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Nightmare Interviews

dougw

What is the worst job interview you have ever been in?

Some interviewers like to pose puzzles that can be fairly simple like "How many kings can be placed on a chess board without threatening each other?" or a little more involved like "Given 12 coins, where one has a different weight, and a balance beam, what is the minimum number of  weighings needed to determine which coin is different and if it is lighter or heavier than the rest?"

I have never been in an interview where I was asked such a puzzle. And I have never posed such a question when I was asking the questions.

Have you been in such an interview? What was the purpose of the question? Did the answer achieve the purpose?

Are such questions a good idea?

Do you like such questions?

What do such questions tell the interviewee?

By the way, what are the answers to the 2 puzzles above?

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  • Some people like artificial puzzles and some don't.  If your purpose in an interview is find a good solver of simple, bounded system problems then the questions suggested are fine (although the puzzles are very well known so the best solution may come from prior knowledge of it).

    In real life problems tend to be much fuzzier and much less bounded and one of the things that may be important is the ability of the interviewee to chew away at a a problem over a long period (weeks , months or even years) - facility at solving coffee time challenges is not going to correlate well.

    So you need to get the person talking, about real stuff, so you can attempt to work out if they are credible and capable. It's very hit and miss. I might consider showing them an actual problem and trying to get them to talk around it, but that isn't always feasible.

    I don't ask stock questions to which you may well get a prepared answer..

    Over the years I've taken on at least as many bad choices as good .........

    MK

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  • Some people like artificial puzzles and some don't.  If your purpose in an interview is find a good solver of simple, bounded system problems then the questions suggested are fine (although the puzzles are very well known so the best solution may come from prior knowledge of it).

    In real life problems tend to be much fuzzier and much less bounded and one of the things that may be important is the ability of the interviewee to chew away at a a problem over a long period (weeks , months or even years) - facility at solving coffee time challenges is not going to correlate well.

    So you need to get the person talking, about real stuff, so you can attempt to work out if they are credible and capable. It's very hit and miss. I might consider showing them an actual problem and trying to get them to talk around it, but that isn't always feasible.

    I don't ask stock questions to which you may well get a prepared answer..

    Over the years I've taken on at least as many bad choices as good .........

    MK

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  • in reply to michaelkellett

    It is rare that the perfect candidate is available and keen to fill the particular job when it opens up. Choosing the best candidate can be extremely difficult, considering that in a year they could be a very different performer for many reasons, many of which may be unpredictable.

  • in reply to dougw

    That is why I looked at the candidates attitude.

    You can have someone who is very capable, but with the wrong attitude. They just do not fit in.

    I have often taken someone who is not quite as good, but who was trainable and seldom did that not work out well.

  • in reply to DAB

    This is a very good point.  In a Software group that I was managing, I was attempting to fill a position.  I had narrowed the field down to two candidates. I had my entire group interview the two people, either in groups or individually.  In the end I was sure that I wanted to hire one person (most qualified) while the rest of the group wanted to other (best attitude).  In the end I went with the groups opinion and hired one of the best people that I have ever worked with.  This person was a solid contributor and eventually  went on to lead the group after I moved on.

  • in reply to genebren

    Yes for an employee. You look for reasonable domain skills and growth potential.
    If you interview a consultant, the process is more focused on what needs to be done now.

    With funny questions and quizzes you can only filter out people that haven't been to a lot of interviews yet, and peoples that have been to many interviews. Don't overestimate yourself: your witty quizzes are as lame as those of any other interviewer.