Intro to Whiteboarding

The Reality of It

This phase of whiteboarding consists of questioning your interviewer’s proposal before answering it.
Interviewers often misphrase or miscommunicate aspects of problems.
- This is sometimes intentional to see if the interviewee will notice.
- This is often times completely by mistake
Having the confidence to question your interviewer is part of the interview process.

Confidence in understanding the language comes from
1. having a vocabulary to interpret, and
2. lexicon to respond with
No one person can remember the meaning of every word.
It is acceptable to not know the meaning of every word of a question an interviewer is asking.
It is not acceptable to answer a question an interviewer is asking without first clarifying the meaning of every word whose meaning is not known.

Generally, interviewers tend to have a pompous air about them more than the average person.
The interviewer is obligated to answer nearly every question regarding the original problem statement.
- Their aggression often comes from their own inability to properly express the definition of a particular phrase or word; often rendering them “the dummy” in the interview.
- Please, do not allow this air to intimidate you or deter you from your objective.

Pompous interviewers often reject questions that are ill-formulated.
Though, conversationally acceptable, the following question-structures are often met with a sense of pretention.
- “What do you mean?”
- “What’s that mean?”
- “What does that mean?”
- “What’s suchandsuch mean?”
- “What does suchandsuch mean?”
Consider the ask as code compilation; if the interviewer uses a word that you are not sure about, then probe for the definition.
Try using this exact verbiage as it has been proven to have positive responses
- “What is meant by suchandsuch?”