Hey fellow ozbargainers. As the title says: what's the weirdest interview question you've ever been asked? It seems like in this day and age, a lot of companies tend to be more creative with what they ask interview candidates. I guess the age-old 'What animal would you choose to be and why' is no longer a preferable question to ask (and probably because everyone gives similar answers relating to power, freedom, etc). Looking forward to reading some quirky questions :P
What's the weirdest interview question you've ever been asked?
lizzle on 12/10/2015 - 12:55
Last edited 12/10/2015 - 15:25
Last edited 12/10/2015 - 15:25
Comments
It's a great question, thanks, and the official answer is endearing. I saw it from another angle, since you said it was a trick question.
Perhaps it is a story about "moving on" …
Let's see, since those people are waiting at the bus stop they probably don't have a lot of money + they are literally on a journey to nowhere.
Also, your best friend is with your love; what is going on? either they are together, or want to be together and/or you want to break them apart…
The old penny-less lady represents what you will become if you follow their path
And since you have a rare single-seater car (a Formula 1 car has only one seat available) (which represents success) you should keep driving, and not give into temptation. As the bus-stop people will only hold you back.
Do I get the job? ☺
I would squish them all in, I do what i want!
thunderstorm? Road rules don't apply here i reckon.
First i'd inform them of the situation then ask if they wanted a ride.
mate in the boot, love in the seat and granny on his/her lap (switch to lighter on top).opps, nikkirose just beat me to it.
You're doing it wrong.
Correct answer is take her home. She's all 3, your best friend, love and old lady in 1. They could all describe one person.
Winner winner chicken dinner!
I was asked: "Which three people in history would you like to meet, and what would you ask them?" The question was completely irrelevant to the job of course, but it did catch me by surprise as it was my first serious job interview. I remember two of my answers: a Pharaoh from ancient Egypt and Adolf Hitler. I guess they were the right answer as I got the job! :-P
The one question I really hate is "what do you consider to be your biggest flaw?" or "what one area of your personality would you improve?" It sounds like a question from a Self Criticism struggle session from Soviet Russia or Mao's China. The next time someone asks me that I'll make that clear.
You should have reeled off (in order of appearance) the icons of history from Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure and see if they notice. Bonus points if you call them So-crates and Beeth-oven.
when they ask. what do you consider to be your biggest flaw. say a exercise like dead lifts lol just don't answer bench it might look bad lol
- Figure out how many corporate helicopters are in Australia?
- How many train drivers are there in Melbourne?
Too many. For both. Unless I was applying to be a corporate Helicopter pilot or Melbourne train driver haha.
Dunno about how many train drivers, but Bronwyn Bishop might be able to help you with the number of corporate helicopters ;)
Sounds like a standard market sizing question. Was this a consulting interview?
I was asked "Do you have any children" and when I said "no" he said "good I don't like women who abandon their children in the home". It was the 80s and they guy was very religious. I got the job and got to know him quite well and he was actually a lovely guy but I did find it challenging.
i was asked the same question, not in an interview, but when i called up enquiring about the job.
me: don't you want to know about my skills/work experience?
nosy mofo: oh, i want to get to know you betterat that point, i wasn't going to waste any more time or money on this idiot and just hung up. would've loved to string him on a bit more. some day..
You really want to mess with him tell him you will report him for asking the question. It is actually illegal to discriminate against people with children.
In my case it was the 80s and I wasn't planning on kids, but it was a bit of an eye opener. (Not as big a one as some of the things that were prevalent back then; such as pictures of naked women on the desks, people smoking, my home loan being filed under my other half's name, (even though I as the employee), etc. Fortunately I never had to deal with sexual harassment, but I'm sure it happened to others.
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/11-illegal-interview-quest…
no point really, and he likely knew that.
the job ad i was responding to was one of those two-line minimalist ads in the paper that only stated the job title and mobile phone number. no mention of business name at all.
Seriously from ALL women thank you so much for enduring that rubbish because if it wasn't for the sacrifices all my predecessors made, I wouldn't have the options and opportunities me and my contemporaries do now.
I mean that from the bottom of my heart.
I have worked in IT for most of my career. I can honestly say that there have been way more delights than crap; and most of the crap is what everyone has to endure in big organisations. I'm an "ovaries out" sort of lady and, fortunately, people seem to respond well to it. My answer is know your stuff, be prepared to argue your point, be prepared to acknowledge when someone has a better idea, work cooperatively with others and make sure you give credit to the right people.
I acknowledge those who came before me, 'cause they had it real tough; it is certainly "on the shoulders of giants". When my mother got married in 1954 she had to resign because married women couldn't work in the Public Service; this then meant she had no superannuation of her own.
I am proud to say I'm a feminist 'cause there is a lot more to be done; particularly in relation to Domestic Violence and religious discrimination.
Overall - Don't expect a free ride, but don't accept second best.
My son was asked if he had a girlfriend, he said no, they said good. He won out over a more qualified candidate too. It was for apprentice chef, 3 years later and he still doesn't have a gf, because he has no time, but he has gone up and up and up, to the point he is now working his dream job, before he has even finished his apprenticeship. there is a lesson in here somewhere.
Yeah, but the lesson might be that if you don't get the work/life balance right then you burn out due to stress.
Buying a home before procreating sounds like a mighty fine idea to me.
@nikkirose: Completely agree. I bypassed the procreating bit entirely. In our case we bought a house before we went travelling overseas. This is more about having another adult who can act as a sounding board and a moderating influence. There is a line between driven and obsessive.
Tell me 3 things you dislike about your manager in your current job. The thumb rule of interviews is not to criticise your current employer. I was caught off guard and couldn't answer the question and didn't get the job.
Personally I would say; "I don't dislike my current manager". If they press you then you could raise some procedural issues within the company you think are not conducive with optimal efficiency; but indicate they aren't a reflection on your manager.
if the question was framed around the word dislike, then use words such as "improve upon", "do better" so the answer looks positive and constructive, and not all negative about your current employer.
I'd reply. He was a crows supporter. You Gota turn those questions l. Their head.
What would you do to improve the health of the internet?
Post more pictures of my cat.
Love it! Would love to hear more quirky responses!!!
I might use this in interviews I'm running next week and respond with "correct" quirky responses post applicant response; different each time just to keep it fresh for the panelists. :)
Haha good response! Unfortunately this was an interview for Google and was not meant to be a quirky question… It was technical
@danielslater811: "Health" is such a subjective term. Do they mean; increase speed of transfer, reduce down time, improve security, make change management effective, standardise configurations, etc. I think if you can tick of the list they might just ignore the question they originally asked.
@try2bhelpful: Yeah it is a subjective term and I asked for clarification and they told me that was all that I was given. It was the only question for an hour long interview so that wasn't the case unfortunately
A couple of mine:
- Theoretically, if you were shrunk down to 10cm height and dropped into a blender which you knew would turn on in 2mins, how would you get out alive?
(assessing creativity - I think I said I might just lay flat under the blades. Then I said actually I'd tear off my clothes and use them to jam the blades. Then I said I'd tear off my clothes, tie them all end-to-end, throw the 'rope' over the side of the blender and climb out. I also said I would call 000 and they might arrive in less than 2mins)
- If you were on an island with a King and Prince and a locked treasure chest, but your Queen was on a separate Island with the chest's only key, and you had one boat but you didn't trust your boat driver… Something something something.. Can't remember the rest, but it was so long!
(this turned out to be a question assessing your applied understanding of public and private key encryption)
Where do you see yourself in 25yrs?
If you were the senior manager, how would you improve this interview style and content next time?
Write up an algorithm to…
(I dislike these practical ones, where you have to demonstrate your process and solution on a whiteboard, with a panel breathing down your neck).
Oh man, they gave me a tricky recursion problem to do on the whiteboard with 3 people staring at me. I got confused. The only programmer on the panel turned his nose up at me, as if I was too dumb to understand it.
Eh, it's usually a win to not get the job at a place with foolish hiring practices. Your co-workers are often a very mixed bag, as a direct result…
Haha! Yes I always feel my mental capacities seemingly slow down with so many people staring! Although I'm always assured it's fine, and have always got the job (so far!), so it must just be my nerves.
I think some companies have to reach out to weird questions like these simply as another layer of screening / choosing? I've noticed it's the very competitive organisations that often have the weirdest / most left-field questions.
You sound like you've had quite the mixed bag of co-workers… :P
a blender is about 15-20cm tall, so i would jump and pull myself over the ledge.
Some of these questions sound like they are from the mental asylum. On the positive note, there are a lot of employers who follow policies and sensitive to job seekers. I went through one interview many years ago where two interviewers were asking me what the company (I worked for) does to improve sales, how they do things and what they are doing now. I keep saying they are proprietary and I cannot discuss confidential information. Obviously I didn't get the job because they say I am not answering the questions. As soon as I walked out, I say to myself that I wouldn't work for this company.
that my friend is called brain rape.. they get you in just to milk competitor information.
I was asked 'Favourite Car from 80s TV' (by a guy who owned a KITT Replica Trans-AM), Favourite 80s Computer Game and Star Trek or Star Wars. All in the same interview, for an IT job at a bus company. They had all agreed that my resume looked fine, they just wanted to know if I would fit in with their goofball personalities.
When I told them I drove a Jaguar and had a USB stick with 8000 DOS games on it in the glove box, I was offered the job. Oh, and Star Wars of course
My father is an absolute bastard when it comes to interviewing. Whenever his company wants a new person for a job that doesn't require too many smarts, my father thins the list by separating those who want the job down to the person that obviously doesn't want the job at all. He then offers the job to that least interested person. After that, he reports all the no shows back to Centrelink with a smile on his face. A few of the astonished people that showed have grabbed the opportunity with both hands and were quickly promoted.
I think my father believes the two acts kind of cancel each other out. I can certainly appreciate why some applicants wouldn't be interested in being sales reps though. I can't think of anything worse than constantly trying to convince people to buy things they don't necessarily need.
oops. double post by mistake.
I can't think of anything worse than constantly trying to convince people to buy things they don't necessarily need.
That's what ozbargain does
man you really chomped the bait
Why we should not hire you?
Not too weird but I got a "When is the earliest you see yourself having children?" once.
You can get into trouble for asking that in an interview. Opens the door to discrimination based on gender / child status..
Good luck trying to prove it, the legal battle isn't worth the time.
Many mid/small sized employers ask discriminatory questions and get away with it.
Yeah but that was about 10 years ago. And it was actually an interview with an MNC so they wanted to know if I can commit to them for the next 10 years or so. I see their point - there's no point investing and training if it is going to get 'wasted'. I didn't mind the question.
I've got a few. One that was different was
"how do you feel about working in the company of devout christians?"
"I'll get my coat."
That seriously made me LOL.
No problem. On bring your pet to work day, I can bring my lion…
Not really an odd question but his reaction afterwards was.
"why do you want to work here" after I answered, he went on a rant recommending me to apply to other places and how to leave the profession.
Was utterly bizarre.
What was the position and what was your answer?
It was in finance, I answered how you normally would but making the pitch personalized to the firm.
Guy was a complete flog, he thought he was a genius even though he not even a partner and his is 55+!
Do you play tekken
How many street lights would it take to light up Pitt Street?
This was for a junior statistician part time role and it's safe to say I was stumped, and was not hired.
They weren't actually asking for the correct answer - none of these brainteaser questions have one. They just show your communication and problem solving skills as you talk through how you would go about solving the problem.
Personally, I always start with "First, I'd Google it", since that's the smartest thing to do first in real life.
They are looking for your ability to solve an atypical problem and reasoning. Don't mention google it won't help you and wastes time. I'm very good at thinking on my feet and want to solve the puzzle myself not have someone else cut my lunch.
I only hire software developers, so I give extra points to anyone who mentions googling.
The thing is, junior candidates especially have been ruined by our archaic school system, where all the problems are artificially made for testing their knowledge. It stops them from thinking outside the box, tells them that's "cheating".
They get a lot of bad habits from it, like claiming hard problems are "unfair"
or blaming colleagues if something goes wrong, because those work in school.A developer who doesn't get this can do a lot of damage. They tend to spend days re-inventing the wheel when they could have googled the right answer in seconds and delivered something useful to our users on time.
@mgowen:
Like what you say. Rather to start at last ending point or review failed ending point [ not own ] see Edison/Tesla, Bell/Meucci, "s results. Or even much sader the Parthian Battery, and if the Romans ect did not keep society in the dark age where would we be now.Code is the new future. Why is it not taught from grade 2?
sigh,… what's 501 x 17 ?
answer: "my calculator says low battery"
partial credit. thats the problem with questions like that.
the problems is that the employer or person hiring is always right, not matter what you do, no matter how stupid their questions or reasons for asking them. Problem is so prevalent, iv also asked questions like how would you sort and array,… (without using .sort) you'd be surprised how many people can think,.. the answer isnt to google it or call .sort, we want to see how you think, the core essence of what were testing, of course goggling it or asking someone is an option, but tells me very little about the core issue that i have asked.
i guess not about how many… but how bright can one light shine? you could have 100 dim street lights or one super bright flood light to do the job?
None…
would wait for the sun to come up
These are the weird ones I've asked
Interviewing for a Jnr Marketing Manager (consumer tech company). What phone do you have and why.
- needed a tech savvy "early adopter" personInterviewing for a Jnr Marketing Analyst, database person. What drives you, why do you get out of bed in the morning, what are you passionate about.
- just needed to see a response to a question that they wouldn't have prepared for
They asked me what kind of fruit I would be if i were one…I said durian, "smelly and spikey and I'll smash the F out of any grapes you're interviewing". #didnthappen
For a civilian defence position sitting alone at a chair in the middle of a half circle of desk bound panellists -
"Tell us about yourself, everyone else we are interviewing already work here.."
"What did you have for lunch?"
All I could think off is that I am pretty sure I would masked whatever lunch breath I had by eating 5 minties prior to entering the office for the interview…It was a polite small talk but it could have been taken the wrong way…
Another 'weird' question I've asked half-way through an interview was: "Do you mind if we continue this interview in French?" He was a brilliant man with a thick french accent. I couldn't understand half the things he said and it was giving me a headache.
I had that in class once when this German guy next to me wanted to bitch about our classmate. We had never spoken before but I look Nordic so assume he guessed there was a fair chance I spoke German and I said yes.
Then it was a monologue of him bitching about this person.
It was quite entertaining.- She's so f***** annoying, never shuts up, no one cares about her opinion, I hope she doesn't come next week, omg be quiet, did you hear her answer? wtf. etc etc
We did the rest of the interview in french and we gave him the job. He never really integrated the team ( although his work was top-notch). He was also homesick and, more importantly, lovesick. Long-distance relationship sucks.
Can you please put your pants back on.
[it was more of a statement than a question, does that still count?]
"What's your name?" come on man, you've seen my CV, interviewed me on the phone, and now my name's gone missing?
"Am i in the wrong room? Is this an interrogation or an interview?"
I've asked the following question - no one gets the right answeer - but it's interesting to see their logic skills.. (give it a shot without googling it :) )
Let’s say that you have 25 horses, and you want to pick the fastest 3 horses out of those 25. In each race, only 5 horses can run at the same time because there are only 5 tracks. What is the minimum number of races required to find the 3 fastest horses without using a stopwatch?
What job was that for?
software dev
6 races. Pick any random 5 horses for race 1 and then pick another 5 for next race and so on till all 25 have run and 6th race between winners from 1st 5 race. Winner of 6th race is fastest
not bad to pick the fastest horse - but the question asks for the top 3 fastest horses.
The answer is 7. There's a couple of ways to get to the answer. The easiest is probably using a visual aid.
i thought 6 too. I don't understand. on the 6th race, couldn't you choose the first 3 horses over the line? am i missing something?
Well technically 1 of the horse that came second in any of the first 5 races could be faster than horse 2 and 3 in the 6th race. It could be a case a heat being run faster than final race
Well technically 1 of the horse that came second in any of the first 5 races could be faster than horse 2 and 3 in the 6th race.
Incorrect, none of the horses from the heats (first 5 races) of the 4th and 5th horses in the final (6th race) can be faster than the 2nd or 3rd horses of the final (6th race).
The key is the mathematical property of transitivity: If A is known to be greater than B, then A is also greater than all things which B is known to be greater than.
@Scrooge McDuck:
WrongMisread your answer.
I'll reduce it to 4 horses with 2 horses per race.
Horse: A, B, C, D
1st Race: A and B races and A comes first. A > B
2nd Race: C and D races and D comes first. D > C
3rd race: A and D races and A comes first. A > DWe know A is fastest since A > D > C so A > C.
But we don't know the relationship between B and D until we have the 4th race.In the case of the 25 horses if the fastest 3 horses were chosen randomly in the first race the 2nd and 3rd horses would be eliminated if only 6 races were run.
What an interesting question! Answer is seven. Less than ten min- including reading the question multiple times. See my soln at image http://i61.tinypic.com/vo3iar.jpg
Can explain if someone is not clear.great working out - you got it spot on!
I got asked this. I said 11 but it's 7.
Very bad question as if you miss the logical deduction from the first heat to the second it's all over. It's a 30 min problem that tests simply one thing. Understanding the second heat isn't like the first as you know the horses history unlike the very first heat which too 5. So the second round it won't be 3. If you didn't work that out its all over. Easy to miss. I missed it.
yeah - no one got it right - but that wasn't the point.. some interviewees had better responses and more importantly explained the problem/solution better than others, which was what I was looking for. Their process and their ability to explain things - not the actual answer.
6
I would say 5. There are other ways of measuring time and distance than a stop watch.
13?
Start with 5 horses, end of race one, get rid of the bottom two, and add two new horses to the pack, redo race, you will need 13 races to find the best 3.
** I believe the assumption is that a horse can perform at the same level for each race **
The question says minimum number of races. While your idea is still correct, it's not the minimum number.
Also, doing it your way is 11 races. 5 race, 20 horses left, keep 3 and add 2 for each race after the first so 20/2 = 10 + 1 = 11
Initially I thought 6 races but the fastest 3 horses could be in the same race. I'm assuming that each of the tracks are not the same length otherwise you could just race them all at the same time and observe the fastest 3 horses (assuming manpower isn't an issue here).
I would simply use one track and eliminate the slowest 2 horses from each race.
- Race 1 - 23 horses
- Race 2 - 21 horses
- Race 3 - 19 horses
- Race 4 - 17 horses
- Race 5 - 15 horses
- Race 6 - 13 horses
- Race 7 - 11 horses
- Race 8 - 9 horses
- Race 9 - 7 horses
- Race 10 - 5 horses
- Race 11 - 3 horses
The above doesn't take into account variances such as the horses not running their fastest or being tired after each race.
Race number 1-5: 5 races, each race has 5 horses = 25 horses
Race number 6: Race the fastest horse from each race against each other
Race number 7, choose 5 horses: The two horses that were 2nd and 3rd to Race number 6's fastest horse in the initial races + the second fastest horse in race number 6 and the horse that came second to it in the initial race + the horse that came 3rd in race number 6.The two fastest horses in race 7 plus the fastest horse in race 6 would be the 3 fastest horses…
I've just started to read this thread, but no-one thus far has answered this problem with a full explanation.
Assuming that the problem is asking for the quickest 3 horses to run the tracks (rather than the "fastest"), that the 5 tracks are identical and that each individual horse always runs the tracks with the same elapsed time:
First find the quickest horse:
- Consider all 25 horses.
- Run all horses 5 at a time across 5 heats.
- Eliminate all horses that were beaten, this leaves 5.
- Run the remaining 5 horses in a final.
- Eliminate all horses that were beaten, this leaves 1, the winner of the final which is the quickest horse.
Next find the second and third quickest horses:
- Consider all 25 horses.
- Eliminate the quickest horse.
- Eliminate all remaining horses that have been beaten, this leaves 2, the runners-up of the final and the quickest horse's heat.
Either of the 2 remaining horses could be the second quickest horse. Enter them both in the supplementary race.
Consider all 25 horses.
- Eliminate the quickest horse.
- Eliminate the two horses already entered in the supplementary race.
- Eliminate all remaining horses that have been beaten, this leaves 3, the runner-up of the heat of the runner-up of the final and the second runners-up of the final and the quickest horse's heat.
Any of the 3 remaining horses and the 2 already entered in the supplementary race could be the third quickest horse. Run these 5 in a supplementary race.
Consider all 25 horses.
- Eliminate the quickest horse.
Eliminate all remaining horses that have been beaten, this leaves 1, the winner of the supplementary race which is the second quickest horse.
Consider all 25 horses.
- Eliminate the quickest and second-quickest horses.
- Eliminate all remaining horses that have been beaten, this leaves 1, the runner-up of the supplementary race which is the third quickest horse.
So after 5 heats, a final and a supplementary race, the 3 quickest horses have not only been found but ranked first, second and third quickest.
Good work
Do you think the atomic bombs should have been dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki?
(In an interview for a job working in Japan.)
Not sure if its implied, but you havent yet him/her yet officially, so I wouldnt give my car to a stranger. The Official answer is you let you best mate drive the old lady home and you stay with the love of your life