So, tell us why you think you’d be a good fit for this position! Oh, you’re not willing to work overtime, donate PTO to sick colleagues or refer to your team members as “family”? I see. We’ll call you once we’ve made our decision…
Job interviews are often stressful, but one thing that can immediately take the pressure off is realizing that you don’t actually want the job at all. Redditors have been recalling infuriating interviews that made them lose their cool, so we’ve gathered their most amusing stories below. Enjoy finding out all of the juicy details, and keep reading to find a conversation with the Reddit user who started this thread!
#1
I had an interview scheduled for 14:00 that afternoon. My terminally ill parent passed away in the very early hours of the morning. I emailed my contact there at about 5ish to apologise profusely, explaining the reason I could no longer attend and letting her know that I was still interested in the position if it was possible to reschedule but I understood if not.
She responded with two words - “that’s disappointing”. This was for a mental health/wellbeing charity.
She responded with two words - “that’s disappointing”. This was for a mental health/wellbeing charity.
94points
We reached out to Reddit user Slumi, who started this conversation in the first place, to find out more about his job interview experiences. He was kind enough to have a chat with Bored Panda and share that most of his job interviews have been pretty standard.
“Maybe I came off as easily offended and irritable in the original thread, but I'm actually a pretty mellow guy,” the OP says. “Those were the only two times I actually got irritated by my interviewer while simultaneously feeling like I was in the right.”
#2
I interviewed for a position right at the end of quarantine. My wife was working with children so we needed to be careful with COVID, so I wore a mask to the interview. The hiring manager instantly made jokes about me being "one of those idiotic libtards" because of my mask. The real kicker was that it was an informatics job where they did PCR testing for COVID...
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92points
#3
I was interviewed at a BASF plant. I don’t remember the exact question, but it was something about why I quit a job or how I dealt with bad processes.
I described a long planning process where 2 weeks of work right before a holiday was ruined by a fiat decision by the head of engineering.
The interviewers were asking about “well did you consider that he had his reasons” and I said something to the effect of “sure we did. But he attends the first session, skips the next 2 weeks of us putting together a several hundred line item work plan, shows up on the final Thursday before the outage and decided he doesn’t like the plan and makes a major change that affects every other line item. Then he walks off. He could have at least offered an explanation instead of just saying ‘Do it my way.’ So I don’t deal well with that kind of leadership.”
Naturally I didn’t get the job offer, I was left with the impression that there was a lot of mysterious decision making you were just supposed to accept and never understand why.
I described a long planning process where 2 weeks of work right before a holiday was ruined by a fiat decision by the head of engineering.
The interviewers were asking about “well did you consider that he had his reasons” and I said something to the effect of “sure we did. But he attends the first session, skips the next 2 weeks of us putting together a several hundred line item work plan, shows up on the final Thursday before the outage and decided he doesn’t like the plan and makes a major change that affects every other line item. Then he walks off. He could have at least offered an explanation instead of just saying ‘Do it my way.’ So I don’t deal well with that kind of leadership.”
Naturally I didn’t get the job offer, I was left with the impression that there was a lot of mysterious decision making you were just supposed to accept and never understand why.
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71points
Thankfully, Slumi says he’s also had a few positive job interviews. “There was one time where the guy interviewing me wanted to check if I knew how to speak English (I live in Switzerland, and my native language is French), so he asked me who my favorite painter was,” the author shared. “I answered that I was a big fan of Edward Hopper. And, as it turns out, so was he.”
“We spent a good 10 minutes talking about the guy and his paintings, it was great. In the end though, I didn't get the job. It was for a senior role, and I had just finished my internship,” Slumi noted. “But the interviewer decided to let me know through a phone call, all while specifying ‘I'm sorry. I want you to know that you actually did extremely well during the interview. But we found someone more senior.’”
#4
In an interview when they offered me less than the lower part of the published salary range (at this point it was like a 5% better than my current job at the time), i asked if it was possible for the salary to be higher, as it wouldn't justify changing jobs. (Take into account at this point i had aced all tests and interviewer were really happy with me, but in this specific interview there was like a manager or ceo or accountant idk but was a higher up that i didnt really met before)
this higher up laughs a little and proceeds to say something like "well we dont have- i mean, we do have the money but we reserve it for someone with more experience than you". i was like wtf does that even mean, i told them in the spot "well ok" and walked away. There were like 6 people there and were basically there to welcome me in the job as they really liked my interview and this a*****e showed up to f**k things up lol. Some time later i still got a call from one of the interviewer saying something like "we finally got [a*****e] to accept your salary requierement!" but at that point i was literally receiving the call from a new job place lmao.
this higher up laughs a little and proceeds to say something like "well we dont have- i mean, we do have the money but we reserve it for someone with more experience than you". i was like wtf does that even mean, i told them in the spot "well ok" and walked away. There were like 6 people there and were basically there to welcome me in the job as they really liked my interview and this a*****e showed up to f**k things up lol. Some time later i still got a call from one of the interviewer saying something like "we finally got [a*****e] to accept your salary requierement!" but at that point i was literally receiving the call from a new job place lmao.
70points
#5
I lost my cool once when I got invited to the hiring manager around of a small company. Before this round, the recruiter was being annoying calling me and texting me about little things about the hiring manager.
Turns out the hiring manager was sick on the day of and the CEO filled in. During the call, the CEO was also on another call and his delegate/assistant was doing some of the questions. I answered a question the CEO finally asked about when to use or mention something in documentation and he didn't like my answer and asked me the same question again.
He was acting like some strict parent and keep shutting down my answers. I had enough of this and was already pissed that he was on another call during the interview anyway. I straight up said this isn't going to be a good fit, Idk what answer you want and I can't read your mind. He was stunned and only said 'ok.'
I hung up the Zoom call and also blocked the recruiter to avoid any more b******t from that circus.
Turns out the hiring manager was sick on the day of and the CEO filled in. During the call, the CEO was also on another call and his delegate/assistant was doing some of the questions. I answered a question the CEO finally asked about when to use or mention something in documentation and he didn't like my answer and asked me the same question again.
He was acting like some strict parent and keep shutting down my answers. I had enough of this and was already pissed that he was on another call during the interview anyway. I straight up said this isn't going to be a good fit, Idk what answer you want and I can't read your mind. He was stunned and only said 'ok.'
I hung up the Zoom call and also blocked the recruiter to avoid any more b******t from that circus.
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66points
Slumi also noted in his post that he’s currently on the job hunt, so we asked how that’s been going. “I do feel like it is harder to find jobs in the Data Science field now than it was 6 years ago. You'd think I'd get more interview opportunities now that I have professional experience under my belt, but I actually get less responses to my postulations today than I did when I was fresh out of college,” he revealed.
#6
I applied for a medium sized company in the financial sector. HR call, tech call, everything goes well. Then I'm sent a long programming exercise that takes me half a day.
In the problem description, they literally mention "We love design patterns at this company :)"
Okay. Well it's just a small program and there's no need for a design pattern, really. But I'll use one to make them happy.
So, the exercise takes me 8-10 hours. I use some design pattern to do it (I think it was a factory design pattern, but I can't remember for sure.)
I submit the code, and a few days later go to the followup interview they had planned to discuss the results with me.
The guy tells me "So, your code was pretty good... But why did you add a design pattern? There was no need for it."
"Yes, it wasn't really necessary. But it said on the page that you liked design patterns, so I wanted to show you I knew how to use them."
"Okay, but a factory pattern is too overkill here, it makes the code over engineered."
I actually agreed with him, but I was confused. I had spent a good mount of time considering which design pattern to add in my code, and the factory one seemed like the least terrible option. So I asked
"Which design pattern would you have used in this code?"
"I wouldn't have used any. There's no need for one here."
He told me that as if my design pattern had offended him on a personal level. I didn't take it very well.
"Obviously there's no need for a design pattern in a small piece of non reusable code that you do for a job interview. But I already had to spend a full day on this, so why wouldn't I follow the instructions to the letter? If you don't want a design pattern in the code, then don't mention them in your page."
The interview didn't last long after that.
I didn't get the job.
In the problem description, they literally mention "We love design patterns at this company :)"
Okay. Well it's just a small program and there's no need for a design pattern, really. But I'll use one to make them happy.
So, the exercise takes me 8-10 hours. I use some design pattern to do it (I think it was a factory design pattern, but I can't remember for sure.)
I submit the code, and a few days later go to the followup interview they had planned to discuss the results with me.
The guy tells me "So, your code was pretty good... But why did you add a design pattern? There was no need for it."
"Yes, it wasn't really necessary. But it said on the page that you liked design patterns, so I wanted to show you I knew how to use them."
"Okay, but a factory pattern is too overkill here, it makes the code over engineered."
I actually agreed with him, but I was confused. I had spent a good mount of time considering which design pattern to add in my code, and the factory one seemed like the least terrible option. So I asked
"Which design pattern would you have used in this code?"
"I wouldn't have used any. There's no need for one here."
He told me that as if my design pattern had offended him on a personal level. I didn't take it very well.
"Obviously there's no need for a design pattern in a small piece of non reusable code that you do for a job interview. But I already had to spend a full day on this, so why wouldn't I follow the instructions to the letter? If you don't want a design pattern in the code, then don't mention them in your page."
The interview didn't last long after that.
I didn't get the job.
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59points
#7
Applied for a marketing role a recruiter called me about. They email me with a list of questions. One of the questions was basically craft a social media post based on this info. This was not entry level position, so basically I professionally worded a response back to them that said “I’ve been doing this for nearly 15 years. I don’t have time to do homework. If you need examples of my creativity and content creation here’s a link to my current company’s social media platforms. I’m responsible for about 90% of the content. Feel free to judge my work there.”
Never got a call back….
Never got a call back….
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55points
The OP noted that the lack of responses he’s gotten could be due to a variety of reasons, and he’s unsure which one's the biggest. “But I'd say one of the main ones is that I'm mostly specialized in NLP (natural language processing), which consists of using machine learning methods to process text,” he told Bored Panda.
“This used to be a very dynamic field that was constantly evolving, because text is a messy data type and you can do a lot of different things with it. But with the arrival of state-of-the-art models that can be used out of the box like ChatGPT, my skill set has become less valuable,” he explained.
#8
Oh gosh, I have a tale to tell. For context I am (24F) and only 5 feet tall and I look like the poster child for innocence. I had an interview with an Arborist company and they told me that I needed to follow a dirt road and that the interview would take place at the end of the road.
This was an 8am interview, and as I used to be a bartender 8am was extremely early for me. I got up at 7, got all dolled up to look good for this interview.
I get to driving to the spot, and I can't find the end of this dirt road that I'm supposed to be at. There's just a graveyard of campers on one side of the road and a cemetery on the other. As I'm driving along I see a truck with the name of the company I'm supposed to be interviewing at pulled over to the side of the road.
I stopped and rolled down my window to ask the truck for directions to my interview and the guy in the truck rolled down his window too.
"Are you (my name)?" He called over to me without getting out of his truck.
Me, suspicious: "Yes....."
Him: "Hop on in and we'll conduct the interview"
Me, absolutely floored that this is happening: "Yeah, no. I'm good. Thank you tho!"
Over my dead body am I getting into some random strangers truck for a "Job interview". I wasn't born yesterday and I know that I'm very easily takeable. I didn't even get out of my car and just left. I still can't believe that they had the audacity to call that an "Interview".
Needless to be said, I didn't get the job.
This was an 8am interview, and as I used to be a bartender 8am was extremely early for me. I got up at 7, got all dolled up to look good for this interview.
I get to driving to the spot, and I can't find the end of this dirt road that I'm supposed to be at. There's just a graveyard of campers on one side of the road and a cemetery on the other. As I'm driving along I see a truck with the name of the company I'm supposed to be interviewing at pulled over to the side of the road.
I stopped and rolled down my window to ask the truck for directions to my interview and the guy in the truck rolled down his window too.
"Are you (my name)?" He called over to me without getting out of his truck.
Me, suspicious: "Yes....."
Him: "Hop on in and we'll conduct the interview"
Me, absolutely floored that this is happening: "Yeah, no. I'm good. Thank you tho!"
Over my dead body am I getting into some random strangers truck for a "Job interview". I wasn't born yesterday and I know that I'm very easily takeable. I didn't even get out of my car and just left. I still can't believe that they had the audacity to call that an "Interview".
Needless to be said, I didn't get the job.
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52points
#9
I apply for a startup that works on some robotic "walkers" that are meant to help patients going through physical therapy. I thought that sounded like a really cool concept so I applied with a custom resume and enthusiastic cover letter. After one week I get an interview. It's 1h30 away and it's finals week, so I'd be losing precious studying time. But, whatever, it sounds like a cool internship so I'll go.
I arrive at the interview, I feel like everything is going well on the technical side. Then the guy asks me "why do you want to work at our company?". I reply "I've always really liked biology and medicine. In fact before I settled on becoming a data scientist I wanted to study life sciences. So, this sounds like a great opportunity to bring my two passions together". This was a 100% truthful answer, by the way
Anyway. The interview ends, and then the guy kind of implies that they're going to go for another candidate. Not sure why, but okay. Then he tells me "By the way, next time someone asks you why you want to work for a company, be more precise than 'I like medicine'".
That comment irked me. Because I had been genuine about why this job interested me, and I felt like it was a pretty damn good reason. So, I answered. "When I explained my motivations, I was being truthful. What did you expect me to say? 'I'm a leg fetishist so I'm super interested in working with legs specifically'? No. I like medicine, I like biology. I don't care if it's the legs, the feet, the hands or whatever else. It's the field I'm interested in and I have the competencies to do Data Science in it.".
The guy didn't really say anything after that. He seemed a bit embarrassed and went "oh... okay."
I didn't get the internship.
I arrive at the interview, I feel like everything is going well on the technical side. Then the guy asks me "why do you want to work at our company?". I reply "I've always really liked biology and medicine. In fact before I settled on becoming a data scientist I wanted to study life sciences. So, this sounds like a great opportunity to bring my two passions together". This was a 100% truthful answer, by the way
Anyway. The interview ends, and then the guy kind of implies that they're going to go for another candidate. Not sure why, but okay. Then he tells me "By the way, next time someone asks you why you want to work for a company, be more precise than 'I like medicine'".
That comment irked me. Because I had been genuine about why this job interested me, and I felt like it was a pretty damn good reason. So, I answered. "When I explained my motivations, I was being truthful. What did you expect me to say? 'I'm a leg fetishist so I'm super interested in working with legs specifically'? No. I like medicine, I like biology. I don't care if it's the legs, the feet, the hands or whatever else. It's the field I'm interested in and I have the competencies to do Data Science in it.".
The guy didn't really say anything after that. He seemed a bit embarrassed and went "oh... okay."
I didn't get the internship.
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50points
“Even if the models I can design would do better than ChatGPT on specific problems, it's time to market and return on investment is simply unbeatable,” Slumi continued. “You also don't need extensive data science skills to make ChatGPT work. A layman can get good results out of it with little coding skills, and even less mathematical ones.”
“Keep in mind though, I live in Switzerland. I don't know how widespread this data science hiring trend is,” he added. “But I know that the big tech companies in the US have laid off a fair amount of employees right now, so I wouldn't be surprised if the competition there had gotten fiercer too.”
#10
I've never lost it in an interview, but I have told more than my fair share of ghosting recruiters to pound sand. The last one was super excited at the "great fit" I'd be at one of their clients. A month later, nothing heard (I'd sent at least three check-ins since our first discussion - 100% ghosted). A few months later, the same recruiter tried the same exact thing with another "great fit" job. I asked her why she would expect me to have any interest since she ghosted me last time. To that, I got a "But it's YOUR responsibility to contact us"...I DID, you idiot.
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45points
#11
I was an executive assistant. I interviewed for a rather fancy office position.
I arrived 10 minutes early. They left me waiting for 30 minutes without apologies for running late.
Then they were basically stuck up. Condescending, talked to me like I was a second class citizen and I should be begging for their job. When they said “why do you want to work here” I told them I don’t and I wasn’t going to sit there and lie to them when I can’t think of a damn reason I would want to work there.
We wrapped up the interview.
The agency were pissed and black listed me 😂.
I arrived 10 minutes early. They left me waiting for 30 minutes without apologies for running late.
Then they were basically stuck up. Condescending, talked to me like I was a second class citizen and I should be begging for their job. When they said “why do you want to work here” I told them I don’t and I wasn’t going to sit there and lie to them when I can’t think of a damn reason I would want to work there.
We wrapped up the interview.
The agency were pissed and black listed me 😂.
44points
We also asked the OP why he thinks job interviews are so torturous nowadays. “The most painful part of computer science interviews is when they want to evaluate your coding skills,” he shared. “I can understand why companies feel the need to do it. Coding is what the employee is going to do at the end of the day, so it would be best if they were proficient at it.”
#12
Interview for federal IT position.
Everything is going well until they ask when I can start. I told them I had mandatory reserve training for a month but could start after that.
They said that wouldn’t work for them and they would have to go with a different candidate. The kicker was this was for VA and I was being penalized for being a reservist.
Everything is going well until they ask when I can start. I told them I had mandatory reserve training for a month but could start after that.
They said that wouldn’t work for them and they would have to go with a different candidate. The kicker was this was for VA and I was being penalized for being a reservist.
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41points
#13
Not an interview but I lost my cool at a recruiter once.
I had been unemployed for a bit and finally landed a job, quite a few months (could be closer to a year) into my new job a recruiter calls.
I didn't land the best paying job, or even in my "field", so I opt to humor her, see if it might lead to something better. Big misstake on my end.
Starts out fine enough, she introduces herself, says she's from X-recruiting company, looking for someone for a position in my "field" asks a bit about my previous work bla bla bla.
Then she asks what about what in the add made me think I would be a good fit for them.
I answer truthfully that I can't recall the add from the top of my head, lady gets _pissed_ .
I ask if maybe she could tell me what company she is recruiting for and maybe I'll remember it?
Wrong move, lady is now fuming and telling me I should have saved a copy of the add.
Whole thing just devolved into a mess where she found me unprofessional because I had aplied to several jobs at the same time and didn't know her add by heart, and me basically telling her that no I didn't remember jobs I aplied for _months_ ago and if they expect candidates to remember them without being able to provide any info on the job or company they needed to stop doing their job at a snails pace.
She continued being condecending and all "no you aplied for this only 3 weeks ago".
Told her I hadn't looked for a job since I got this new one and started on X-date, "that's Y months ago isn't it?". She tried backpaddling saying there must have been an error and my profile really fit this job.
Told her to f-off and never call again.
Could definetly have been a computer error but holy hell... I have jobs I aplied for last week, that I'm all nerves hoping I'll get, I can't remember _those_ adds or my cover letter by heart even.
And she got all snotty because I couldn't remember the job based on the name of _her_ recruiting company!?
I had been unemployed for a bit and finally landed a job, quite a few months (could be closer to a year) into my new job a recruiter calls.
I didn't land the best paying job, or even in my "field", so I opt to humor her, see if it might lead to something better. Big misstake on my end.
Starts out fine enough, she introduces herself, says she's from X-recruiting company, looking for someone for a position in my "field" asks a bit about my previous work bla bla bla.
Then she asks what about what in the add made me think I would be a good fit for them.
I answer truthfully that I can't recall the add from the top of my head, lady gets _pissed_ .
I ask if maybe she could tell me what company she is recruiting for and maybe I'll remember it?
Wrong move, lady is now fuming and telling me I should have saved a copy of the add.
Whole thing just devolved into a mess where she found me unprofessional because I had aplied to several jobs at the same time and didn't know her add by heart, and me basically telling her that no I didn't remember jobs I aplied for _months_ ago and if they expect candidates to remember them without being able to provide any info on the job or company they needed to stop doing their job at a snails pace.
She continued being condecending and all "no you aplied for this only 3 weeks ago".
Told her I hadn't looked for a job since I got this new one and started on X-date, "that's Y months ago isn't it?". She tried backpaddling saying there must have been an error and my profile really fit this job.
Told her to f-off and never call again.
Could definetly have been a computer error but holy hell... I have jobs I aplied for last week, that I'm all nerves hoping I'll get, I can't remember _those_ adds or my cover letter by heart even.
And she got all snotty because I couldn't remember the job based on the name of _her_ recruiting company!?
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38points
“The problem is: it's pretty much impossible to get a good idea of a person's coding skills in so little time. Still, that's not going to stop them from trying,” the author continued. “And they will usually do so in one of two ways: By either asking you to work on a project (5+ hours) at home, or by asking you those dreaded leetcode questions.”
“Both are incredibly painful in their own way. The project because it's disrespectful of your time, and leetcode questions because they're so irrelevant to 99% of what your work will actually consist of,” Slumi says. “They can also be very difficult, which is why people who apply at FAANG literally learn hundreds of such problems by heart only to regurgitate them during their job interviews."
“There are also companies that ask you to work for them, possibly for free, for a few days (or weeks) before they can evaluate if you're a good match,” the OP continued. “That one should be straight up illegal. Thankfully it's not that common.”
#14
Oooo I lost my cool at a recruiter once! A little context: I had just moved to California from Washington and had my WA drivers license still. Washington does dl id numbers different than California. CA is typically this format: A572349 while WA uses a different format, ie. John Smith would have a dl number like SMITHJO198DR.
I showed up to some dingy building to apply to a variety of customer service jobs. The recruiter asked for my ID to get my started. She looked at the ID numbers and said “You have a weird ID number, why did you choose those numbers?” I asked her what she meant by that because I was genuinely confused. She told me “if you’re going to get a fake ID to hide your identity, maybe get something less obvious than your name.” Excuse me?? I snapped on her, “I don’t like being accused of things that are not true, and what exactly are you implying anyway? That I’m a criminal that needs to hide their identity to get a job at a rundown recruiting agency?”
Needless to say, I left and didn’t get any jobs at that agency as a result but no great loss. People can be so darn weird.
I showed up to some dingy building to apply to a variety of customer service jobs. The recruiter asked for my ID to get my started. She looked at the ID numbers and said “You have a weird ID number, why did you choose those numbers?” I asked her what she meant by that because I was genuinely confused. She told me “if you’re going to get a fake ID to hide your identity, maybe get something less obvious than your name.” Excuse me?? I snapped on her, “I don’t like being accused of things that are not true, and what exactly are you implying anyway? That I’m a criminal that needs to hide their identity to get a job at a rundown recruiting agency?”
Needless to say, I left and didn’t get any jobs at that agency as a result but no great loss. People can be so darn weird.
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36points
#15
I lost my cool at an interview once. I saved 90% of the anger for later ...
I was interviewing with a well-known company in my area. I knew I would be interviewing with someone I had worked with years before, so I was especially wooried about embarassing myself.
During the interview the person asked "How have you use 'technology XY' in your work?" I had to answer "i have not use 'technology XY' at all. I am sudying, but I cannot even claim more than a minimal understanding". The interviewer said "But it is on your resume that you have this skill. It is the primary reason we called you for an interview." I showed them my own copy of my resume and we compared.
The recruiter had altered my resume to include several skills I did not claim. It was for the recruiter that I saved 90% of my anger. This was the same recruiter that attempted to convince me to take a 20-year step backwards in technology (i.e. switching back to COBOL mainframe from C# .NET) for his own gains.
I was interviewing with a well-known company in my area. I knew I would be interviewing with someone I had worked with years before, so I was especially wooried about embarassing myself.
During the interview the person asked "How have you use 'technology XY' in your work?" I had to answer "i have not use 'technology XY' at all. I am sudying, but I cannot even claim more than a minimal understanding". The interviewer said "But it is on your resume that you have this skill. It is the primary reason we called you for an interview." I showed them my own copy of my resume and we compared.
The recruiter had altered my resume to include several skills I did not claim. It was for the recruiter that I saved 90% of my anger. This was the same recruiter that attempted to convince me to take a 20-year step backwards in technology (i.e. switching back to COBOL mainframe from C# .NET) for his own gains.
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36points
So why do companies make the hiring process so painful? “For a lot of them, it's because they simply don't know how to evaluate your skills in other ways than in those. I also think a lot of them don't care, it's not them who are going to spend dozens of hours learning algorithms by heart,” Slumi says. “This is especially true of big companies. When you have thousands of people interested in your position, so what if 90% of them get discouraged by the interview process? That still leaves hundreds of candidates who will actually walk the walk."
#16
Yes indeed! This was for a part time research assistant position at a herb shop. Immediately when I get there, the owner’s attitude was disgusting. He barks at me that I “can’t sit like that” when I go to sit on his “temple’s” floor. First red flag. Then he starts complaining about the look on my face, even though I don’t have an attitude. He’s telling me to “relax”. Second red flag. The final straw is he tells me randomly we can’t sit in here and we go back out to the main hall where we sit in chairs. From there, it turns into this entire bash fest! He had asked me to show him an example of some of my writing, which I had already emailed to his assistant who was printing it out. Before he even sees it, he’s already criticizing it. I keep telling him “you haven’t even read it! How are you already rejecting something you haven’t even read?” He’s like “I vetted your resume, I see how you write.” Okay so why am I even sitting here? Why did you call me in to do a second interview? Against my better judgement, I send him another piece of work and this trifling clown had the nerve to say my work was “copy and paste” writing. Excuse me???? At that point I just got up and left, telling him that he has no idea what he really wants, apologizing to the assistant that I will not be working there (she was a sweetheart) and he’s not even worth the trouble. I also reported this on Yelp for the store and the Better Business Bureau for the generality of the business. He’s supposed to be this spiritual “healer” working with all these herbs and wellness products and yet this is his disgusting attitude? Dangerous. The pay, the hours, none of it was worth it.
31points
#17
I had a similar experience recently. A recruiter ping me on LinkedIn for a opportunity at a start-up that looked interesting and it matched my profile. He send them my CV and they say, we'd like to skip the initial HR interview and go straight to the test scenario. Cool, they send me an email with a set of instructions on what i need to do and a zip json attached. The instructions were to basically ingest the file, normalize it build some schema layers and then produce an SQL output report, they said you can use any language you like and any DB you want.
I build it all in AWS, dropped the file in S3 ingested in into AWS PostgreSql hosted DB and then produce the final output using Dash and hosted on Heroku. Wrapped it all into a nice and clean repo with read-me and comments and all the ETL layer nicely presented. I though i nailed it as it was clean, efficient and it included extra stuff just to prove a point that i'm not just a coding monkey.
You know what their reply was.... a single line saying "oh very nice output but we wanted you to build the transformation in Python instead of SQL" . Their reply was forwarded to me by the recruiter and i told him to go back to them and tell them:
1. They mentioned use any language you want.
2. that this is incredibly disrespectful and a complete joke to ask someone to spent 3+ h to build something and then reply with a single line.
He apologies and said that he though their reply was very harsh and that he will forward my feedback.
I hope karma teaches this interviewee a lesson.
I build it all in AWS, dropped the file in S3 ingested in into AWS PostgreSql hosted DB and then produce the final output using Dash and hosted on Heroku. Wrapped it all into a nice and clean repo with read-me and comments and all the ETL layer nicely presented. I though i nailed it as it was clean, efficient and it included extra stuff just to prove a point that i'm not just a coding monkey.
You know what their reply was.... a single line saying "oh very nice output but we wanted you to build the transformation in Python instead of SQL" . Their reply was forwarded to me by the recruiter and i told him to go back to them and tell them:
1. They mentioned use any language you want.
2. that this is incredibly disrespectful and a complete joke to ask someone to spent 3+ h to build something and then reply with a single line.
He apologies and said that he though their reply was very harsh and that he will forward my feedback.
I hope karma teaches this interviewee a lesson.
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28points
#18
Had an interview at Crapple many years back - 4 rounds, I got a close to perfect score on the technical test but on round 4 they decided to give me exactly the same test again.
Figured out they hadn't been talking to each other so asked them why I'm getting the same test, when they realized what they had done they asked me if I could just do it again.
This is after being grilled several times by engineers on progressively more difficult questions...
Got up and grabbed my stuff, basically said if this is what your interview process is like I don't want to go any further.
Took me to security and searched me, threatened getting the police involved, apparently they came to the conclusion I was some corporate espionage spy because "nobody has ever terminated an interview like this", absolutely cracked me up, never laughed so hard in a work environment.
Probably would've made my career a lot easier just doing the test again, I never got into FAANG after that but still feel I did the right thing.
Figured out they hadn't been talking to each other so asked them why I'm getting the same test, when they realized what they had done they asked me if I could just do it again.
This is after being grilled several times by engineers on progressively more difficult questions...
Got up and grabbed my stuff, basically said if this is what your interview process is like I don't want to go any further.
Took me to security and searched me, threatened getting the police involved, apparently they came to the conclusion I was some corporate espionage spy because "nobody has ever terminated an interview like this", absolutely cracked me up, never laughed so hard in a work environment.
Probably would've made my career a lot easier just doing the test again, I never got into FAANG after that but still feel I did the right thing.
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27points
Next, we asked the OP what he thought of the replies to his post. “Most people seemed to understand where I was coming from. The ones that didn't seemed to be under the impression that I'm an easily angered person that always lashes out at his interviewers, or at people in general,” he shared. “Just to make things clear: I don't. You have to take the context into consideration for both of those cases.”
#19
The best thing that ever happened to me was not getting a role at a financial firm.
I had applied for a network engineer role that looked interesting but was vaguely described.
I fire off a resume, pass two different screening phone calls and I get a request to come in and interview.
I knew something was off when I receive a timeline for the interview, and the six hours it was going to take.
During my time I talk with everyone (insert Gary Oldman meme) from the company, Co CEO’s, HR, Trading, company psychologist, hiring manager, line supervisor, the network team, etc.
The first time I met the line supervisor he came in with his heavy hitter and decided to play stump the chump. That immediately turned me off, I’ve conducted countless interviews myself and have had to play technical resource during interviews.
Team fit, willingness to learn and a basic understanding of how the technology works are the most important things are the most fundamental aspects to me.
I was white boarding a bunch of items during the interview and a switch just flipped in my head, this was so stupid that I just stopped and told the guy no. I would never do binary math on paper to come up with an answer. I have an app of my phone, I understand what is going on behind the scenes, that’s all one needs to know. He misunderstood my disengagement as a lack of understanding on my part; I know what’s going on, the guy is a dipshit going on a power trip who’s never had any leadership training.
At this point I’ve gone total sunk-cost fallacy, I should have just left, but I stayed for the remainder. I get to near the end and I have a one on one with the line supervisor. Things start to go down hill when he tells me how only one person has ever left while he’s been the supervisor and then starts to go on and on about how that personal was the biggest mistake ever because they left.
Then we get the conversation around to me and how he has grave reservations on my skill set and my ability to learn. That’s the point where I start to go off on the guy. Could I have handled it better, yes. But the guy was a walking, taking example of the Peter Principle, I was tired and was looking for a fight at that point.
I got a phone call from HR a week later saying I did not get the job, everyone liked me but the line supervisor. I did manage to get a quick exit interview where she admitted the line supervisor has had multiple HR complaints about his attitude and that he was “working” on it.
Because I did not get that job, I ended up in my current role which has ended up being the best job I’ve ever had. So I always thank that company for having a c**p network supervisor. Best thing that never happened to me.
I had applied for a network engineer role that looked interesting but was vaguely described.
I fire off a resume, pass two different screening phone calls and I get a request to come in and interview.
I knew something was off when I receive a timeline for the interview, and the six hours it was going to take.
During my time I talk with everyone (insert Gary Oldman meme) from the company, Co CEO’s, HR, Trading, company psychologist, hiring manager, line supervisor, the network team, etc.
The first time I met the line supervisor he came in with his heavy hitter and decided to play stump the chump. That immediately turned me off, I’ve conducted countless interviews myself and have had to play technical resource during interviews.
Team fit, willingness to learn and a basic understanding of how the technology works are the most important things are the most fundamental aspects to me.
I was white boarding a bunch of items during the interview and a switch just flipped in my head, this was so stupid that I just stopped and told the guy no. I would never do binary math on paper to come up with an answer. I have an app of my phone, I understand what is going on behind the scenes, that’s all one needs to know. He misunderstood my disengagement as a lack of understanding on my part; I know what’s going on, the guy is a dipshit going on a power trip who’s never had any leadership training.
At this point I’ve gone total sunk-cost fallacy, I should have just left, but I stayed for the remainder. I get to near the end and I have a one on one with the line supervisor. Things start to go down hill when he tells me how only one person has ever left while he’s been the supervisor and then starts to go on and on about how that personal was the biggest mistake ever because they left.
Then we get the conversation around to me and how he has grave reservations on my skill set and my ability to learn. That’s the point where I start to go off on the guy. Could I have handled it better, yes. But the guy was a walking, taking example of the Peter Principle, I was tired and was looking for a fight at that point.
I got a phone call from HR a week later saying I did not get the job, everyone liked me but the line supervisor. I did manage to get a quick exit interview where she admitted the line supervisor has had multiple HR complaints about his attitude and that he was “working” on it.
Because I did not get that job, I ended up in my current role which has ended up being the best job I’ve ever had. So I always thank that company for having a c**p network supervisor. Best thing that never happened to me.
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27points
#20
Interviewed at this health tech startup once. Rounds 1 and 2 were great, as I was mostly interviewing with HR and the marketing director.
I was asked to do a 3 hour personality aptitude test out of my workday—to which I was told I scored well.
When it came to the final round where I was interviewing with the startup founder herself, that’s when all hell broke loose.
She came in hot-headed and would roll her eyes whenever I’d answer her questions.
She was simply in horrendous mood—you could tell something had happened (or maybe that was just the way she was).
When it was my turn to ask her questions about company culture/expansion plans, role progression and standard things of the nature, she responded “seriously? is that what you’d ask me?”
She then went silent, didn’t answer any of them and folded her arms.
I was clearly feeling awkward and decided to speak about how excited I was about potentially joining the team, to which she continued rolling her eyes whilst scoffing.
It was just so nasty and mean-spirited. Truly the worst interview I’ve ever had to experience.
Just downright weird and disrespectful.
I was asked to do a 3 hour personality aptitude test out of my workday—to which I was told I scored well.
When it came to the final round where I was interviewing with the startup founder herself, that’s when all hell broke loose.
She came in hot-headed and would roll her eyes whenever I’d answer her questions.
She was simply in horrendous mood—you could tell something had happened (or maybe that was just the way she was).
When it was my turn to ask her questions about company culture/expansion plans, role progression and standard things of the nature, she responded “seriously? is that what you’d ask me?”
She then went silent, didn’t answer any of them and folded her arms.
I was clearly feeling awkward and decided to speak about how excited I was about potentially joining the team, to which she continued rolling her eyes whilst scoffing.
It was just so nasty and mean-spirited. Truly the worst interview I’ve ever had to experience.
Just downright weird and disrespectful.
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25points