Take home assignment: what to ask before you start

A take home assignment is a task you do on your own time, at home, as part of the hiring process. In a take home assignment interview, the employer reads your work and then talks to you about it. Some are small. Some are big. The listing often does not tell you which.

This guide uses one real example from a live listing, then gives you the questions we would ask before starting any test. We read the listing in full on 2 November 2026.

A real example: what Fluence asks you to build

The Fluence Full-Stack Developer listing makes the test the first step of hiring. After it comes an interview, then a six-month contract for the right person.

The test is to build “LendLoop”, a small tool-lending board for neighbours. The listing says:

• You may use AI tools to write the code.
• The test is unrelated to healthcare on purpose, so that Fluence will not use your work.
• The stack is Next.js, Clerk, Convex, n8n and TypeScript.
• Signed-in people must be able to list a tool, ask to borrow one for a date range, approve or decline requests, and mark a loan returned.
• There must be two roles, admin and user, enforced in the back end and not only on screen.
• You must build at least two automations in n8n: one that notifies people when a request changes, and one that sends daily reminders about overdue loans.
• The connections between parts must be secured: signed messages, secrets kept out of the code, retries that do not create duplicates, and failures that show up.
• You hand in a code repository, your n8n workflow files, a README with setup steps, and a short note on what you would change for production.

They say they judge code structure, security thinking, usability, how the integrations are designed and how reliable they are, and your documentation.

That is a lot of parts. Count them before you say yes.

What the listing does not say about the test

On 2 November 2026 the Fluence listing did not say:

• whether the test is paid
• how many hours it should take, or what the deadline is
• who owns the finished work, apart from saying it will not be used
• whether you get feedback if you are not chosen

This is not unusual. It is why you ask.

Eight questions to ask before you start

These questions are ours, not from an outside source.

1. Is the test paid? If not, are you comfortable with that?
2. How long should it take? Ask for a number of hours, and a deadline.
3. What will you be judged on? The Fluence listing answers this. Many do not.
4. May you use AI tools or outside help? Fluence says yes. Do not assume.
5. Who owns the work, and what may they do with it? Fluence says it will not be used. Get that kind of promise in writing. Compare it to the Askable listing, whose terms say your work must be yours to license and must not be published anywhere.
6. Do they give feedback? Even if you are not chosen.
7. What happens next, and when? Ask for the steps and dates after you submit.
8. Are you really able to be hired? The Fluence listing does not say where you may work from or how people in other countries are contracted or paid. Ask first, so you do not spend a weekend on a job you cannot take.

How to decide

Put the questions in one short email. A good employer will answer. Their answers, and how fast they come, tell you something about working with them.

Then decide how many hours you are willing to give. If the test is larger than that, you can say so and ask for a smaller task.

Keep a copy of everything you send and everything they send you.