Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
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Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#2Anand would do well to read the room. This is why soft skills are so valued. If he sees he’s annoying the vp with too many questions, maybe dial it back. Does Anand want the job or want to be right?
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#3Anand would do well to read the room. This is why soft skills are so valued. If he sees he’s annoying the vp with too many questions, maybe dial it back. Does Anand want the job or want to be right?
Its easy to misread people after several hours of interviewing. Especially if everyone else is open to questions and things go well. Id actually apply criticism to the VP ahead of the candidate. My expectation is that someone operating at the VP level has some degree of self awareness which this person clearly lacked.
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#4Anand would do well to read the room. This is why soft skills are so valued. If he sees he’s annoying the vp with too many questions, maybe dial it back. Does Anand want the job or want to be right?
I'm not sure why it's only on Anand. If the VP was getting annoyed, why couldn't the VP steer the conversation? He's the VP ffs. Isn't "having conversations" one of the key job requirements for any VP?
The problem with "just read the room" is that you can very easily misread someone when you're meeting them for the first time, for example during a several-hour-long interview session.
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#5Anand would do well to read the room. This is why soft skills are so valued. If he sees he’s annoying the vp with too many questions, maybe dial it back. Does Anand want the job or want to be right?
Anand could very well be moving across countries and investing immense amounts of times to start a new life. He could also be leaving a great job to seek a new challenge in a company he wants to invest years of his effort in. The VP has also dedicated time specifically for Anand's interview. He also probably has the power to fire him in short notice and with limited severance.
Anand should ask all the annoying questions. This way he's saving both himself and the VP all the wasted time of hiring him and then having a broken relationship because things weren't clear later. This way the VP can also see what concerns the potential employee and if they have a potential mismatch in expectations.
Finally, even if we disregard all that I said above, if it's Anand's working style to ask a lot of questions and he hides this style during the interview, then he will invariably clash with management later due to it if he's hired. Then he may have more to lose then just a potential future job.
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#6Anand would do well to read the room. This is why soft skills are so valued. If he sees he’s annoying the vp with too many questions, maybe dial it back. Does Anand want the job or want to be right?
He wants to be right. A job interview is not like an exam, it's like dating. An opportunity for two parties to decide if they can work together. Hiding who you really are to 'pass' is a bad foundation.
That's why I don't like the conclusion of the article. Anand didn't fail the interview because the criteria were wrong - the interviewer failed because they suck at being an engineering manager.
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#7Anand would do well to read the room. This is why soft skills are so valued. If he sees he’s annoying the vp with too many questions, maybe dial it back. Does Anand want the job or want to be right?
OTOH maybe the VP feels challenged, which is why the questions are 'annoying'.
I mean, in this climate where people are being asked to win X-factor competitions for the privilege of a job, how sure are we that those already onboard would pass if they had to run the gauntlet?
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#8I’ve had this experience. I passed all of the interviews only to be failed by a senior manager that had some kind of expectation I couldn’t figure out.
About 6 seconds into a phone call, I’d failed for not matching whatever expectation he had for how a phone call should go. As far as I can tell, he expected me to do everything his way without being asked.
That was truly bizarre. I think I dodged a bullet there.
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#9I’ve had this experience. I passed all of the interviews only to be failed by a senior manager that had some kind of expectation I couldn’t figure out. About 6 seconds into a phone call, I’d failed for not matching whatever expectation he had for how a phone call should go. As far as I can tell, he expected me to do everything his way without being asked. That was truly bizarre. I think I dodged a bullet there.
I once failed a job interview at the algorithms exam. I don’t know what it is, I’ve done great in other BSc-level math oral exams. Felt weird to have two teams at the employer, one that felt confident about hiring me, and another that thought I’m deeply incompetent.
Combine the scrutiny with a 3-6 month hiring process, I decided to dodge whatever that was.
Re: Stop eliminating good candidates by asking them the wrong questions
#10I’ve had this experience. I passed all of the interviews only to be failed by a senior manager that had some kind of expectation I couldn’t figure out. About 6 seconds into a phone call, I’d failed for not matching whatever expectation he had for how a phone call should go. As far as I can tell, he expected me to do everything his way without being asked. That was truly bizarre. I think I dodged a bullet there.
So if this type of thing let's us dodge bullets, maybe nothing should change?