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Today's interviewing process

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holy-cow
(@holy-cow)
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I have been fortunate to escape being the victim of a job interview of any kind since 1989. That said, I participated in a job interview last week where we spent all day interviewing a total of six applicants for our job opening as principal of our middle school. It was 10 on one all day long. A very intimidating process to say the least. We had a list of about 20 questions that were presented in the same order to each applicant. Very little questioning occurred outside of those limits due to the current list of no-no's. If the applicant chose to tell us certain personal information that was fine, but we weren't going to ask.

Our Superintendent is an elitist who likes to pretend he is much more powerful than he is. He asked an incredibly stupid question of each applicant that was not on our pre-approved list. He would pipe up with, "What are you reading?" Half of the applicants looked at him as if he was accusing them of not paying attention and reading something somewhere in the interview room. One fellow had been staring at an ink pen he had in one hand and almost answered with something like, "First Federal Savings and Loan, 715 Cherry Street". Eventually everyone made up some story about reading some novel that is probably on a Best Seller list now or recently except for one guy who happily admitted he was more into ready articles in magazines and online that might benefit his general knowledge. Most of them are so incredibly busy working 18 hours a day six days a week than to be able to spend much time on 400+ page novels. What a maroon, as Bugs Bunny would say.

Anyone been in the hot seat lately or part of an interview team? If so, what kind of weird questions were asked? Or, was everything very normal and directly tied to the job?

 
Posted : March 9, 2016 4:11 pm
(@mike-falk)
Posts: 303
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Remember when Sarah Palin couldn‰Ûªt name a newspaper that she reads? You want questions that the interviewee might not be prepared for.

I would encourage anyone, on either side of the table, to understand the psychology of interviewing. To be good you cannot do it once every 27 years.

If you look at the Monster.com 100 top job interview questions‰ÛÓbe prepared for the interview

You will find the question: What's the last book you read?

 
Posted : March 9, 2016 4:21 pm
Williwaw
(@williwaw)
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Just recently interviewed three different candidates for a party chief position. Two of them had the degree and LSIT I was looking for. The whole thing was a fairly casual affair. I wanted them to get a feel for what they were getting themselves into and for me to get a feel for their temperament. The whole interviewing people thing is fairly new to me but I've learned the hard way not to just hire the first body through the door with a pulse hoping it'll all work out.

What I really wanted to give all of them a list ten very simple tasks with instructions to go through them as quickly as they possibly could, with the very last task on the list being to ignore the first nine and just sign their name and see who actually read through the list before beginning.

Probably for the best I didn't.

Just because I'm paranoid, doesn't mean they aren't out to get me.

 
Posted : March 9, 2016 4:38 pm
holy-cow
(@holy-cow)
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Oh, I'm not good at it and don't intend to be. I was merely behaving nicely per the standard process. My chore was to listen to how seven of the other nine viewed each candidate. Their vote didn't really count much, but it could influence those of us who were Board Members who were going to report to the full Board where the final decision would be made. The Board Members tended to save our comments for the Board Meeting, which was last night.

A large Sunday paper I try to read every week has a featured writer who discusses the various aspects of the whole job opening/listing/selecting process. I have read many of those articles to have a general idea of what is currently the fad and what has died out. It appears the biggest liar with the dumbest interviewers gets the job, then loses it after proving his ineptitude, so the process repeats and repeats, keeping the Human Resources Department fully staffed.

The closest thing to the "What are you reading?" question to ever come my way was during an interview for an engineering position that would involve a great deal of energy studies and related cost-benefits of alternative procedures in an industrial environment. The specific question was, "What is a BTU?" The inability to answer that incredibly simple question tended to eliminate the contenders who had purchased their diplomas rather than having ever attended any engineering classes. I was disgusted with the number of pretenders who applied. One actually made it through and was hired.................and terminated a couple of weeks later when it became obvious that his diploma from some school in India was completely fake as there was no such school anywhere in the world. Apparently our Industrial Relations/Employment Department had made no attempt to verify any part of his submitted records.

 
Posted : March 9, 2016 4:41 pm
(@cameron-watson-pls)
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We have built a short list of simple questions geared to flush out poor work ethic before we get too far down the road. The best one is "who was your worst manager/supervisor and why?" If you get an answer like "oh, Joe Blow for sure, that SOB made me get to the job site on time, work a full day, answer my phone, clean my equipment, ect." then we know to move to the next interview. If it's "Joe Blow because he didn't give me clear direction, didn't hold me accountable, didn't empower and excite me about my job, ect." then we know we've got part way to a winning personality we can work with. Those people we'll put up with a larger learning curve even.

 
Posted : March 9, 2016 6:12 pm

(@jason-graves)
Posts: 137
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I dislike interviews. You don't really learn anything about the person. I'm more into having a meal together and talking with the person. People are generally prepared for interviews and can answer in the way they think you want to hear it.
Most of my failed jobs were due to not getting along with someone. That would've solved by a more casual hangout session.....

 
Posted : March 9, 2016 6:14 pm
(@tom-adams)
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Holy Cow, post: 361470, member: 50 wrote: ...What a maroon, as Bugs Bunny would say.

haha....I bet the guys getting interviewed were thinking "I knew I should have turned left in Albuquerque"

 
Posted : March 10, 2016 7:50 am