The fifth and final episode for Be The Next Microsoft Employee went live today and I could not wait to watch. The first four weeks we got a lot of insight into the candidates and into Microsoft. We learned which of the candidates had stronger technical skills and which ones had stronger communication skills. We also learned that Microsoft was looking for someone that is well rounded in many areas. If Microsoft were only interested in technical skills they would park a van filled with bags of cash outside the MIT graduation ceremonies (BTW, if Microsoft needs someone to drive that van, I am familiar with Cambridge, just sayin’).
When we saw the four candidates at the end of the last show Buck Woody (blog | @buckwoody) was giving them their assignment at dinner. I am guessing the idea was to see if they would collaborate or if they would decide to stay up all night and work on the challenge alone. They each chose to go it alone and I can only wonder if they may have been able to get some sleep had they worked together. I think there is a good chance they would have stayed up all night anyway, even working as a group.
The next day the four candidates were given the chance to present their solutions to the judges. Besides Buck and Tim there was also Pete Harris (@SQLPete) and Karen Lopez (blog | @datachick). The presentations themselves were mostly filled with stuff you wouldn’t remember from a meeting because it had likely put you to sleep. I’m not sure if the presentations were lacking due to the candidates being nervous, or if they were tired, or if it was just a result of the way the episode was edited. I found it hard to pick a clear winner based upon what I saw.
The judges did not have that issue and they chose Boston Mike as the winner of the challenge. His prize was a free registration to the upcoming PASS Summit in Seattle this November, and I can’t wait to have a chance to meet Mike while there.
After the challenge results were done it was time to announce the overall winner. Instead of making us wait a week and airing a special two hour episode live from the Public Market the producers decided to just have Tim announce the winner.
It was Boston Mike!
I really enjoyed this show. It gave wonderful insight into all the skills that data professionals need in order to be successful. You need more than just hard technical skills, you need to be able to communicate your ideas in a way for others to understand. Companies like Microsoft need more than just folks with good technical skills, and this show helps to reinforce how important it is to work on all areas of professional development.
Here’s hoping Microsoft does a similar show the next time they need to hire an executive!
I thought all of the candidates were pretty weak. I was kind of shocked really with how unknowledgedable they were. When I saw this I was thinking that the participants would be pretty stellar and may beyond my level, but I felt like I was more knowledgeable than of the of the contestants.
Still, it was interesting.
I’m not sure what knowledge you were expecting to see, but I suspect you wanted to see some hard-core SQL skills. What would have you considered to be “stellar”?
Also keep in mind a very simple fact: they were available. I bet there were at least a dozen or so people that applied but did not make it as far in the process because there is no way their current employer would let them leave work for a week to interview with Microsoft.
I think these four did a very good job considering all the pressure they were under. And let’s not forget that the show likely was creative with some of their editing.
I agree with RGP. Hopefully the job includes some training.
I’m sure Microsoft offers some training programs. I hear they have this thing called an MCM program…
In response to both posters who thought the candidates were weak….. it is soooooo easy to underestimate the stress of being interviewed, competition style, on camera, in front of the whole world, with ‘you failed’ challenge number x ringing in your ears, while living away from home, while trying to simultaneously do your day job entirely remotely.
I attended an intensive t-sql course taught by an MVP who is one of the best authors, speakers, and SQL educators out there. All the attendees were pros. One challenge given to us near the end of the five day course was: write code to update col1 of a table with the data from col2 and vice versa.
We spent an hour. The answer:
UPDATE tbl SET col1 = col2, col2 = col1;
This works because of the all-at-once nature of SQL Server. Looks dirt simple, huh? So easy everyone who writes t-sql should be able to toss this off in two seconds? Not if you’re second guessing yourself… working under stress….. have recently been fooled by deceptive questions, have been learning tons of new things and have a full brain, and/or haven’t learned the all-at-once concept in a way that it would make it immediately spring to mind here.
The point is…. they’re not MCM’s, but the group did better than you think. Certainly an enlightening presentation by Microsoft for many reasons. Enjoyed it.
Spot. On.
You’re right – what was edited did not show the full breadth of what these candidates went through in each challenge – have you been following the posts that go “behind the scenes” in each one? http://borntolearn.mslearn.net/btl/b/bethenext/archive/2012/08/21/be-the-next-microsoft-employee-fifth-challenge-i-am-the-architect-i-designed-the-matrix.aspx