I'm hard wired for the "honesty thing" but started going out of my way a few years ago after a bad experience. I interviewed with a company for a contract and

I'm hard wired for the "honesty thing" but started going out of my way a few years ago after a bad experience. I interviewed with a company for a contract and I had told them I only had 5 days of experience in technology X. They hired me and then let me go after a week because they needed a true expert to fix something in time to ship. I said them "I told you I only had 5 days experience with technology X, why did you hire me when you needed an expert??!" The manager responded "We just liked you so much!" After that experience, I would tell them [interviewers] right at the beginning of the interview that I was going to try my best to "open my mind and let them peek inside" and give them any data they might need to reject me. I'd tell them, "It's going to sound like I'm trying to talk you out of hiring me but I'm really just trying to make sure we're a good fit." Somewhere in there I'd tell them the above story so they'd know why I was taking such an unorthodox approach (and offer them another cookie). I'm a freelancer with multiple clients now. I have too much work so I guess I have the luxury of not taking jobs that aren't a good fit. That said, being so confident that you can be radically honest with a potential client or interviewer, also signals competency. A desperate person doesn't behave that way.