To get annoyed with pointless interview questions?

[Sparklycat]

A thread asking for help with thinking of interview questions for a teaching position has led to people saying that in their school they ask things like "why are manhole covers round?" and "if you could be an animal what would you be?". Really??? For a teaching job?? I'd just laugh at the interviewer and consider if I wanted to work for somewhere that considered that relevant. Or perhaps I am behind the times and things have moved on since I last went for interviews many years ago...probably OK if you go for an interview at Google though.

In a couple of years I shall be reentering the job market after many years of self employment and I'm dreading interviews. If any wanker asks me stupid questions I shall hate myself for not telling them exactly what I think, but the problem is if you really want the job you have to humour them don't you

"I'm afraid Mr Dog would have been out on his ear before his coffee cooled. It sounds like something an Apprentice candidate would say."

Maybe he should've said "so I can lick my own bollocks"

YANBU. I had a dreadful interview where I had to 'estimate the value of biscuit sales in the UK over the next 5 years' - no warning, and I had to come up with an answer without any working out. Which would have been fine for, say, a sales role for a supermarket, but entirely irrelevant to a compliance role in an accounting firm.

I did start talking about the sort of things that might need to be considered, but was told they weren't interested in those sort of things and needed 'an answer to the nearest £10'. To my shame I spluttered through a set of assumptions and got - apparently - the wrong answer. I didn't get the job, based on my wrong answer about biscuit sales, apparently.

DH's hypothetical answer of 'hang about, I'll see if it's on Wikipedia' seemed like a good one. I've since heard that the accounting firm in question use the biscuit question for every single role within the company - presumably they recruit exclusively from United Biscuits or something.

I think I'm at the stage of my life now where if I did get asked a biscuit question I'd just say, politely, that the job wasn't for me and walk out. Luckily I've only had very practical interviews where I was asked things relevant to the job. My recent interview was in PR and contrary to what you'd expect it was totally straightforward, just 'tell me about yourself' and 'what would you like to do?'

When I interview (technical positions) I deliberately throw real obscure curveball questions in.

I have no interest whatsoever in the answer the candidate gives. I have every interest in how they approach it.

For one position, had an experienced guy walk out after 3 questions ("If you're going to ask questions I can't answer, I may as well go."). The role went to a University leaver, who had shown he knew how to go about solving the question in a methodical manner. He sealed the offer when he asked me what the answer was before leaving - the only candidate who did.

I'd rather employ someone who can solve problems, over someone who "knows stuff". Especially in a day and age when "stuff" can be obsolete between an interview and start date.

I think it's fair enough to approach things that way Lurking but I don't think it works in all industries. In many of the jobs I've worked in, knowing stuff was essential and it certainly didn't change within weeks - it was fundamental stuff that you couldn't do the job without. For me, the smart alec questions just indicate that the interviewer isn't really interested in knowing me they're just having some sort of power trip fooling themselves that they're being 'creative' and 'finding lateral thinkers.'

I'm with lurkinghusband - although I don't throw curveballs and try to stick to industry relevant questions, I do want to see people's minds at work, and I do want to ask them questions they don't know the answers to. I agree that someone who was genuinely curious to know the actual answer to the random question I'd thrown at them would probably get the job; curiosity is way up the list of qualities I recruit for.

My friend attended an interview recently where the interviewer greeted him, then leaned back in his chair and said "Right. Impress me" My friend thought "fuck this"and left. He said it would have been like working with David Brent

I was considering starting a thread today about DH going for an interview for a cleaning job and as well as the (extremely patronising) advice in the interview confirmation email about trying not to be late (thanks for that tip!), they have requested he wears "professional business dress". DH and I have had a lively debate about the likelihood of him buying a suit

I agree with Lurking too.

To be fair, in that instance, the candidate was amazing. He had just finished Uni (this was 2005). He had on his cv he had repaired computers over the summer for some money. Turned out he would go to the house, collect the computer, take it home on the bus, fix it, and return it the next day.

When he started with us, my boss (who was as tight as a gnats ***) invested in driving lessons for him, as he was so keen. He's now development manager with a team older than him.

I hate it when people run down the youth of today.

I was asked the animal question in an interview, I said I'd be a koala, sweet to look at but really rather quite vicious

I was still offered the job

Actually Ego, that was exactly how I approached it - and got a short 'not interested!'

I can see the point of giving a very loose topic (presentation on your best friend, or write a press release about tarmac) to showcase a skill that the candidate ought to have, but if I ask (say) a paralegal to recite their favourite Shakespeare sonnet in Latin, it tells me nothing whatsoever about them or their skills: the only thing it might give me is a power trip of watching them squirm. And I probably ought to expect at least one of them to tell me to fuck off.

but if I ask (say) a paralegal to recite their favourite Shakespeare sonnet in Latin, it tells me nothing whatsoever about them or their skills

may not tell you much, but it would tell me a lot.

Back in 1988 last year at uni, I applied to one of the (then) biggest employers in the UK. They invited me to a 3-hour sit down test (at UCL*) with 200 others. There were 3 papers - 50 minutes each. When the invigilator read out the rubric, there was a tiny clue, which (on the basis that only 10 people were selected) people missed.

The clue was that it would be impossible to answer all the questions. This was compounded by the fact there were some 2-line questions (maths/science) which needed 10 minutes to answer, and 2-page questions which needed 2 seconds time.

Since we were all final-year honours students, I felt it was unlikely the employer wanted to spend such a lot of time and money assessing our maths skills. But every chance they wanted to assess how we coped under pressure. So I decided to triage the questions (and show I had done) and then pick them off in increasing difficulty. Thus showing I had assessed the entire situation, made a decision, and carried it through.

Whatever I did worked, because I was asked back for more tests, and got the job. At that stage, the HR manager asked what I had thought of the tests, and I replied as above. Maybe I shouldn't have used the word "obvious" but ....

Of course, the biggest clue to all the candidates was the department at UCL administering the tests was the Psychology* department. Not the Maths, Physics or Computing department.

The problem being Lurking is that, while many of those tests were once in vogue it has since been demonstrated that they're not very good at finding the right fit for a job.

"why are manhole covers round?"

This is actually a really good question.

A friend of mine is an engineer who recruits graduates onto a training programme. For years his favourite question was to hand them a paperclip and ask them how they'd improve it.

The biscuit question is odd but questions with no right answer or a range of answers in which you can blend what you know with creative thinking and problem solving are really useful.

Koalas have high rates of STDs. Choose another animal if you ever go for a job in a zoo or game reserve.

I work in PR and always ask as a closing question "if you were a brand, what would you be and why?"

It is a great question as people can demonstrate their knowledge of brands (important in PR), their own personalities, their ability to think quickly....

Well the manhole question is a great one if you're going for an engineer job. A teacher job? Not so much haha.

Yes, mathematics, social science, history and logical thinking have no place in schools

Yabu, of course they want to ask questions that you haven't thought of to see how you think off the cuff. And questions that don't have a 'correct' answer are a chance to test your reasoning, imagination, eloquence etc. I'm actually pretty surprised that so many people are offended by this kid of question, and also missing the point by thinking about their relevance to the job being applied for (clue - not everything is about content).

The "official" interview answer is that it's round so you can't drop it down the hole. I don't know whether that's actually true from a sanitation engineer's POV. Either way I think it's not a great question because the vast majority of people will either not be able to work it out, or will already know the answer. I can't imagine that a significant number of candidates will be in a position to crack it on the spot, and I don't think it will make them think in interesting ways.

This may be sour grapes because I was asked it at interview for Goldman Sachs many decades ago and failed to crack it, but the job and I were a very bad fit for many many other reasons.

Actually it is round so it can't be put on wrongly and (most importantly) it can't be dropped into the hole, or easily wedged into it. You can get the kids to try it out with different shapes (or maybe only in my house is this fun).