Maybe we are talking past each other. This is the page I was thinking of: http://itasoftware.com/careers/work-at-ita/hiring-puzzles.html http://itasoftware.com

Maybe we are talking past each other. This is the page I was thinking of: http://itasoftware.com/careers/work-at-ita/hiring-puzzles.html http://itasoftware.com/careers/work-at-ita/hiring-puzzles.ht... These aren't classic Microsoft "puzzle questions". They are programming challenges that say a lot about your approach to programs and problems. In particular, all of them ask you to make tradeoffs between correctness and performance. They are cool enough to attract engineers, hard enough to discourage the idly curious, and unique enough that no published solution exists. That's why I said that someone who does this kind of puzzle for the sheer enjoyment of it might be exactly what a high-level software shop is looking for. Would I want a "puzzle expert" who could solve the problems on ITA's page? Hell yes.