Here’s the weird thing about the whole job interview process: no one really likes it, but everyone keeps doing it.
It’s costly for employers, who spend money on recruiters or HR staff to review resumes, phone-screen candidates, check references, etc. Then they pull employees away from productive work to spend time interviewing candidates. Usually several employees, for interviews with several candidates. It adds up.
For job seekers, if you don’t happen to interview well, you are in serious trouble. You could be the most qualified candidate, only to be screened out when you stumble on some contrived interview question. What is your greatest weakness? If you were a superhero, which one would you be? If you worked here, would you be home now? I honestly can’t say, I seem to have a basic problem with asinine questions.
These days, you can’t even get an interview to begin with unless you exactly match the qualifications listed on the job description. This leads to another question: what kind of unimaginative drone wants to do exactly the same thing in a new position? And why would anyone want to work for a company that sees an employee as nothing more than a list of skills, incapable of learning anything new?
If you do manage to get your foot in the door and get an interview, the real nightmare begins. To prepare for the interview, you can research the company, but nothing can prepare you for the weird people who will interview you.
Some people seem to dislike you from the get-go, possibly based on your resume, or because they don’t like what you’re wearing, or the way you talk, or maybe because you resemble someone they don’t like. Who knows? Other interviewers will admit they haven’t looked at your resume, and will act bored while you fill them in on your background. Still others seem to be interviewing you for an entirely different position than the one in the job description. The absolute worst is the gang interview, in which several people interview you simultaneously.
For one set of interviews, I was placed in a circular conference room with glass walls, which was sort of like being in a giant fish tank. What am I, a pet iguana? I’m in a freaking enclosure here! Why not put some gravel on the floor and throw in a couple of logs for me to climb on? But that wasn’t the worst part. The glass walls weren’t clear, they were tinted red. Such a nice, soothing color. I was okay at first, but after a while it started to get to me. It was like The Shining. Red room. Red Room. Redrum! REDRUM! REDRUM!
After a couple of hours in the REDRUM, I was ready to climb the walls (much like a pet iguana), and my normal interview style of babbling like an idiot devolved into a series of incoherent grunts and squeals. I think I may have sounded somewhat like “Flipper” (the bottle-nose dolphin), if Flipper had recently smoked a lot of crystal meth. The interviewer, who happened to be the hiring manager, also happened to be asking about my communication skills at the time, so that pretty much was that. I had spent literally hours preparing for that interview, only to crash and burn.
So I’ve decided to fight back. From now on, I’ll have some fun with job interviews. It’s going to go something like this:
Sample Interview Questions and Answers
Q: What is your greatest weakness?
A: Well, sometimes I throw up during job interviews.
Q: Where do you see yourself in 5 years?
A: That really depends on the number of parole violations.
Q: Do you belong to any professional organizations?
A: Would a white supremacist gun club count?
Q: How do you handle stress and pressure?
A: Drugs and alcohol.
Q: What motivates you?
A: Greed. Also, sex.
Q: Why are you leaving your current job?
A: Because of the restraining order.
Q: Can you give an example of seizing the initiative?
A: I’m HIRED. Now get me some coffee, biatch.
Okay, I won’t get the job, but I probably wouldn’t have gotten it anyway, and I’ll have some fun in the process.
For what it’s worth, here are my proposals for a system to replace the current job interview process:
- If you have transferable skills that mesh pretty well — not necessarily exactly – with the job description, you’re in the running.
- You are not discriminated against for gaps in employment, unless incarceration was involved. It’s a tough job market out there; it has been for years. Employers: think about how much more motivated someone will be when they’ve been without a steady paycheck for a while.
- Really good recommendations from former employers and coworkers should count more than anything else. “He did a good job, he learns new things quickly, he worked extra hours when necessary, he played well with others. He didn’t give me any crap. He made me look good. I would hire him again.” What more do you want?
- You interview with the hiring manager, period, not with six people who don’t want to waste their time interviewing people to begin with. And preferably not in a giant red fish tank.
