Interview @ Microsoft
I was at Microsoft for an interview. At the end they asked me, if I have any questions for them. I thought this is my chance and asked,
"What is the optimum size of a team in a project, so that if we add more members, they do not contribute productivity equivalent to the percentage increase in the staff size and why ?"
What do you think they said?
"What is the optimum size of a team in a project, so that if we add more members, they do not contribute productivity equivalent to the percentage increase in the staff size and why ?"
What do you think they said?
Labels: outside-the-box, thinktank
posted by Rajesh Lal at
9:26 AM
29 Comments:
The economic law of diminishing returns would state that the number is 4 (or any more than 3, to put it another way).
But something tells me this might have more to it.
How would they not always be equal? If you increase staff by 20%, wouldn't the increase in work be 20%?
In my experience, they'd probably say you couldn't have too many people on a team.
My experience in IT has shown that 5 is the largest a group working should be before you start losing productivity per employee. With 5 people you will have someone in charge to help corrodinate the other workers, and communication is still kept simple without worrying about wh o is working on what. Although this is more true with 3 or 4 people, 5 seems to be the breaking point when communication becomes difficult.
The number is irrelevant. The quality of the work our workers can display on any given project is how we choose the members. Be it 1 or 100, however many people able to contribute without just taking up space is how many we use.
Thats what I think an exec would say.
I think the answer has got to be one. Add a second person and some portion of the effort goes to communication in some form.
You can argue that all of Microsoft’s office products are centered around making various aspects of this communication more efficient:
• Word and e-mail allows direct written communication
• Power-point is for presentation to groups and training
• Project provides a tool for breaking large projects up into smaller pieces and efficient co-ordination of a group of people to complete those pieces
So with that said, a Microsoft person might look at the question in terms of the inefficiency of two or more people communicating and answer “one”.
Productive work groups consist of a "Leader" who is leader of the meeting, a "Judge" who enforces groud rules, a "Gatekeeper" who helps keep on topic, a "Recorder" who is in charge of the flip chart, a "Timekeeper" who is in charge of alloted meeting time, and a "Sribe" who keep notes.
A total of five team members who each have equal roles, and have full ability to make as much input as any other.
More than anything, it is important to ensure each member of the team is empowered to make decisions that affect the group.
they told him that he is a nerd
WHERE ARE THE MICROSOFT GUYS HIDDEN?
ANSWER PLEASE ?
well i feel that there is no optimum number for all projects in general....doing my homework takes one persong optimumly (maybe 2 =])
but sending a man to space takes 100's of people optimumly....
leave it to gates to ask a question like this!!
^^^^^^^^^^^ohh and rob....in your scenerio no one does the work... they just keep time or enforce rules or something of that nature
the interviewers would say.."Great, you get the job" Why?
Because Microsoft staffs are too dumb to answer such question..
The maximum number people would depend on the size if the project; but in my expirience most people either over estimate the work load, or underestimate the abilities of there staff and they end up paying people to stand around. So i would say my answer would be whatever they think minus 1
First of all what Fiendish said is false. The law of diminishing returns states that there is a point at which adding more people does not improve productivity by the same ammount. It Does not state any specific point this would happen.Also given the fact that we have no information on the type work; this cannot be determined. This means the answer to this question is not that strait forward.
The question is " What do you think they siad?" which only LOL and Prometheus seemed to answer so far. Great Job,Your both right,thats what you think! Personally i think "they" would say nothing because that would assume they all speak at the same time, otherwise one person would say something. Without prior knowledge of the question, it seems hard to beleive they could prepare an in unison answer.
I also beleive it to be pretentious to assume that he was hired before even the end of the interview. Yes he said " so that if WE add more members" :-P
I haven't posted for a while, but this one is intriguing.
This interviewer would immediately know you're also applying for a job at Google, so would say something like "so, how much is Google offering?", or any number of other such answers.
An interviewer certainly wouldn't answer your question directly...unless to give you a wrong answer to make you do poorly on the Google Labs Aptitude Test you're quite obviously taking.
Well if i was the interviewer, Id say something like, "what a great question, i think we are at the optimun level of efficiency right now! I suppose theres no point in offering you the job."
^^^^^^very clever^^^^^^^
Very Clever in avoiding the question huh !
Well, I think it would be two because a team is made up of two or more people. My dad used to say ;
1 boy = 1 boy's work
2 boys = 1\2 a boys work
3 boys = no work at all
JohnR
It's not the intent of this puzzle to actually answer the question imo, but in corporate management we usually user 4-5 team members as a good starting point. You have increased time spent communicating, which reduces effeciency, but you also have more people thinking about innovative solutions to problems ("two heads are better than one"). There's also the matter of how granular you can realistically make the job owning to external project constraints: eg, two people mowing the lawn with one lawn mower does not get the job done twice as fast.
they said: "can you repeat the question?"
The minimum size that can complete the project on time and within budget. For a small project, one.
More than one is less effective.
For a large project whatever it takes. Although, sometimes, the budget is the controlling factor, and time takes a back seat.
they wouldn't have said a thing...a clear silence along with a crickets chirp when they tried to figure out in their mind what you had said....then they'd say i need to talk with my superior and then we'll call you, have a nice day (completely evading the question)
They would say;
"Please Contact our support team for more information."
This is actually funny!
The line "What do you think they said?" is the dead give away.
Ans:
"What do you think?" they said.
Yes Chai!
Beat me to it :)
headcage,
How can Chai "beat you to it" when your reply is a day later than his..
Noob faggot..
They said, "You're hired!"
ANSWER = 1 and 5
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DETAILS
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For the Question
What is the optimum size of a team in a project, so that if we add more members, they do not contribute productivity equivalent to the percentage increase in the staff size ?
Answer is one because the moment you add another member the percentage increase is 100 but some portion of the effort goes to communication in some form between the two.
Take a simple example
1. 1 man can do 1 unit of job in 1 day
2. If total unit is 10
3. Add a member and you have to coordinate between the member say 10% of the time every day
4. So two member can do that job in 5.5 days instead of 5 days
The productivity increased by 90%, less than the 100% increase in the staff size
OTHER ANSWER
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The other answer can be 5 If the question was truncated to the bare minimum
What is the optimum size of a team in a project, so that if we add more members, they do not contribute productivity ? Here there is no comparision to the staff increase. IMO its can be 5
GOT RIGHT
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Got 1: brennan gillis, mitchs, 5th anonymous guy,
Got 5: Baghtal, Rob
OTHER CREATIVE ANSWERS
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Thanks to, Steve for pointing the source of the question GLAT, and JohnR for sharing his dad's unique philosophy, and chai for creative answer.
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