3 ms·

It is true, and not that I am trying to be dishonest myself but I am not the same person while taking an interview. It's a sad that we can't be honest or humble

It is true, and not that I am trying to be dishonest myself but I am not the same person while taking an interview. It's a sad that we can't be honest or humble but in this system we have to sell ourselves, fake enthusiasm for the hiring company is a must, do whatever it takes to pass the interview then think later if we take the position or not. If not, somebody else with the same capability or or less will snatch that job. Plus that interviews like tests are gameable. In an ideal world a trial period would ensure both the employees and employers are a fit. But that could be abused as well if it becomes the norm.

tartoran 6y ago
How would a trial period work?
- grugagag 6y ago
  Work on a sample project, sample team for 2 weeks. See if you like the work and the company sees if they like you. This would only work if it were a widely accepted standard practice.
  - mattkrause 6y ago
    In the US, two weeks of vacation is pretty standard so a prospective employee would either have to a) forfeit all of their vacation for the year or b) quit their previous job first and risk having no job at all.
    - grugagag 6y ago
      It was a suggestion if it wasn’t broken. The system is currently broken with respect to both employers and employees finding eachother on multiple dimensions not just salary but basically the best possible fit
Afton 6y ago
Someone always suggests this. The issue is that if you did this, 95% of the candidates that would agree to this kind of setup would be the kind you didn't want. If I'm sitting on 2 offers, one is a hire and one is a "Let's see how this works out after 2 weeks of work", I'm going to take the first one. And that says nothing for the necessary benefits question in the states, where changing jobs often involves expensive (in money or time) changes to health care insurance.
- grugagag 6y ago
  We don't know for sure and it's hard to know how this works. What's obvious is that the current system is broken and we need a replacement of some sort. Being able to try a company and see whether they like me and whether I like them and the type of projects I am supposed to work would be a major factor in finding the right marriage. We take jobs for the salary tag and quite often we do whatever we have to do to continue getting that nice paycheck but we're not happy with the work we do.
  - Afton 6y ago
    For sure, it's an empirical question what %age of people who would accept this kind of offer are "I have no other choice, so I accept your offer" or "I want to make sure I will actually want to work at your company". I'm just saying that I would 100% not do this unless I had no other choice, or was independently wealthy.
manfredo 6y ago
As a company you're also competing against other companies for hires. Good candidates can get offers from multiple companies. If you're going to tell candidates to make an opportunity cost sacrifice of several weeks of work just to the the possibility of an offer then you better be offering something extremely valuable to the candidate. Otherwise why would the candidate take the chance on your interview process if they can secure an offer from other companies without paying the opportunity cost? The result is that this interview process will likely only be pursued by candidates not able to get offers from other companies.
pkaye 6y ago
> In an ideal world a trial period would ensure both the employees and employers are a fit. But that could be abused as well if it becomes the norm. I was talking to our work HR director about this and given that US is mostly "at will" employment, either side could decide to end the employment at any time so a trial period doesn't really mean much. Secondly its hard on the employee if we let them go on short notice so we try to hire from a long term perspective.
ksk 6y ago
In an ironic cycle, many employers also market their services and products in this fashion - over the top marketing, fake enthusiasm for the customer, over-selling features, constant talk about "community", virtue-signalling with social media posts on hot button political topics, etc, etc. To be sure, I'm not saying everyone and everything is fake, but it's interesting to just climb out to the bank, clear the clutter and just observe how the river flows.
dahart 6y ago
> It's a sad that we can't be honest or humble but in this system we have to sell ourselves, fake enthusiasm for the hiring company is a must, do whatever it takes to pass the interview then think later if we take the position or not. If not, somebody else with the same capability or or less will snatch that job. As someone who’s given hundreds, maybe thousands of interviews, personally I would advise against this. Being fake about your interests is not more likely to help you get the job you want and one that fits you well, if it even works at all. Being honest about your interests with yourself and your potential employers is the best way to end up being where you want to go. You can show excitement for specific topics that a company works on, and it’s okay to like the company’s products, or their work environment, but people who are enthusiastic fans of a company without specific reasons to want to work there are, in my experience, not more likely to get hired. > Plus that interviews like tests are gameable. This is true, and it’s good to understand so that your expectations don’t go crazy. You are competing against other people, and you have no idea how good they are. All you can do is your best.
- dahart 6y ago
  Oh you know what, I somehow thought you were saying that interviews are a gamble, I misread "gameable". My reply only somewhat applies, but allow me to fix it... This is a pretty common concern, I've heard it before. But in practice I've never actually seen it happen myself. It's worry about what's possible, but not what's likely. The problem with worry about others gaming interviews is that it ignores what happens after they get hired. Someone who's faking it would probably be later revealed. It's usually easy to uncover exaggerations during interviews. And last but not least, the vast majority of people I've met haven't lied or cheated or tried to game the interviews. I've had lots of interviews where people start by inflating or spinning their experience a little - there's nothing wrong with framing yourself from a positive angle. All it takes is a couple of follow-up questions to uncover the boundaries of their experience. This is one reason why the article here is wrong. Unstructured portions interviews serve the super important function of conversation about the candidate's experience. Standardized questions are not as good as casual conversation and follow-up questions, at helping me really get a sense for you and your experience and what interests you.
sfkdjf9j3j 6y ago
In the U.S. you can be fired for no reason, so the hypothetical trial period is basically just hiring people without interviewing them and then firing them as soon as you realize you made a mistake.

tartoran 6y ago

How would a trial period work?

grugagag 6y ago
Work on a sample project, sample team for 2 weeks. See if you like the work and the company sees if they like you. This would only work if it were a widely accepted standard practice.
- mattkrause 6y ago
  In the US, two weeks of vacation is pretty standard so a prospective employee would either have to a) forfeit all of their vacation for the year or b) quit their previous job first and risk having no job at all.
  - grugagag 6y ago
    It was a suggestion if it wasn’t broken. The system is currently broken with respect to both employers and employees finding eachother on multiple dimensions not just salary but basically the best possible fit

Afton 6y ago

Someone always suggests this. The issue is that if you did this, 95% of the candidates that would agree to this kind of setup would be the kind you didn't want. If I'm sitting on 2 offers, one is a hire and one is a "Let's see how this works out after 2 weeks of work", I'm going to take the first one. And that says nothing for the necessary benefits question in the states, where changing jobs often involves expensive (in money or time) changes to health care insurance.

grugagag 6y ago
We don't know for sure and it's hard to know how this works. What's obvious is that the current system is broken and we need a replacement of some sort. Being able to try a company and see whether they like me and whether I like them and the type of projects I am supposed to work would be a major factor in finding the right marriage. We take jobs for the salary tag and quite often we do whatever we have to do to continue getting that nice paycheck but we're not happy with the work we do.
- Afton 6y ago
  For sure, it's an empirical question what %age of people who would accept this kind of offer are "I have no other choice, so I accept your offer" or "I want to make sure I will actually want to work at your company". I'm just saying that I would 100% not do this unless I had no other choice, or was independently wealthy.

manfredo 6y ago

As a company you're also competing against other companies for hires. Good candidates can get offers from multiple companies. If you're going to tell candidates to make an opportunity cost sacrifice of several weeks of work just to the the possibility of an offer then you better be offering something extremely valuable to the candidate. Otherwise why would the candidate take the chance on your interview process if they can secure an offer from other companies without paying the opportunity cost? The result is that this interview process will likely only be pursued by candidates not able to get offers from other companies.

pkaye 6y ago

> In an ideal world a trial period would ensure both the employees and employers are a fit. But that could be abused as well if it becomes the norm. I was talking to our work HR director about this and given that US is mostly "at will" employment, either side could decide to end the employment at any time so a trial period doesn't really mean much. Secondly its hard on the employee if we let them go on short notice so we try to hire from a long term perspective.

ksk 6y ago

In an ironic cycle, many employers also market their services and products in this fashion - over the top marketing, fake enthusiasm for the customer, over-selling features, constant talk about "community", virtue-signalling with social media posts on hot button political topics, etc, etc. To be sure, I'm not saying everyone and everything is fake, but it's interesting to just climb out to the bank, clear the clutter and just observe how the river flows.

dahart 6y ago

> It's a sad that we can't be honest or humble but in this system we have to sell ourselves, fake enthusiasm for the hiring company is a must, do whatever it takes to pass the interview then think later if we take the position or not. If not, somebody else with the same capability or or less will snatch that job. As someone who’s given hundreds, maybe thousands of interviews, personally I would advise against this. Being fake about your interests is not more likely to help you get the job you want and one that fits you well, if it even works at all. Being honest about your interests with yourself and your potential employers is the best way to end up being where you want to go. You can show excitement for specific topics that a company works on, and it’s okay to like the company’s products, or their work environment, but people who are enthusiastic fans of a company without specific reasons to want to work there are, in my experience, not more likely to get hired. > Plus that interviews like tests are gameable. This is true, and it’s good to understand so that your expectations don’t go crazy. You are competing against other people, and you have no idea how good they are. All you can do is your best.

dahart 6y ago
Oh you know what, I somehow thought you were saying that interviews are a gamble, I misread "gameable". My reply only somewhat applies, but allow me to fix it... This is a pretty common concern, I've heard it before. But in practice I've never actually seen it happen myself. It's worry about what's possible, but not what's likely. The problem with worry about others gaming interviews is that it ignores what happens after they get hired. Someone who's faking it would probably be later revealed. It's usually easy to uncover exaggerations during interviews. And last but not least, the vast majority of people I've met haven't lied or cheated or tried to game the interviews. I've had lots of interviews where people start by inflating or spinning their experience a little - there's nothing wrong with framing yourself from a positive angle. All it takes is a couple of follow-up questions to uncover the boundaries of their experience. This is one reason why the article here is wrong. Unstructured portions interviews serve the super important function of conversation about the candidate's experience. Standardized questions are not as good as casual conversation and follow-up questions, at helping me really get a sense for you and your experience and what interests you.

sfkdjf9j3j 6y ago

In the U.S. you can be fired for no reason, so the hypothetical trial period is basically just hiring people without interviewing them and then firing them as soon as you realize you made a mistake.