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154

answers:

1
+2  Q: 

Hiring Problem ??

I have gone through one of the books of algorithm and I have found a problem named Hiring Problem. Here is the situation
I have to conduct a interview for hiring the candidates for my company. I am personally not able to conduct the interview as I have failed to do so.So I have hired a employment agency for hiring the candidate.The agency will send me each day a candidate among n candidates. Algo for this will be

**Algo Hiring Candidate(n)**  
best=0 // The candidate with the least quality  
for i=1 to n  
If the candidate is better than the best valued candidate we should hire him  
Best=candidate[i]  
return i;  

But here,interview cost will be always calculated as we have to take the interview of each candidate.So we have to concentrate on how to minimize the hiring cost.
Total cost will be O(interview cost and hiring cost)
I have gone through many observations such as the agency will send the candidate randomly and in the worst case we have to hire all the candidates,then the hiring cost will be higher as each candidate come in a order of increasing quality.
But practically this is not possible as it is never possible that all the candidates will come always in increasing order.They should come in a random order. I have taken many observations but I am really not able to minimize the hiring cost. Can someone help me out through this problem. Hoping for a true response.

+3  A: 

I think that this is an example of the Secretary Problem.

amelvin
Yup,but am not able to actually minimize the hiring cost.
Vibhakar SInha
That's my thought, too. So if I'm not mistaken, he should see 1/e of the candidates, then choose the best after that, right?
JoshD
That's it, Sir.
wok
I can't understand what you wanna say.
Vibhakar SInha
You cannot choose before 1/e, or it would not be optimal.
wok
That what I want to find.The hiring cost should be optimal.Can you please elaborate your answer
Vibhakar SInha
This is a famous Dynamic Programming problem (it is computer science, not just programming though). "The aim is to maximize the probability of choosing the candidate of greatest rank". See [here](http://www.math.kth.se/optsyst/utbildning/kurser/SF2862/introtext.text).
wok