Hired, fired, and everything wired: 13 years of Andy Lein's Google TA wisdom

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With over 20 years of recruiting experience, including 14 years as a Recruiting Team Lead at Google, Andy Lein has reviewed more than 100,000 profiles and conducted over 10,000 interviews.

As an EMCC-certified coach and founder of Lein - Candidate Experience, Andy brings unique insights into the evolving world of technical recruitment. Following his keynote speech at FOUND's TA Leaders event, we reached out to Andy with several questions about his approach to talent acquisition in the age of AI, the importance of human connection, and how companies can improve their hiring processes.

In this comprehensive interview, Andy shares candid stories from his extensive career, offers practical advice for both recruiters and candidates and reveals how the technical hiring landscape has transformed over the years.

When hiring for technical roles (such as at Google), what specific mathematical skills or advanced degrees do you prioritize? How has this evolved in recent years?

When hiring for technical roles, such as at Google, specific mathematical skills like algorithmic thinking are crucial. Advanced degrees in computer science, mathematics, physics, or engineering are highly valued, but practical experience is at least as important. Soft skills are increasingly important too. What I mean by practical experience, rather than “just a degree”, even a PhD, I would like to see that candidates can apply what they have learned actually. I would best describe this as ‘problem-solving’. Valuing candidates who can apply their knowledge in real-world settings and adapt to new technologies has always been a path to promising hires. Continuous learning and interdisciplinary skills are also prioritized, reflecting the evolving nature of technical roles. Additionally, things like winning ACM-World Finals, a packed GitHub account, and acknowledgment for their open-source contributions are strong signals, but not disqualifiers if they are not present.

What are the most significant gaps you've observed between candidates' academic knowledge and their ability to implement solutions in real-world environments?

It's hard to say how challenging the process will be for each individual. At big tech, I've seen highly intelligent people fail because they underestimated the difficulty of the process. A former candidate, who later became a friend, shared his experience: "Until I interviewed with Google, I was always the smartest person in my environment. I never had to study much, excelling easily in school and at ETH. Even during my PhD, I was in the upper third of my class. Everyone around me kept telling me how smart I was, and I started to believe I could conquer anything in my domain. But then Google came along, and for the first time, I realized I wasn't as smart as I thought." He admitted he hadn't prepared well for the interviews and failed. This experience had a profound impact on him. Two years later, he tried again, prepared thoroughly, and succeeded.

Could you describe the most effective hiring process you've experienced, either as a candidate or recruiter? What specific elements made it stand out?

Can I rephrase the question to “Could you describe the most effective hiring process execution?” Processes are one thing, how they are executed is what makes the difference. Even without a process, hiring can be very effective if the execution is excellent. I once received an application, an employee referral, on Friday afternoon around 16:30. The referrer told me that his friend had another offer and had to accept/decline on the upcoming Tuesday. I called the candidate, invited him for interviews on Monday, and briefed the interviewers that I needed their feedback immediately after the interview and we had a so-called hiring committee taking place the same day late afternoon. I was able to extend an offer before I walked out of the office that Monday. So this was essentially a hire within one business day. The same process would usually have taken ~4 weeks in a normal yet speedy manner. Just to name a few points when it comes to efficiency in the hiring process, it clearly helps if the process is outlined and involved people know what their role in the process is and what expectations are when it comes to submitting feedback for example. Also, how many steps are there in total, are multiple rounds of interviews happening on multiple days or can they be scheduled on one day? Exec-level support clearly helps. If Execs declare this as Priority-1 and potentially even make it part of their employee's performance plan, things seem to work out fine. I could continue with more factors impacting efficacy.

Which companies do you believe are setting the gold standard for technical hiring experiences today, and what are they doing differently?

Well, Lein - Candidate Experience is nailing it. :-) Honestly, I don’t feel comfortable answering that question. Why? I believe that there might be many companies out there that do an excellent job and I am simply not aware of them. I don’t think it would be fair to them if I name others prior to them. Hence, let me focus on the attributes of a strong candidate experience instead. Easy applying, salary transparency in the job posting, quick feedback, personalized feedback (instead of “we move forward with other candidates” → “Whilst we appreciate your experience in x, for this particular role, we are looking for a profile with more experience in y, we currently don’t see this on your profile to the extend we were hoping for.”), fast process, transparent process, holding up to promises (No “I will get back to you on Friday” and then radio silence.), and again, personalized feedback either way at the end of the process. I am not even expecting companies to go above and beyond here, but for example: What if a Technology Retailer would send a company-branded headset to candidates they have late-stage video interviews with? Costs probably < 100 CHF incl. Logistic. Impact - huge. 100 CHF for late-stage candidates is low cost if you compare it to a single agency hire of 30k+ for a white-collar employee. Same for a sports brand retailer, what if they were to send a pair of sporty shoes to every late-stage candidate who comes onsite for an interview? Production costs <30 CHF + logistics…again, very low cost but big impact in comparison. These are just ideas how companies could easily stand out and would probably save lots of money on employer branding Ads as this would easily go viral on Social Media.

What aspects of the recruitment process do you believe cannot or should not be replaced by technology, even as AI advances?

I would mirror the question to each company. For example, a company that introduces AI Recruiter Avatars to their process should not be surprised about candidates leveraging AI Candidate Avatars. As simple as that. “Cannot” is a strong word as I am not comfortable predicting what technology will evolve into in the next few years or decades, but for now, I am not impressed by any CV-matching tools that I have seen. From my perspective, AI tools in evaluation will then be interesting, when they are super reliable and so far I haven’t been convinced. In general, in most roles companies are hiring for human interaction will play a role in one way or another. If so, the candidate's journey should anchor on that element too. This is also about building trust between the candidate and the company and from a candidate experience perspective, showing interest in the candidate and appreciation for their time investment too. That said, I think AI can help in drafting (personalized) emails for example e.g. based on the selected rejection reason from the Recruiter, a well-formulated personalized email could be drafted in no time.

What strategies have you found most effective in attracting and retaining diverse technical talent in today's competitive market?

To effectively attract and retain diverse technical talent in today's competitive market, it's crucial to first ask internally: "What are we trying to solve?" and then follow up with: "What does diversity mean in that context?" Often, people associate diversity solely with gender or race, but the topic is much more complex. For instance, hiring another woman into an all-female team doesn't necessarily increase diversity. Similarly, adding a male team member to an all-male team might not support diversity either. However, if the team consists entirely of Swiss men and the new member is from a different continent, that adds a different layer of diversity.

Consider this: What adds more diversity—hiring a Swiss female software engineer with a Computer Science degree from ETH into a mixed-gender Swiss team of ETH Computer Science graduates, or hiring a self-taught biologist programmer from abroad - even if male?

In essence, to understand what constitutes diversity, companies must first define the comparison group (company, department, team), then assess the current composition of that group (gender, degree, language, age, social background, etc.), and finally decide what would genuinely add diversity. Only with this clarity can a company successfully develop strategies and tactics to increase diversity in its current setup.

Could you share two memorable candidate stories—one about someone who was rejected, and another about a candidate whose unique hiring journey led to their success with your organization? What key lessons did these experiences teach you about talent evaluation?

Well, the rejection one is easy as I actually have a very recent example. This only just happened a couple of weeks ago. A Talent Acquisition Lead sends me a connect request on Linkedin. I accept and ask back what sparked their interest in my profile. Response: “You recently rejected a friend of mine with personal and detailed feedback that he was pleased to be rejected. I wanted to see who is the Recruiter behind that.” Receiving that message made my day. At the same time, it made me sad as obviously, candidates don’t experience this very often anymore and even other TA Leaders seem to be impressed if they just hear about it. What happened? Well, I just did what I described in one of the points above. I told the candidate why we are not moving forward with their application rather than just saying we are moving forward with somebody else.  

With regards to the unique hiring journey, I had a candidate from Cameroon, he did well in his interviews, but just slightly missed the hiring bar at the time. When I called the candidate to reject, he said “Andy, you can not do this. Getting this job in Europe would not only change my life but the life of my family. I am talking about 80 people. They count on me, I can not tell them I didn’t make it.” He didn’t say this in any harassing way or so, he was simply disappointed on the ground. I asked him for a week or two to progress an idea I had. I went to our internship team which has a slightly lower hiring bar and they had finished their internship staffing for the year. However, I pushed them, since again - this candidate was so close to even getting a full-time role and if we are serious about diversity, we shouldn’t easily let go of such a great talent and really fantastic human being on top of that. Ultimately, they were able to create another internship opportunity, we offered, and he accepted and converted into a full-time employee after his internship. Meanwhile, he now worked at this company for more than a decade and received multiple promotions since. We, both, felt so much gratitude for each other, that every time we met on the floor there was this deep emotional energy in the room that I can barely describe. The key lessons? As a Recruiter, never just trust the outcome of an evaluation, also trust your feelings, and more importantly, never look at candidates simply “as a business case”. Each of them is unique, each of them is a human with their own background, life, and story. We, as Recruiters, have a tremendous impact on the next chapter of their stories and potentially those of their families.

How do you recommend candidates best leverage both their technical abilities and interpersonal skills during the recruitment process?

Very simple actually. Be authentic. Try to not consider an interview as an interview. Try to do what you would do in a real-life scenario e.g. if you don’t understand the question, ask clarifying questions. Don’t pretend to be someone you are not. You won’t be happy anyway if you get the job based on that. Be authentic, trust yourself. If you don’t get the job, you are still great. You even have the perfect skill set - just not for that particular role.

What are your top three criteria or recommendations when selecting an external recruitment partner?

Reliability. Quality. ROI (Return-of-Invest).

I think external recruitment partners have to evolve. The times of sending a CV per email without having spoken with the company or the candidate and wanting to charge xx% of the annual salary for that - those times are over, I think.

If you had a magic wand, what tool would you use daily to make your life easier? (can be anything)

Sounds idealistic, but I would use the magic wand to cause peace in the world. The recent happenings on the planet keep distracting me mentally and I guess this would be a win-win, for me, and the world. 🙂

On a final note

Andy's insights reflect a career dedicated to understanding both the technical and human aspects of recruitment. In an era increasingly dominated by AI and automation, his perspective reminds us that effective hiring ultimately comes down to recognizing the unique potential in each candidate and creating processes that honor their humanity.

As technology continues to transform recruitment, Andy's emphasis on execution over process design, personalized feedback, and seeing beyond metrics offers valuable guidance for companies seeking to build exceptional teams. Whether you're a recruiter, hiring manager, or candidate, the lessons from his 14 years at Google provide a roadmap for more effective, empathetic, and successful hiring experiences.

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Following Andy Lein's keynote speech at the TA Leaders event hosted by FOUND (getfound.io), the FOUND team compiled these questions from team members to explore his recruitment philosophy. Andy is the founder of Lein - Candidate Experience, where he helps companies optimize their recruiting strategies with empathy and expertise.