We are constantly updating HackerRank for Work with new improvements and fixes. Here is a summary of customer-facing updates we have made from July 8th, 2020, to October 7th, 2020.
Developer Skills Platform
Plan
Create Custom Roles
We now offer the ability to create custom roles. You can start with a role from HackerRank as a starting point and duplicate it to customize to your needs.
Custom Roles for Test and Interviews
The custom roles that you create can then be used as the basis for both tests and interviews. When creating a test, you can choose questions for the test based on the skills in the role. For interviews, the custom role will dictate which skills are shown in the scorecard to interviewers.
The candidate packet for candidates will also show the skills that are selected for the custom role.
Source
Virtual Career Fair Overview
This quarter we launched HackerRank’s first Virtual Career Fair with 53 companies and over 20,000 student sign-ups. The three-day event allowed students to learn more about companies through their profiles and dozens of live AMA, info, and panel sessions. If a student was interested in applying, they were able to do so directly through the fair.
If you would like to participate in future Virtual Career Fairs, please reach out to your Customer Success Manager.
VCF Exhibitor Profiles
Sourcing Tab Updates
We introduced a new sourcing tab built for the Virtual Career Fair. The sourcing tab allows recruiters to organize, review, and message candidates that they receive through the fair. The candidate profiles are shown here mix standard candidate info like school and resumes with HackerRank skill data points like certifications, badges, and contest results.
Screen
Code Review Question Type
We added a new Code Review question type. These questions have been designed to give candidates a real-world task - review the code written by someone else and provide feedback on it. This task is ideal for more senior-level candidates who are expected to have existing industry experience. They may be managers, mentors, or simply contributing members of a high performing team.
Code Review questions are manually graded, as there is no automated way to read the feedback or judge their seniority. However, written comments from the candidate can provide a really good signal of their seniority and experience in a relatively short amount of time for the candidate.
Read more or take the candidate experience to a test drive with this sample test.
Online IDE Button for Project Tests
We made three changes for tests that have one or more Project questions:
- We updated the software requirements section to be more crisp and helpful
- We added a new “I’ll work on the online IDE” button. This is constant feedback we received from candidates, they preferred working on the online IDE more
- The online IDE inside the test is now out of Beta.
These updates were completely driven by the feedback we received from candidates. They consistently shared that they preferred working on the online IDE and didn’t want to set up their local environment.
Update the software instructions field for Projects
We have added a new optional field for Project questions to customize the software instructions. These instructions are provided to the candidate to help set up the local environment if they choose to work on their local machine. Through this new field, question creators can now modify the instructions as per their question instead of relying on default instructions.
Copy/Paste Proctoring
Interview
Projects in Interviews
With projects in interviews, real world problems using advanced skills and frameworks can be interviewed with ease and will give a deeper view of the candidate’s capabilities. We currently support React, Angular, Node, Springboot, RoR, Django, .NET, and Data Science skills with Projects in interviews.
Individual Interviewer Scorecard
Previously, the scorecard inside an interview session was shared between all interviewers. When more interviewers were using a single interview session, it made it hard for them to write their individual feedback. Each interviewer now gets their own private scorecard in the interview and it is not visible to the other interviewers.
Freehand in Whiteboard
During an interview, it may be easier to sketch out a custom shape instead of using the default boxes and circles. We have now added a freehand pen on the whiteboard.
You can try this feature on this page by clicking the “Try it Now” button.
Rank
Candidate Packet
The candidate packet is a single view of a candidate and all of the data points HackerRank has on their skills, including how they did on test questions and any feedback given to them by interviewers.
Candidate Packet - Public Profile
We have added a new tab in the candidate packet named Public profile. This tab shows the candidate's activity on the HackerRank Community - including any Skill Certifications, Badges, Contests, etc. This tab will show up if a candidate selects “Share my HackerRank profile with HackerRank” before taking a HackerRank test.
Benchmarking - CodeScreen
Benchmarking refers to the comparison of a candidate’s scores on specific skills against a cohort of candidates who have been assessed on the same set of skills. For a hiring manager, it is crucial to make hiring decisions that can be backed by data and this is where benchmarking can help.
When a candidate takes a test with questions that are tagged with Skills, you will see their benchmark next to that skill. You have the option to compare the candidate against other candidates in the company or against all candidates HackerRank has ever seen.
Benchmarking - Interviews
We have also added benchmarking capabilities for the feedback given during an interview. In this case, we want to give insights about the interviewers. Does one interviewer always give 5 stars, even for mediocre interviews? We show you how the rating the interviewer has given compares to their average rating, which tells you if this candidate is better than average.
Enterprise Capabilities
Admin
Just-In-Time Provisioning of Users
It is often a challenge to manage who has access to HackerRank, either to view test reports or give an interview. Customers who use Single Sign On can now make use of just-in-time provisioning. By setting up your domain, you can redirect any users with a corporate email address to your SSO sign-in page. If they are able to successfully log in, HackerRank will create a user account for them seamlessly.
Bypass Login for SSO Companies
If you are using Single Sign On, the system will bypass the HackerRank login page for test reports and take you directly to the corporate SSO sign in page. For many users who are logged into SSO all day, they will go directly to the report page.
You can use the Just-In-Time provisioning feature and this improvement to give employees frictionless access to shared test reports.
Link Invite for Interviewers
We have added Interviewer as an option when inviting colleagues to join your team in HackerRank. Prior to this, you had to select either Recruiter or Developer.
Read More about Link Invites.
Integrations
Google Calendar + HackerRank Interviews Integration
We’ve launched calendar add-ons to make remote interview scheduling seamless!
Our calendar add-ons let you create a calendar event, add a HackerRank Interview link, and send the interview details to attendees all through your calendar.
Recruiting coordinators scheduling remote interviews can use one button to add a HackerRank Interview link to their Google Calendar invitation.
Scheduling a remote interview is now easier than ever!
Get our Google Calendar add-on now!
Check out our Feature Showcase for Quick Setup and more information.
Outlook Calendar + HackerRank Interviews Integration
We’ve launched calendar add-ons to make remote interview scheduling seamless!
Our calendar add-ons let you create a calendar event, add a HackerRank Interview link, and send the interview details to attendees all through your calendar.
Recruiting coordinators scheduling remote interviews can use one button to add a HackerRank Interview link to their Microsoft Outlook invitation.
Scheduling a remote interview is now easier than ever!
Get our Outlook add-on now!
Check out our Feature Showcase for Quick Setup and more information.
New ATS Integrations Settings page
We have revamped the ATS Integrations Settings page. This new page enables you to find your ATS and set it up much quicker than before.
With clearly outlined steps, support guides, and a cleaner interface, we have provided the company administrators with an intuitive experience to set up your ATS Integrations.
Library
QA Engineer Role Launch
HackerRank now enables Selenium Skills that can be leveraged to assess QA Engineers and Back-End Developers. Selenium is one of the most frequently requested Skills by Customers and one of the key skills required to be assessed for a QA Engineer. Selenium skills are defined with the key competencies on the Skills Directory. Browse through the library questions here.
Read more about it in the support article.
Dev UX
Improvements
- We have upgraded to MYSQL 8.0 and TSQL 2019 databases and also improved our infrastructure to execute database queries faster so that candidates have a better experience in their tests and interviews.
- We have upgraded REPL Console in Interview to match the version of the HackerRank Code Environment. Users can now copy their code to the console and execute them in real-time without a worry.
- The code editor across our platform will now support compile-time error detection in Java and Ruby.
- When candidates code execution exceeds our time limits, we now show the time limit within the test case UI itself. Previously, this limit was only available in our environment documentation and was hard for the candidates to find during a test.
Fixed Issues
Multiple customer-impacting issues were fixed during Q2. Here are some of the top issues that were fixed:
- Interview sessions abruptly ending
- Code Review zip file upload issues
- Boot failed error in projects
- Loading candidate list