Craziest Interview Question

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When I was out of work in the early 2000's, I was interviewing for a sales position in a Mall store (for TV and HiFi equipment ).(I've never worked in sales - but I have an idea how I would like to be treated as a customer). A week prior, I boned up on HDTV and the related technology.. Well that was a waste. They didn't ask me any technical questions. The oddest question they asked- near the end of an hour
long interview - was:

What don't you like about people?

I don't know why, but that threw me for a loop.

I didn't get the job.
 
Originally Posted by DriveHard
Oh...I would never fire someone for asking a certain "silly" interview question. I value my people more than that. Yup, there are HR lines that can't be crossed...but to fire someone for trying to lighten the mood or get an insight on how someone thinks surely isn't worth the investment already made in that person.


I have a huge problem with people asking silly question to get an opinion of people, and use that as a go or no go indicator. Socializing is fine, giving a question like "would you kill a butterfly for $10k" or "how many ballons can you fit in a swimming pool" is just silly, and it serves nothing but stroking the interviewers' ego. This is not a behavior I would encourage in my team. This is not a frat house rush, we do not tolerate a hazing culture here. It is also very easy to form a biased opinion and pick someone "similar" to your personal background instead of the best candidate for the company.

Yeah, if I invest in my employee and end up getting this, I'm doing it wrong and should have done better training instead. I want people to dig deep on the know how and integrity, with meaningful questions that the interviewee understand and explain the reason. I'm not testing how many riddles they have read and solved in their youth for entertainments. I'm not hiring someone that knows how to BS but not how to get things done.

Google used to do this and after decades of data, found that it doesn't do squat.

What about "Are you a wolf or a bear?", don't laugh, I've seen people post this on Blind after an interview and ask the anonymous crowd why is it asked?
 
When interviewing with Admiral Rickover in 1977 he asked me at most 2 questions during what was to be a 1 minute interview:

"Why do you want my program?"

He didn't like my answer....told me "B.S." and yelled at me to get out of his office.

I spent the next 90 minutes in a corner of the Naval Reactors secretarial pool sitting on a stool staring at filing cabinets until someone might see me again. It was like being the dunce in grade school.

A few minutes later I found out I was accepted into the Admiral's program. Go figure.
 
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Originally Posted by Zee09
I've killed many people but never a butterfly on purpose........


But have you been offered $10,000?
 
The strangest question I've asked at a job interview was "What was your time?" The candidate claimed to have run the Boston marathon. But he couldn't remember his time. [If you have run the Boston marathon you'd remember your time.]

That lead to a series of other questions which established to our satisfaction that he didn't even have the training he claimed.

The grand finale is he stole everything in his hotel room that wasn't tied down (bath towels, hand towels, face cloths, and even the soap and shampoo stand). The hotel manager said no-one had ever ever done that before! The hotel was billing us directly for his room charges, so we deducted the hotel's extra charges from his travel expense claim. And no he didn't get the job.

The strangest question I've ever been asked [at my medical school interview] was "So what did I drink?". "Beer" I relied, "All engineers drink beer." I guess that was the right answer, I got in.
 
Originally Posted by Virtus_Probi
The CEO had a few choice words to share about that headhunter...


Once we had an opening for a firmware guy (C / hardware knowledge / etc). The recruiter send us a silicon validation guy (run test script instead of writing them) that knows how to write web pages (and nothing in between). My boss didn't check before sending us to interview him, and I'm the 2nd interviewer of the day.

I told the candidate what I think might happen but still, wish him good luck. When I walk out the room I ran into my boss, and before I even said a word he already knew what happened from the 1st interviewer of the day. He apologized to the candidate, bought him a lunch, and send him home early.

Both my boss and the recruiter messed up (didn't read the resume's detail), wasting the candidate a day.
 
Originally Posted by 69GTX
When interviewing with Admiral Rickover in 1977 he asked me at most 2 questions during what was to be a 1 minute interview:
"Why do you want my program?"
He didn't like my answer....told me "B.S." and yelled at me to get out of his office.
I spent the next 90 minutes in a corner of the Naval Reactors secretarial pool sitting on a stool staring at filing cabinets until someone might see me again. It was like being the dunce in grade school.
A few minutes later I found out I was accepted into the Admiral's program. Go figure.

Maybe he wanted to see if you would collapse in tears and not doing so got you in??
 
Originally Posted by PandaBear
Originally Posted by Virtus_Probi
The CEO had a few choice words to share about that headhunter...

Once we had an opening for a firmware guy (C / hardware knowledge / etc). The recruiter send us a silicon validation guy (run test script instead of writing them) that knows how to write web pages (and nothing in between). My boss didn't check before sending us to interview him, and I'm the 2nd interviewer of the day.
I told the candidate what I think might happen but still, wish him good luck. When I walk out the room I ran into my boss, and before I even said a word he already knew what happened from the 1st interviewer of the day. He apologized to the candidate, bought him a lunch, and send him home early.
Both my boss and the recruiter messed up (didn't read the resume's detail), wasting the candidate a day.

We once had a guy who had been an audio engineer in NYC come up to interview as an IC designer...I have no idea why.
I was forced to interview him and asked him to draw a few basic circuits, the guy just said there were a lot of ways to make any kind of circuit work and why get too involved in the details?
My boss had him next and spent about 10 minutes with him, then sent him home despite it being mid morning...he was beet red after kicking the guy out and said he wasn't wasting money buying him lunch and that it was a good thing they made him drive instead of giving him plane tickets.
 
Originally Posted by ecotourist
The strangest question I've asked at a job interview was "What was your time?" The candidate claimed to have run the Boston marathon. But he couldn't remember his time. [If you have run the Boston marathon you'd remember your time.]

That lead to a series of other questions which established to our satisfaction that he didn't even have the training he claimed.

The grand finale is he stole everything in his hotel room that wasn't tied down (bath towels, hand towels, face cloths, and even the soap and shampoo stand). The hotel manager said no-one had ever ever done that before! The hotel was billing us directly for his room charges, so we deducted the hotel's extra charges from his travel expense claim. And no he didn't get the job.

The strangest question I've ever been asked [at my medical school interview] was "So what did I drink?". "Beer" I relied, "All engineers drink beer." I guess that was the right answer, I got in.



I only remember my PR on the Boston Marathon, I've done a bunch of other ones and don't remember the times. I do have the medals though.

I do like how sometimes people who don't know about running say crazy things. I remember one person who told me that her friend was a marathoner and that she ran 10 miles every day during lunch. That would be believable if she was fast, but I got the impression she was a 4-5 hour marathoner so I knew that she wasn't doing those 10 miles in a hour.
 
If I didn't "need" the job, I would have answered that I would not be in a position of working under some incompetent wacko that made me choose butteryfly vs $10K. Ridiculous inappropriate questions are posed by ridiculous inappropriate people.
 
Craziest interview question might be interesting since there are some companies that have weird interview questions just as psych tests. However, I do remember being in an office during an interview. The room had no A/C so they kept the door open and I could hear someone else in the office having a complete meltdown.
 
Strangest question I asked during a hiring interview?

What did you go to prison for?

As it turned out the guy had been convicted of a gang-related murder (it was kill or be killed) that he did admit to, and subsquently spent over 10yrs in prison.
He explained the entire story. And how he turned his life around in prison getting a degree, and becoming an advocate for many other inmates. He was running a community big brother type program when he applied to our job opening. The local community thought very highly of him.

He got the job. Unfortunately, he never spent a day at work with us as he was diagnosed with cancer only days after our interview....passed away within months. Very sad.
 
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Originally Posted by Gebo
Originally Posted by Zee09
I've killed many people but never a butterfly on purpose........


But have you been offered $10,000?



lol....... Good one
smile.gif
 
"If you could be any type of car, what would you be and why?"

I'm sure quite a few students in my college said a Ferrari, a Lamborghini, or a Dodge Viper. I told them that I would probably be my daily driver which was a red 1994 Toyota Camry Coupe. My answer took about two minutes. I mentioned that it was reliable, low maintenance, offered excellent quality, and that I would be happy to keep it for another 10 to 15 years.

Don't remember if I got the job offer. But I did become my own boss a few years later and have stayed that way for nearly all of 20 years.

I still miss the car but I definitely don't miss Corporate America.
 
Originally Posted by kschachn
Originally Posted by Onetor
I would NOT kill for no amount of $$$$. Even the most insignificant insect. Boy, the lasting implications for those that would even pose that question.

How do you drive anywhere then? Or walk, for that matter.


Carefully! Lol, good point....killing is too easy....
 
Originally Posted by DriveHard
Originally Posted by Onetor
I would NOT kill for no amount of $$$$. Even the most insignificant insect. Boy, the lasting implications for those that would even pose that question.

We need to make our World a better place!


So you don't drive your car? You kill thousands of insects every time you get behind the wheel
So you don't spray around your house? You kill thousands, and leave countless more homeless
So you carefully walk with your head down looking for insects? You step on many ants during a normal summer walk
So you don't vacuum your house/wash your sheets? You kill thousands of dust mites with this practice...

Seriously...a bug??? I have killed many beautiful butterflies just driving, riding my motorcycle, even by riding my bicycle.


I would never kill anything for money. (greed) Only self defense or someone else. Please read my response carefully. I won't explain my personal beliefs, except that I won't kill for money. But, you and others made your point. Lol........
 
Interviewer: "We all steal stuff from our employers. What dollar value would you assign to what you took from your current or past employer?"
Me: "Under a dollar... in pens, which I took accidentally, and they always made their way back!"

Got the job busting tires. Also had to answer a question about conflict with co-workers, which I said that I'd deal with them first because it was probably just a misunderstanding.

I asked an interviewee at the TV station what brand snow tires she ran. She was completely startled and didn't handle the question well. The job was detail oriented and I figured someone who knew what brand tires they had was into that sort of detail. It also reinforced that the ideal candidate was able and willing to come in during all sorts of Maine weather. (There's significant additional work roof-raking a field full of satellite dishes to keep a signal on-air during snow events so my department had to come in!)
 
Originally Posted by 69GTX
When interviewing with Admiral Rickover in 1977 he asked me at most 2 questions during what was to be a 1 minute interview:

"Why do you want my program?"

He didn't like my answer....told me "B.S." and yelled at me to get out of his office.

I spent the next 90 minutes in a corner of the Naval Reactors secretarial pool sitting on a stool staring at filing cabinets until someone might see me again. It was like being the dunce in grade school.

A few minutes later I found out I was accepted into the Admiral's program. Go figure.


That's awesome and it's super cool you got to interview with him personally.

Legend has it he told an interviewee to make him mad, so the applicant took a bunch of Top Secret folders off his desk and threw them out the window.

Or he'd invite someone over for dinner, and if he put salt on his food without tasting it, he was out.
 
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