I have a situation that was put to me today that raised some red flags.
For a Unity C# developer role I was asked to send an entire Unity Project to them for assessment.
The situation is thus that they first said they wanted to assess my coding abilities, fair enough I thought and asked what criteria they would be assessing against, I was assuming that it would be legibility, clear naming conventions etc.
Then they said they would prefer an entire Unity Project,the problem being this particular role is tied to Virtual and Augmented Reality where my particular projects are innovative because of the way the coding/animations/interactions/etc. in the project has been pieced together, they are not copy paste solutions and their worth is in the fact that they are original.
Sending them an entire Unity Project would be leaving me wide open to theft, so I put it to them that I would be happy to present this from my own hardware at an interview.
I have to wonder, is this sort of request the norm? Am I being too cautious?
It seems really shonky and I get the feeling the company (which doesn’t have any spectacular projects from a coding point of view) is looking to pilfer things…
I think bringing the project in and showing it would be acceptable. If they have a problem with that, I’d move along. not worth your time and potential loss of effort IMO.
I think it is the most reasonable solution in this situation, especially if you’re planning to visit them in person. I would probably do the same thing in this situation.
Using your own hardware is probably the best solution.
If that can’t happen and your project is worth a substantial amount (perhaps have a trusted person evaluate it) then have a lawyer create an non-disclosure agreement or whatever the lawyer suggests. If they won’t sign that agreement then you know they are fishy. However if your project does not have any real value other than for yourself then you may want to proceed without expensive insurance. Only you can decide the risk vs reward ratio.
Do some open source projects, like game jams, so you have some examples you can hand out at will
Build or contribute to a few open source tools
Build a demo project that you don’t mind handing out
Offer to walk them through one of your projects without sending it in
As a general rule you shouldn’t be sending in your own proprietary projects that you intend to commercialise. Not should you even show them projects you’ve worked on for others, unless the IP owner has made it publically available.
You’ve also got to remember a lot of VR studios are incredibally tiny and have no idea what they are doing when it comes to HR stuff. Just have an open chat about what they need, and your concerns. You can even spin it as a positive, you’ll be an employee that will be very conscious of protecting their IP.
But ultimately requiring a potential employee to jump through a lot of hoops isn’t a good sign. The hoop jumping won’t stop after you get the job. If a company has a 17 step hiring process, you can bet the rest of their processes will be just as long.
I think I may have burned a bridge but in all honesty I don’t think anything good would have come of it.
An NDA at this point would be a little too far as I don’t know all that much about the criteria they are looking for, the problem is that I’m negotiating with other companies in regards to licensing agreements to continue developing further, so handing it to someone on a platter for free when it’s not yet in the public domain would be a really dumb move, particularly when a company is still in direct competition with me if I’m not working for them.
I’ve been searching whether this has been asked of other people and so far I have not found anything, so that’s kind of iffy in itself.
When you’re right you’re right, I have done game jams but not in a coding role which doesn’t really help me i this situation. I have no issue with showing projects in the public domain because that covers my ass in regards to theft, it’s an all round difficult situation.
I have been in situations before where the interviewers weren’t really in a position to test my knowledge through questioning because it wasn’t their background and they were managers or similar.
I think the biggest red flag is the lack of interaction innovation in their work, it either means they know they need a person in or just their ideas…
I’ll admit it’s not useful advice for now. It’s not like you can magically produce an open source project overnight for them.
Yeah, that kind of sucks. In my industry it’s fairly standard for the first point of contact to be an HR consultant who knows virtually nothing of the technical side of the industry. Learning to talk HR is an art in and of itself.
These days I straight up ask the interviewer what their background is. Saves a bunch of pointless guessing.
I would say that the fact that you have concerns about this means you should probably thank them for their interest and look elsewhere. It’s kind of a good gut check. Look at it this way, an interview goes both ways, as much as they are considering you for a job/contract, you are also interviewing them to determine if you want to work for them. If you have any concerns about their trustworthiness, or they ask for something that sounds odd or unusual, take it as a red flag.
Code samples are not uncommon. Bringing a laptop/device to an interview to show more & sensitive stuff is very common. Sending a complete game/project/source is not.
Go with your first instinct. You saw red flags and had concerns, find someplace else that doesn’t make you feel that way.
Good luck!
Did they ask for a particular project, or did they just ask you to send something and your main IP project is the only one you thought of or have to share? If they specifically asked for you to share something in an area you’d otherwise be competing in… huge warning sign. Even if the work is awesome they don’t have to hire you and they’ve got your stuff.
Like @zombiegorilla says, these things work both ways. If they’re making you feel genuinely uncomfortable before the job even begins then how do you think it’s going to go after that?
More the latter than the former however due to the area it would be hard to show anything that is not my IP, they have now asked me to do a 2 hour “test” and the way I’m reading it is they want me to create a usable solution for them for free.
I’ve asked for clarification regarding the test, but honestly I’m not treating this prospect seriously anymore, it’s a tiny company yet somehow they are getting one-off outsourced work from triple AAA game companies that have bad reviews regarding content/cost of game.
All in all it reeks of nepotism, working with such projects you’d think they’d have a tip-top team, but I’ve looked at their team and it’s… surprising in a bad way, I don’t understand how the people working their got hired.
You’re right, I am no longer treating this situation seriously as it really does feel like a scam.
Programming tests are very common and usually preferred over code samples. But typically they are generic in nature. Or something related to the work you are being hired for. In some cases the present a challenge they have had in the past and see what your solution would be. That is useful, as it show if you think outside the box, or how your problem solving works. I would hope a 2 hour test wouldn’t actually be useful for their team, just to asses your skill. If it is too specific or want more than pseudo code that would be worrying.
I have few friends at google now, one just recently. He spent several days, over ten interviews and at least 12 hours (in small chunks) doing code tests. A couple were actually unsolvable (kobiashi maru). But it was google, and a senior role. Being who they are, even having proven experience only gets you in the door. Upside, other employers know about googles vetting. Future interviews at other places will be abbreviated.
Agree with @zombiegorilla regarding ‘gut check’, if it feels wrong its a warning sign. Even if its not indicative of malicious intent, it probably means you wont fit together.
That said a few things of note to me:
“I think the biggest red flag is the lack of interaction innovation in their work, it either means they know they need a person in or just their ideas…”
It completely reasonable to hire people for their ideas. In fact for many being hired to provide ideas would be considered a good thing. Even if you think you have the next unicorn idea, if you don’t have the skills, resources, or connections to get it off the ground its worth nothing. Of course in this case if you have no faith in their ability to deliver its somewhat moot.
Programming tests are very common. I would only consider it a red flag if they are asking for something very specific. Even then patching something functional together out of a bunch of 2 hour programming tests is an exercise in orchestration and project management that suggests a very high degree of skill. If you could do it, you probably wouldn’t need to
EDIT: To the original question… before I had assets, portfolio, etc, to point to, I did a few small but complete unity projects as interview pieces. I wouldn’t spend any more time on this than a programming test (say max 4 hours for a high paying/full time job).
That I completely understand but in association with asking for an entire Unity Project I really don’t feel this is the case, particularly that they haven’t defined the role they are trying to fill, they’re just looking for someone with Unity C#.
I totally get that, it’s the fact they haven’t defined the role that bugs me the most. It’s like “yeah, anybody that does a thing”, they haven’t clarified whether it’s more production within Unity or just purely coding C# in Unity, they haven’t clarified experience expectation or education background or anything really.
If they’re not taking a serious approach to defining who they are looking for then it suggests they aren’t planning on taking any possible candidates seriously.
In addition to your edit, this work is definitely not going to be high paying. Their team judging by prior experience and skill set would not be highly paid coming to the company. It looks like low-balling opportunism rather than headhunting talent.
Better safe than sorry?