During our most recent Trusted Tech Talk, Building High Performance Engineering Teams, one of the most frequently asked questions was: “If you don’t use coding challenges in your interview process, how do you evaluate candidates to ensure they can do the job?” It’s a valid concern, especially in a market where technical skill needs to be balanced with business fit, speed, and experience. And with more companies opting for leaner, more candidate-friendly hiring processes, it's essential to find alternative ways to confidently validate technical ability.

At Maxwell Bond, we work with some of the UK, EU, and US’s most innovative tech employers, and we’ve seen first-hand how engineering leaders are rethinking traditional assessment methods without compromising on quality.

 

Why Coding Challenges Are Falling Out of Favour

Coding challenges often demand significant time investment from candidates and don’t always reflect real-world scenarios. While useful in some cases, many businesses now view them as outdated, especially when speed of hire and candidate experience are critical. Instead, leading employers are taking a more nuanced and structured approach to technical assessment.

 

Here Are 5 Proven Alternatives to Coding Challenges:

  1. Technical Deep Dive Interviews
    Conduct a detailed walkthrough of a past project or codebase. Ask candidates to explain the problem, their approach, the tools they used, and how they overcame obstacles. This reveals both depth of knowledge and practical application.

  2. System Design Exercises
    Discuss architecture and design patterns relevant to your business challenges. This helps assess problem-solving, scalability understanding, and technical leadership in real-time, especially for senior hires.

  3. Pair Programming or Whiteboarding Sessions
    For roles that require collaboration, many hiring managers now opt for live sessions where candidates solve simplified problems together with a team member. This simulates real working conditions and highlights communication style and technical fluency.

  4. Asynchronous Take-Home Tasks (Optional)
    If testing is needed, make it short, highly relevant, and optional. This ensures candidates aren’t discouraged from progressing, while still providing insight into their capabilities.

  5. Use of Probation Periods as an Assessment Window
    Trust in your hiring process and team’s judgment, and structure a clear plan for the candidate’s first 90 days to assess performance. This removes friction from the hiring stage and focuses evaluation where it matters most: on the job.

 

How Maxwell Bond Helps You Get it Right

At Maxwell Bond, we support hiring managers in crafting hiring processes that are tailored, inclusive, and effective. Whether you're hiring your first engineer or scaling a product team across the UK, US or Europe, we provide market insights, benchmarking, and candidate screening processes that go beyond a CV or a coding test.

We help you evaluate candidates based on real outcomes, experience, and cultural alignment, ensuring the technical bar remains high while removing unnecessary roadblocks.

 

Looking to Rebuild Your Tech Hiring Process?

We’d love to help. Our team has placed hundreds of engineering professionals into scaling businesses and high-growth teams – across Software Development, DevOps, Cloud, and Product. Whether you're hiring locally or globally, we’ll help you create a hiring journey that ensures you attract, assess, and secure the best talent.