Comment by _jab

Sometimes when I give simpler technical questions (applies to system design too), candidates begin to massively overthink it. The question seems so simple that they start anticipating high-scope extensions that don't actually exist, like turning a basic algorithm into a distributed, high-availability pipeline. There's only so much you can do as an interviewer to rein candidates back in at that point, and those interviews tend to go off the rails pretty quickly, with little code actually ending up being written.

Thing is, I reckon those candidates aren't a good fit anyways. The biggest mistake I see engineers who join startups make is that they pursue excessively sophisticated solutions, with robustness that does not justify the added complexity. I'm sure these candidates are smart, but they're not good fits for the high-velocity, simplicity-obsessed technical environment of a product-play startup.