwork, how much they are concerned about teammates and how they react when something happens to other people. The best part is always that I can see a genuine, unique person with a story in each candidate, be it a bass guitarist, coffee geek, or a nurse.
Teamwork experience, solving real-life problems, perception of others.
Being open and honest. You can also watch this.
Most of the candidates.
Our developers always have some nifty algorithm tasks to put in front of our candidates. After a quick explanation of the exercise, you’ll get to solve the task on the whiteboard. The perfect solution is not the most important thing for us! We’re looking for people who can approach the problem with a positive attitude, explain their thoughts and catch clues given by us.
On algo we had a riddle for each of the candidates. While solving it together, we were looking at how well the candidate was explaining their thoughts, catching our clues and proceeding with their thought process. Algo lets us check the candidate’s logical thinking, communication skills and how they deal with a difficult task. We were pleased to discover that everyone solved our riddle this year!
There are N dogs standing in a line. Each dog is assigned a rating value. You are giving treats to these dogs subjected to the following requirements: 1. Each dog must have at least one treat. 2. Dogs with a higher rating get more treats than their neighbors. What is the minimum number of treats you must give?
Solving logical riddles and algorithmic tasks.
Internship candidates, developers, testers.
You can expect taking part in one or more pair programming sessions with our developers. The sessions involve working on exercises, katas or simple programming features that will allow us to judge the level of your programming knowledge. The difficulty of pair programming problem will be adjusted to candidates experience and our expectations (we have some easy tasks for future interns and some more difficult for those applying for more senior positions).
The candidates were creating a simple program that plays with a given text in any language they know. I was helping them with planning their work and an algorithm on paper, then turning into human Stack Overflow when they were actually writing a code :D
Checking if the number is even or odd, findind out how many times given element appears in an array.
Internship candidates, developers, testers.
Intro exercises or some practise on Codewars.
We don’t want you to be hungry! Somewhere in between the tasks you’ll be facing, we’ll invite you to eat lunch with us. We offer many options to choose from. Usually, we decide to order something or go to a nearby bistro. We respect candidates’ various nutritional needs and habits. Don’t hesitate to share with us your needs and we’ll do our best to provide you with something delicious. If you’re sure that we won’t be able to satisfy your needs though, feel free to bring your own meal. We have a fully equipped kitchen available, where you’ll be able to heat the food, spice it and serve it.
There is no need to bring your own laptop or prepare anything beforehand. However, if there is anything you would like to show to us - feel free to bring with you anything you want. Some people feel better coding on their own machines. If it will help you, feel free to take one with you.
When we're planning to hire more than one person we tend to invite more than one candidate for Happy Hours. Most often it happens in the case of internships recruitment. Inviting two-three candidates allows us not only to perform individual tasks but also to check how they're going to cooperate as an ad hoc team. In case of such setup, we'd like you to optimise for mutual support and cooperation. You might be meeting your future internship teammate after all.
We’ll do our best to make you feel taken care of in our office. If there is anything we did not think of or do not know yet, please don’t hesitate to let any of us know. We’re happy to adjust to your needs and habits. Is the room you’re in too loud? Would you like a break to unwind? Do you have any questions about how we work? Don’t be afraid to influence the way things will be happening! Happy Hours is also a time for you to find out everything you need about our company and check if this is the place where you’re going to shine.
