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Felix Rieseberg, an Anthropic hiring manager who has led Claude Cowork and Claude Desktop, says his team has stopped asking coding questions in software engineering interviews. The reported reason is that the team found data-structures-and-algorithms interviews gave it no useful signal; the source does not establish that Anthropic has changed its company-wide hiring policy.
Felix Rieseberg, an Anthropic hiring manager who has led Claude Cowork and Claude Desktop, says his team has stopped asking coding questions of software engineering candidates. The team found that data-structures-and-algorithms interviews provided no useful signal, according to The Pragmatic Engineer’s report, which describes a change within the team rather than a confirmed company-wide policy.
The report says the change concerns coding questions used during recruitment for software engineering roles. Rieseberg’s team concluded that the familiar interview format based on data structures and algorithms did not help it evaluate candidates. The source does not detail how the team reached that conclusion or how long it had been using the format.
The report identifies Rieseberg as a hiring manager who has led work on Claude Cowork and Claude Desktop. It attributes the decision to his team; it does not say Anthropic has ended coding interviews across all engineering groups, changed its overall hiring process, or adopted a replacement assessment company-wide.
The development appears in The Pragmatic Engineer’s The Pulse, a roundup of developments in technology companies. Its item says other AI-native startups, and potentially other parts of Anthropic, could follow the approach. That is a forecast, not a confirmed decision by those organizations.
How Anthropic Teams May Judge Engineers
The decision matters because coding interviews are a common way for technology employers to assess engineering applicants. If a team finds that these exercises do not predict the abilities it needs, removing them could change what candidates are asked to demonstrate and how hiring teams spend interview time.
For applicants, the reported change is a signal that at least one team at a major AI company is questioning the value of standard algorithm-focused tests. It does not establish that candidates can expect to avoid coding assessments at Anthropic or elsewhere: the report gives no replacement process and makes no claim that other teams have adopted the same approach.
The report also raises a broader question about how AI-focused companies assess engineering work as software development practices change. That is an implication of the hiring decision, not evidence that AI tools caused the team to drop the interviews. The source gives no account of AI use in its hiring process or of a measured link between interview performance and job performance.
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A Team-Level Hiring Change
The source presents this item as one part of The Pulse, alongside separate updates about AI spending, company expectations for engineers and managers, and employee exit offers. Those other items are not part of the Anthropic hiring decision and do not establish why Rieseberg’s team changed its interviews.
The Anthropic item specifically describes DSA interviews—questions based on data structures and algorithms—as the format the team found unhelpful. It does not say that the team has stopped evaluating coding ability altogether. Nor does the report supply a timeline, hiring figures, internal policy documents, or details from other Anthropic managers.
The distinction between a team-level practice and a company-wide rule is central here. The source says the rest of Anthropic could follow, but frames that as a possibility. No broader rollout is confirmed in the material provided.
Scope and Replacement Tests Are Unknown
The source does not say when the team made the change, how many candidates or roles it affects, or whether the decision applies to every engineering hire led by Rieseberg’s group. It also does not describe what the team now uses in place of coding questions, if anything.
No evidence is provided about how the team judged the interview format, whether its conclusion was based on hiring outcomes or candidate feedback, or whether Anthropic has evaluated the practice across other teams. The claim that the interviews gave “zero signal” is presented as the team’s rationale through the report; the underlying data and method are not included.
It is also unclear whether other Anthropic groups or AI-native startups will make similar changes. The source says they could follow, but reports no confirmed plans from them.
Watch for Broader Hiring Changes
The immediate question is whether Anthropic applies the approach beyond Rieseberg’s team. The report provides no announced company-wide policy or timetable, so any broader change would need to be confirmed by Anthropic or by additional reporting.
Further detail from the team could clarify what assessment, if any, replaces algorithm questions and how it evaluates candidates for engineering work. Until those details are available, the confirmed development remains limited: one Anthropic team has stopped asking coding questions after finding its DSA interviews uninformative, according to The Pragmatic Engineer.
Key Questions
Has Anthropic stopped using coding interviews company-wide?
That is not confirmed. The report describes a change by the team led by hiring manager Felix Rieseberg, not a company-wide policy.
Why did the team stop asking coding questions?
According to The Pragmatic Engineer, the team found that data-structures-and-algorithms interviews gave it no useful signal about candidates. The report does not provide the team’s underlying data or method.
What will replace the coding questions?
The source does not say whether the team adopted a different test or interview format. No replacement process is specified in the report.
Are other Anthropic teams or AI startups making the same change?
The report says other teams or AI-native startups could follow, but it does not confirm that any have done so or announced plans to do so.
Source: newsletter.pragmaticengineer.com
