There are tons of studies and writings on the pitfalls of the ‘first five minutes of an interview’ in the professional world. Very often, interviewers make initial assessments in the first five minutes and then spend the rest of the allocated time confirming those initial assessments. We all, both interviewers and interviewees, are susceptible to this ‘first five minutes’ problem. Structured interviews, awareness of such pitfalls, training, and experience help us avoid this trap. However, my interview at Pure Storage was a very good example of this ‘first five minutes’ problem – a classic case study of confirmation bias.

An interviewer asked me to write a function to draw a circle. While writing the code and engaging in conversation, it was quite clear he was looking for a very specific approach and expected me to write code accordingly. He wasn’t interested in different approaches and trade-offs. He was discarding other approaches with highly opinionated statements, which is a sign of strong-headedness and a my-way-or-the-highway attitude. Within the first fifteen minutes, it was very clear to me that he had already made his ‘initial assessments,’ and the rest of the interview was a mere formality.

Draw a circle.