In another question I asked recently about best practices for whiteboarding, there was general consensus that thinking out loud while coming up with the answer was the best strategy. Indeed, long moments of silence are awkward.However after recent interviews I have noticed that if my thinking out loud leads to wrong solutions or down the wrong path, that with further consideration I would have seen, interviewers tend to quickly jump in and point out problems with my approach, especially if I stop to pause for a minute. This was not an isolated case, and happened during more than one interview with more than one interviewer. The other thing is that after the interview, on a problem I absolutely bombed, when I sat down and sketched out the problem on a piece of paper in silence I was able to sketch out the solution pretty quickly. Thinking out loud ends up with me spending brain cycles on reflecting on how what I say must be registering with the interviewer and in addition there's a fear of recognizing that I've gone down the wrong path and starting over after having written something on the board wastes a lot of time. Once you've started down one path and realize you've written a lot of junk, you can't undo it, whereas if you've thought quietly about it the interviewer wouldn't have seen the mess and it would have been quicker since whiteboarding a bad idea takes up more time than simply considering a bad idea.I don't want moments of silence but at the same time speaking takes more time, leads to self-consciousness and can lead to interviewer intervention on something I might have figured out myself with just a little more time.
Is thinking out loud during an interview really the best strategy?
problem solving
It may not the best strategy for you, but it surely is nice for the interviewers, as long as you don't go Full Metal Jacket-crazy on them.Most interviewers appreciate that (at least for programming positions), as it allows them to:evaluate your thought-process,and guide you if you're on the wrong track.But feel free to say hang on, let me have a think about this and think things through before rambling on too much. Take your time; but don't let them hanging for ages. They are anxious to see if you're stuck or not.Also, being on the wrong path at first is not a bad thing: it is your throught process. It's incremental and you need encounter issues along the way. Fairly normal. It's only bad if you don't see that you're on the wrong track, or refuse to see it when told so, and then don't manage to find the right way.It helps to get the conversation flowing and going forward.