[tzs]

    Misconception 2: brain-teasers don't tell you anything

    This couldn't be more wrong... The reasons why an interviewer throws you
    a brain teaser or design question is to understand your thought logic
    and problem solving skills. While you talk through how you would solve
    your problem, they are assessing your communication skills, your process
    in solving a problem and also what knowledge you have as part of your
    experience.

The problem here is that a lot of the brain-teasers I've seen bandied about for interviews are the kind of problems where you either get them via an a-ha insight, or you don't get them at all. That's kind of what makes them good brain-teasers.

[FaceKicker]

Yeah, I've never really understood how you can "talk through your thought process" for a question like "Why is a man-hole cover round?" It seems like you'd either come up with a reason or you wouldn't be able to come up with anything at all.

Perhaps you can say things like "Well, let's see...you need to be able to pick the man-hole cover up out of it's hole, then put it down somewhere, then maybe move it, ..." but I really think these types of ramblings are just stalling for time rather than an actual English narration of what I believe is an inexplicable thought process that would go into coming up with an actual answer to such a question.

[davetong]

I'd hire you if you kept on going with your answer... you've shown the following traits already:

- ability to analyse the problem

- talk about possibilities, thus displaying communication skills

I have probably misled my comment by using the phrase "brain-teaser" when I really meant "design question".