How to Test Yourself?

[David Habercom]

This follows a question I asked in October about how to find a qualified
successor for my job when I retire in about a year.

I am self-taught in Access & VBA and not especially talented, but I have
built and maintained a small database for several years. The work we do --
private fund raising for a public university (US) -- is complicated, and the
database and code reflect that. I am anxious (and so are my bosses) to find
someone who can 1) understand what I have done, 2) improve on it for the long
term, and 3) handle an intense reporting schedule among a bunch of
non-technical professionals who don't grasp how difficult the job really is.
(But they do leave you alone, since magicians and shamans shouldn't be
disturbed...)

After my earlier post, I concluded that we should give thought to requiring
finalists for the job to demonstrate their ability by designing a database
from scratch. As I think about that prospect, here are the questions that
come to my mind. I would appreciate your answers and any additional
suggestions.

1) Clearly we should provide some raw data for the test, but in what form?
Since I regularly have to import from other systems which output Excel or
ASCII files, should we provide those? Or is importing so simple we should
just hand the person some tables?

2) How much direction should we give? Is a generic set of requirements
(build tables, design a form, create a report with subreports, etc.)
sufficient, or should we require a design that parallels the actual
combination of tables, queries, reports & modules we use? Or should we just
give a "word problem," such as: take these 3 excel and 2 ASCII files and
produce a report which does such-and-such, etc.?

3) How much time should we allow each candidate for a test? A week? Two?
Three? We want the test to be revealing, but we need to be reasonable with
the candidates.

4) Who can we call on to help evaluate the results? I will certainly have
my own opinion, but I think the university should find someone with more
talent & experience than I have to judge the technical aspects of each
person's work.

I look forward to your good counsel. Thanks.

 

[Sailormike]

I don't see that requiring a design means much. You have a design. You aren't
re-writing this app, only improving it. And importing data (from those
sources) is fairly simple.

Why not give the applicant a copy of ur .mdb file (only the tables) with 10
or so records (fictional data) and ask him\her to produce a report that you
actually have. U might even delete the relationships in the relationship
window.

Give the app a hard copy of the report (u might have to pencil in field
names). Just looking the data it might not be clear where it came from, allow
about 30min. and see what you get back. If the result is a report close to
what u gave him then he knows relationships queries and report design.

Almost certainly he knows forms. You might ask him to give you back the .MDB
with the report and a frmAddNewRecord and some new records added.

BTW, the sign on my office says "Temperamental artisté at work. Disturb at
your own risk."

Sounds like an interesting job. How much are you paying?
--
Thanx
SailorMike

PS American Express asked me here for a copy of the last app I wrote. They
gave it to their dB guys who REALLY torn it apart. But I did get the job,
just bruised my ego.

 

[Jeff Boyce]

Has your department decided to restrict the pool of applicants to on-site
only? You might find a wider range of experience if you entertain the
possibility of someone "remote" (but accessible via Internet).

As you mentioned, you'll need some way to evaluate the responses you
receive. Are you willing to go with "expert opinion", or do you have some
objective measures you'll want to enforce (?also)?

The speed with which the job gets done is, in my opinion, less important
than the quality. A well-designed and built solution that rarely "breaks",
is fairly user-proof, and has the flexibility to adapt to changing
circumstances would be more valuable to me than a "brittle", inflexible
product that needs regular maintenance to keep running. How will you
evaluate the robustness of the solutions you are provided?

A few thoughts...

--
Regards

Jeff Boyce
Microsoft Office/Access MVP


Microsoft IT Academy Program Mentor
http://microsoftitacademy.com/

 

[David Habercom]

Thanks, Sailor. Interesting approach. We might go for that, rather than a
from-scratch test. Too early to say what the salary range will be, but
considerably less than mine after 20 years, which is US$49K + generous
benefits, including medical.

 

[David Habercom]

Good questions, Jeff. It is hard for me to imagine this working as a remote
job. It might be possible, but given the decidedly hands-on preferences of
professional fundraisers -- the consummate grip-and-grin personalities -- I
know they would resist the idea.

My concern about speed is driven primarily by wanting to fit the exercise
into the university's hiring process, which already is sloooww. Your point
about robustness, OTH, sounds right on.

To follow up on the "expert opinion" question: the university has a bunch of
OIT professionals in other departments, including SQL gurus. Might we just
look there for someone to help evaluate?

Thanks.

 

[Tony Toews]

(But they do leave you alone, since magicians and shamans shouldn't be
disturbed...)

Hahahaha. My liaison at a current client is quite good at this. If
he is leaving the office for a while or returning he'll just knock on
the wall beside me, ask if I need him for something and then quickly
leave if I say no. No wasted chit chat. He knows he doesn't want to
disturb my train of thought.

Tony
--
Tony Toews, Microsoft Access MVP
Please respond only in the newsgroups so that others can
read the entire thread of messages.
Microsoft Access Links, Hints, Tips & Accounting Systems at
http://www.granite.ab.ca/accsmstr.htm

 

[Jeff Boyce]

David

I don't know about your SQL gurus, but the ones I've come into contact with
are, shall we say, less than appreciative of what Access can do (the phrase
"toy db" comes to mind). Unless you know the background, philosophy and
experience of the "experts", you're only trading your impressions for
someone else's. If you've been at it for a while now, I suspect you'll be
able to rate what applicants offer on some sort of scale, perhaps something
like:

* (hmmm, I learned that 10 years ago)
* seems workable
* I can follow this, but it's a stretch
* whoa! how did s/he do that?!

Remember, too, that if you are evaluating a person's Access capabilities,
the approach they would take to solving an issue may not be the same
approach you've learned. For me, the bottom line is "does the user have
something that does what s/he wants it to, is easy to use (and to teach to
someone new), and 'just keeps going...'"?

--
Regards

Jeff Boyce
Microsoft Office/Access MVP


Microsoft IT Academy Program Mentor
http://microsoftitacademy.com/