What is the strangest feedback you've had from an interview?

[Confusedmummytotwo]

Hi All,

This one has got me interested today.

I had a job interview last week, set up via a recruitment agent, at a big posh relatively newly built building, with two managers who had been the longest serving members of staff in the whole nationwide company- at 4 years tenure, this put me off so I wasn't interested in the job.

However, I've just had the feedback from the recruitment agent which has made me laugh. Apparently they feel I wouldn't fit in with their team as I'm not 'rough enough' and they don't feel I would be able to deal with the banter, that their staff have.

So what is the strangest feedback you have ever been given?

I went for an office junior position back in the 80s in a local well known solicitors office and told I was a bit 'long in the tooth' for the role...I was only 17.

I don’t think they were worried about men being struck dumb or worse by your beauty, but tbh the likelihood of your being at best propositioned and at worst assaulted. Female carers working with male dementia patients are subjected to a great deal of sexual innuendo, groping and other offensive behaviour.

Not feed back but a comment. I had been recruited by an agency for a receptionist role years ago when I was in my 20s the retiring receptionist was training me up and said the other girl who interviewed was much prettier than you...

Not an interview, but a pre-interview personality test.

Apparently I was likely to prioritise completing my work to a high standard and making good on previously-agreed commitments over networking and "promoting my own achievements and abilities to others."

And apparently this was a bad thing??

God this still rankles today, the only feedback I’d got for a job I didn’t get was that I’d rushed by presentation. I was told just before I began that as they were running behind schedule, I needed to be quick and get it down from 15 minutes to 5!!! Twats.

my presentation. Also they still proceeded to steal the ideas I presented in those five minutes so it must have been alright

I once went a little far with the fillers. I didn’t look terrible but it was a bit obvious.

anyway, interviewed for a job that I had all of the right experience for - possibly overqualified for - and the feedback was that my face was a distraction.

needless to say I stuck out my old job where nobody cared and earned a great amount of money so no huge loss - but I found it very funny.

Interviewed for a role in which I had more than 20 years experience, in the sector and at the same level of seniority ( I applied because it was a company I wanted to work for). Feedback was not enough experience. I challenged the idiot HR person who just bumbled and stumbled and couldn’t justify it. Clearly not the reason, but at least make an effort to come up with a credible response 🙄.

I think sometimes the company know the type of personality and person they want, but rather than just saying you were unsuitable, they have to give some sort of examples.

Had pretty much the same experience except I didn't even get to interview. For some bizarre reason HR then got in touch, asked if I was still interested, and when I said I was told me they were offering the job to someone else. Oh, OK then.

Still trying to work out what was going on there.

I can understand that one- although I appreciate it was annoying for you.

They were prepared to consider someone without the relevant experience, if no one with experience applied or they interviewed badly or they didn't have some other thing that you did so they wanted to interview you.

But in the event, there was someone else with the skills you have and experience so they went with them.

"You don't need to have experience" True

"We chose a candidate with more experience over you" Also true

I was told I was "too perfect" for the job and I wouldn't be challenged

Reality : A close personal friend of the Line Manager I would be answerable to had applied and it was the sort of working co-partnership that the Line Manager got the final say.

Outcome : Successful applicant so bad at the job that he dragged the Line Manager down with him with some seriously unprofessional carry on. Line Manager's behaviour was fed back and alerted someone who had enough about them to make the relevant external complaints. Line Manager lost an extremely cushy gig he'd revelled in for years as the price he paid for Jobs For The Boys

Slightly off tangent as I never even got to the point of feedback.

Went for a promotion as a safeguarding lead having worked in safeguarding arena for the previous 5 years. Male candidate beat me by one point apparently (yeah right). Nothing to do with the fact his boss was big mates with the interviewer.

I then get a phone call from the successful candidate asking if he could 'come and pick my brains' as he had no experience of safeguarding and needed some advice from me. 🙀

Ironically it turned out he knew more about domestic violence than he thought as it turned out he'd previously been arrested for domestic violence (not charged) and they pulled the offer and gave it to me!

Bittersweet though.

Was that consultancy by any chance?

I was turned down for an interview by a clothes shop on the basis that the staff needed to wear the clothes so they couldn’t be more than a size 10.

DH was turned down for a job after the final interview with feedback that he was the best candidate but they were going with the interim for continuity. A year later they called him to ask whether he was still available as the continuity candidate had been a disaster.

I was told they thought I would be bored in the role. I got the same job with a different employer and have now been there for 4 years with no plans to move on. I go to conferences with the people who rejected me 🙂I do find it amusing that they got it so wrong.

I went for an internal promotion and was told ‘it’s not your turn’. Later, I went for a job at another university which I was told I almost didn’t get because ‘I was too smartly dressed’. I didn’t get the first teaching job I went for because I would have been the junior in the department but would also have been the oldest.

Just addressing the 'I' versus 'We' discussion. As a senior candidate for CEO roles I do both 'I' and 'We' because when you're talking about transformation change, strategy etc you can't pretend you did it all on your own. Nevertheless you have to share your leadership style and strategic approach and obviously the many occasions you are personally responsible and accountable and on your own.

When I interview I'm careful to explore the 'We's' and 'I's both ways. The people who over-claim and those who under-claim - I probe and ask questions to explore who did it and how results were achieved. Mostly we are not heroic sole campaigners - great leaders and managers always work through others. Nothing real and impactful is achieved on your own. But I do want to find out what individuals personally identified, created, made the case for and led implementation on. Don't like wild over-claimers or shrinking wallflowers (dependent on the role).

In the end its about authenticity alongside expertise and experience. I like people who confess to not having worked on something before but who come up with intelligent ideas. I like people who show they want to learn and grown - I am always doing that and I've been a CEO for 20 years.

Oh and on the interview feedback. Mine wasn't bad - it was untrue.

I was told by the headhunters that I wasn't shortlisted for final interview for a CEO role in my sector. I was well known as the number 2 CEO in the sector. I was really shocked that I didn't even get into the last 6 shortlist for the final interview and felt very diminished - that I was that poor at interview. In the end the internal candidate got the job.

Nearly a year later I met the head of the board's recruitment committee and he thanked me for my application and for coming second in the recruitment. This was reinforced by another member of the board. I was pissed. Not because I didn't get it - but because the headhunter wasn't honest: after stage 1 interviews they decided that no one was strong enough to beat the internal candidate. I'd have got that. But instead they left me thinking I wasn't good enough to get into the final 6.

Sorry, but I'm with the wife on this one. If you can hear how you're talking about yourself 😂

I wouldn't want you in my home either.

Job was as an English teacher in a tough secondary school. Feedback was they 'had decided to offer the job to a candidate who had a degree from Cambridge University' (rather than my first class honours degree from Newcastle Uni). I asked had his taught lesson been better, did he answer the questions in interview better, get on with children better? The response was 'the degree was the critical difference'.

He was a posh drip all day and he left the school after half a term, by mutual agreement. I was appointed at the nearest secondary school a week after the first interview so met him at NQT meetings for the first half-term- he hated the job.

I’ve had some recently all got through to 2nd interview stage -

The successful candidate had a relevant degree for the role - why put me through two interviews when I didn’t then.

Successful candidate had recent experience in a similar role - obvious from my CV that I’d been a SAHM for 6 years so why waste my time.

Successful candidate was already working in this area - internal then, another waste of my time.

Best one was 3 months after I’d gone through a stillbirth and was keen to get back to work and be busy (didn’t want to go back to previous employer) - I wasn’t ‘bubbly’ enough! Obviously I hadn’t brought it up in interview but it was a professional role and I didn’t realise I was supposed to be laugh a minute.

My friend was told she was "not parochial enough" and would get bored in the office - had she considered applying for a job in a big city?

My stance on bullying was ‘too firm’. The question was along the lines of what would I do as a manager if one of my staff was being bullied by another and I said how I would try and stamp it out immediately, bring both parties in for discussions etc but apparently that was too harsh.

As a new graduate I volunteered in a fundraising department of a charity. I wanted to make it my career so I did a lot over and above what was expected. Everyone in the office wore jeans and t shirts.

I interviewed for a role I'd basically been doing as a volunteer. Was told I didn't get it as I didn't dress smartly enough. I wore black trousers , a shirt and a fine knit jumper. I was skint I couldn't afford a suit!

I'm 90% certain I didn't get the job because I had made friends with quite a few of the staff and the boss didn't like that.

My answers were not precise enough during the interview. I pressed them further and it turned out that when I had talked about a spreadsheet, I should have made it clear that I meant excel spreadsheet.

At the end of an interview for a software project manager, I was told I had great PM skills, but they couldn't take it any further because it was obvious I had no knowledge of Python, and the developers would "eat me alive."

I expressed surprise, as Python wasn't mentioned in the job spec. Interviewer, equally surprised, said it was a main requirement.

We compared our copies of the spec; identical except for one critical word missing from mine:

"Experienced project manager to lead PYTHON software projects"

I never did find out how and when that word went AWOL...