kiplinger.com — Among my favorites: 1. This suit has been in my family for five generations. 2. You think this is disorganized. Wait till you see me on work projects. 3. I'd rather watch The Worst of C-Span than research your company. 4. I expect you to provide the exact job I want on my terms -- now. 5. I could care less -- but not much less.
Nov 9, 2006 View in Crawl 4
Closed AccountNov 10, 2006
What an utter waste of time. I want to beat the author of that "story" for filling a page with nothing of value. Thinking about all the people that will each waste 3 minutes reading that nonsense, that guy is responsible for an entire man-year of lost productivity in the workplace today.
ulicbelouveNov 10, 2006
You'd be surprised how many people do not follow these. They do not have any good resumes, with typos, out-of-date, not enough copies, or more commonly, printed on what has to be the cheapest paper they could get the ink to stick to.Also, I remember a tale of an IBM interviewer that was a bit surprised at how little time people take to research a company. In one of his interviews at a college, he was basically looking for someone who could state what IBM stands for. Many of his interviewees did not know the answer. I believe the one or two that did got the job.
ubuwalker31Nov 10, 2006
I was recently called about a job and I was asked:"So why did you leave after 3 years?""They were cheapskates"That was my gut talking, and I immediately caught myself and said "I don't mean to badmouth a former employer, but I wasn't being paid enough money".They still want to interview me for the job.
circlefusionNov 10, 2006
Stupid interview hoops.I've said this before on previous digg stories covering this topic. I've worked with many employees in large company environments who were incompetent. It seems to be common in This proves to me that this hiring-manager-rulebook type of thinking is crap. Let me go through some of the points that he makes..."Noah made no eye contact."Hyberbole? He had to have made SOME eye contact. Just because he didn't stare lovingly into your eyes the entire interview does not give you insight into his potential as an employee. I think that many interviewers place way too much importance on this particular detail of the interaction. Quite frankly, it's quite uncomfortable to constantly stare at someone during an interview. I've done it before in a handful of interviews, but only because I read somewhere that you're "supposed" to do that in interviews. That act doesn't say a damn thing about me as a potential worker. Do you want to know how assertive I am and how much I pay attention? Do you want to know if I'm interested in the job? Do you want to know if I'm interested in what you are saying? That isn't the way to find out."He inquired about being reimbursed for the $12 round-trip expense he incurred to visit our offices." Sounds extremely reasonable, responsible, intelligent, in fact bold, that he would ask about this."He explained that he'd fallen into his profession (the same profession for which we were interviewing him) and wanted out."Given that this guy Noah is just a made-up example, I'd have to take your word on it. It is more than likely you getting the wrong message from what he is saying. I mean who says "I really don't want this job" during an interview? I seriously doubt that is what the interviewee(s) meant."He gave rambling five-minute answers to questions that could have been answered with a simple yes or no."Ok, but what did he say during those five minutes? Were you paying attention? Is it a problem that he spent five minutes, or that he didn't say anything of value during those five minutes? Maybe he was trying to communicate something to you in addition to a simple "yes" or "no". Perhaps you made a mistake in only expecting a yes or no. Not every answer fits into those two little boxes."And his handshake was akin to a near-death experience."Who the f*&K cares? I don't even know what that is supposed to mean. He didn't handshake the way that you wanted him to? I'm sorry, but what does that have to do with the job position? Are you hiring for a position as a professional hand-shaker?Do you realize that interviews are a two-way street? You are hiring them as an employee, but they are also choosing you as an employer. Setting up these ridiculous interviewing rules just creates unnecessary, impeding hoops that people must jump through. Often, the result is that you are hiring the right person for the interview, but not the right person for the job. Interviewing has become a secondary skill just because of this set of rules that interviewers tend to follow.I realize that interviewing is difficult. I've been an interviewer a handful of times. It is extremely difficult to get to know someone in that short amount of time. However, I think that interviewers fail more often than they succeed, and I blame this idea of an interviewing rulebook. They are missing the point of the interview.It's almost like saying..."Look, before this interview starts, be warned that I am not very good at communicating with people, so I found this book that gave me a list of things to look for during the interview. Here at Jackass Enterprises, we use an incredibly flawed interview process which entails scanning the crap out of every detail about the interviewee that has nothing to do with the job, asking the wrong questions, interpreting every movement or word as a mark on their character, or basically just doing everything we can to misunderstand what they are saying. There is even a temperature probe scanning them at all times to make sure their body temperature doesn't go above 98.6....because you know what that means. *snicker*. All of this usually results in hiring the wrong people for the wrong reasons, but everyone seems to be doing it now, so we though why not us too. During this interview, it is highly likely that I may misinterpret everything you are doing or say, so please just follow these rules. Don't scratch your face with your left hand, don't wear pants with a greenish hue, don't EVER look at the left wall of the room, make sure that you know your last manager's favorite ice cream, don't ever use the words "employer" and "eggs" in the same sentence, make sure to stare directly at my cornea at all times, do your best not to blink at all, and basically just don't say anything that I am going (mis)interpret as a character flaw. Alrighty...so let me begin screwing up this interview. *grin* "I've been an employee. I've been a contractor. I've been a small business owner. I plan to be a medium to large business owner in the future. My interview process will NOT be the norm, because, from my observations, the norm doesn't usually work. You're not a mind-reader. You're not going to accurately profile potential employees using methods like these. You're not "above" the people that you are interviewing. It should be a two-way street at all times.[steps down from soapbox]I hope some interviewers and employers are reading this.
circlefusionNov 10, 2006
hit wrong reply... digg down
circlefusionNov 10, 2006
@Desolite "...instead of trying to be an anal retentive grammar digger."My irony meter just went off.