4 ms·
Long time ago I go the "Why is a manhole cover round?" at an interview. I prefaced that I heard this question before and followed up with 3-4 possible answers.
by pkaye 6y ago
Long time ago I go the "Why is a manhole cover round?" at an interview. I prefaced that I heard this question before and followed up with 3-4 possible answers. The interviewer was still impressed.
- daniellarusso 6y agoI have started asking this, since I have not heard it asked in awhile (like almost 2 decades), and it is interesting to hear the responses.
- wyclif 6y agoIt's clichéd question, but in my opinion it's a very good one and would still be useful if it wasn't so overused. The reason why is because there's one big reason why manhole covers are round and maybe 3-4 subsidiary and less important reasons why. A person who can 1/ identify that there's more than one reason, name them all and 2/ sort and rank the reasons correctly in order of importance reveals a person's clarity of thought and reasoning process.
- daniellarusso 6y agoMy initial intent, because I thought it was so clichéd, was just to get a laugh. But, I would say the majority had not heard the question before. This is a younger cohort.
- umvi 6y ago> Why is a manhole cover round? Easy, manholes covers are round for the same reason JavaScript is the most popular language. Answer: once round manholes became ubiquitous it became extremely difficult to make anything other than round manholes covers.