Ask HN: Non-developers, how are your job interviews like?

[enrmarc]

We all know how they are for developers: programming challenges (Fizzbuzz, homework, whiteboard coding, etc.), examples of your work (GitHub, side projects, blog, etc.), questions like "what is the hardest challenge you have had to overcome and how did you approach it?", they ask you about something and they expect you to get excited talking about it... and the usual behavioural questions.

[smilesnd]

Hiring manager "Can you pass a background check?" Me "Yep" hiring manager "Can you pass a piss test?" Me "Yep". Was really the only questions I been asked during interviews before becoming a programmer.

[xiaoma]

Was it a government job?

[smilesnd]

UPS moving a box from right to left. If you are moving boxes left to right you either in the wrong spot in the warehouse or just doing it wrong.

[punchclockhero]

Interview for the last job I held (back office agent at a call center):

Foreign language test with grammar, vocabulary, reading comprehension and mock customer service email sections followed by a most ordinary interview in English (some chatting to break the ice and salary discussion at the end) Very efficient process. Other similar businesses interviewed the same only with just the mock email instead of a comprehensive language test.

Last interview so far (tech support at a small VoIP software company):

Take what is colloquially referred to as the "retard test" (company is proudly unPC) which included general trivia like "First person in space" (some applicant apparently answered with Louis Armstrong), a middle school level math word problem and some brainteasers (thank you, Professor Layton) followed by some very intense technical grilling scaled to my self reported knowledge level (I admitted domestic level networking knowledge and got quizzed on the most common settings of a consumer router). That was followed by even more intense culture fit questions to find out if I can thrive in the company's peculiar environment (got referred so I knew in advance what it's like to work there, but still I found it a bit too prying) Unlike the call centers, the tech company interviewers were very distrustful and pretty much expected to not find a word of truth on my resume.

[I_am_neo]

It's mostly a peacocking competition, unless you have certain non-technical skills, or an 'in' already.

[tunap]

This is what I have experienced the last few months. The interviewer checks off boxes in their notes as you successfully utter the current "buzzwords" they are looking for. I didn:t notice the connection until I had 2 interviewers & the guy pulling for me gave me a wink or thumbs up when his associate paused to make a mark on his notepad. Afterward, my guy affirmed I hit the right topics. Sadly, I didn`t make the cut as I was asking for a "livable" wage which exceeded their professed "competitive" offering.

[id122015]

If I get the job through a friend, the interview does not matter. If I apply to a job and I dont have a friend there, the interview does not matter.

I heard you dont use other skills than the ones learnt in the first 6 years of school to work in a bank or in HR.

They only call me to interview when I have to lift heavy bricks on a construction site.

[punchclockhero]

Wish I had friends like yours, mine only get me interviews.

[BlackjackCF]

I can only speak from experience from when I was fresh out of college with an English degree and trying to get a job for... literally anything under the sun related to marketing, communications, or copywriting.

The interview honestly doesn't matter. You're also lucky if you even get a call back for an interview. Usually, there's so many people who look just like you on paper that your resume and cover letter almost instantly get thrown into the trash.

When you do get called up - it's usually just a lucky break. Most people are fairly personable. Any number of factors can affect your interview and whether or not you're selected. I just happened to get a lucky break the first time I got a job as a marketing intern... and it was just because the person interviewing me also went to the same alma mater as me.

[xiaoma]

Language majors, like philosophy, psychology or math majors have some very core skills that are useful in a lot of pursuits but not enough to clear the hiring bar in much of anything unless you're from a top school or have an advanced degree.

[BlackjackCF]

Pretty much. There's a reason why I work as a SRE now.

[auxym]

Junior Mechanical Engineer (aka EIT) here. Interviews are pretty... standard I guess? Nothing like the interviews I read about on HN.

Most of the time is spent discussion my past projects, both technical and less technical aspects, like conflicts in team work and what not. Since I'm recently out of school, those projects are mainly a major design project I was a part of in undergrad (designing building a desert orienteering buggy from the ground up in 2 years), my master's research project, and coops (5) I did in undergrad.

Sometimes, especially if there is an HR person in the room, I'll be asked the really cliché interview questions, like name your 3 worst weaknesses. I hate that, it's a bullshit question, and (I hope) they very well know everyone will give them bullshit answers with the straightest face they can.

Exactly once I've been asked to solve relatively trivial mechanical (statics&dynamics) problems on a piece of paper. Honestly, I normally enjoy it when I get to write down FBDs and work out those kinds of problems. But it was the first I was asked to do it with an interviewer watching over my shoulder, and that was much harder than I thought. I totally choked up under pressure, and could only barely finish 70% of one of two problems. I feel for you devs now.

Funnily enough, in that same interview, there was a later part with an HR lady, that went well enough I think, until at the end she asked me asked the movie I thought was the funniest I ever saw. Sort of stressed and exhausted from the previous 3 hours of interviewing, not being a huge fan of comedies in general, and having recently re-watched Fargo, I went on about Coen Brothers movies, and how I think there is something hilarious about how trivial misunderstandings escalate into ridiculously life changing outcomes for every character.

Apparently she'd never heard of any of those films, and I'm not good at communicating my enjoyment of George Clooney's fuck machine in Burn After Reading. Didn't get that job, not sure if it was that or the paper problems that sank me.

(just kidding, I definitely did not bring up a fuck machine in a job interview, but I might have went on a bit much about Fargo, which she intially confused with Argo)

[julie1]

Daily movers: be on time at 7am.

Next day 7am: get into the truck, don't forget to sign the daily contract, pays is monthly at the end of the month. Come tomorrow at 7am, if you did your job correctly you will have another contract.