A very funny interview



  • I responded to this ad on Craigslist:
    http://reno.craigslist.org/sof/1060436473.html

    which resulted in an extremely funny 'interview' on Skype with the wierdly titled 'Head Wombat' who appropriately labels herself as a 'pot stirrer'

    *** Shelly Head Wombat added Marc xxxxxx to this chat
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      Hi Marc
    Marc xxxxxx says: 
      Hi
    Hi Lacy says: 
      Tell us your favorite joke or funny story
    Marc xxxxxx says: 
      I'm afraid that I'm not that good at the funny joke thing. I tend to subscribe to the more subtle British style of humor.
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      then hit us with that
      or someone might kick you out of room.
      We get our amusement one way or the other.
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      I am thinking this is not a short novel.
    Marc xxxxxx says: 
      Sorry I don't have a sense of humor that can come up with a funny story at a whim. 
      If I did I would probably be making my money on the lae night show. 
      Does this job rely on my ability to tell a funny story?
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      Yes.
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      or joke.
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      all this time and not once did you think to google "joke"
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      ?
    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      This is a red flag to us
    *** PaTrick xxxxxx ejected and banned Marc Rohloff from this chat
    


  •  @marc said:

    I

    Shelly Head Wombat says: 
      all this time and not once did you think to google "joke"
    

     

    Shelly's got a point there.



  • @marc said:

    Marc xxxxxx
    @marc said:
    Marc xxxxxx
    @marc said:
    Marc xxxxxx
    @marc said:
    Marc xxxxxx
    @marc said:
    Marc Rohloff
    FAIL



  • @jimheem said:

     @marc said:

    I

      all this time and not once did you think to google "joke"
    

     

    Shelly's got a point there.

     
    Would a joke I copied from Google have been funny?


  •  So the TRWTF is that you can't handle a little off the cuff thinking? A chance to improvise? Show that you are unbending in your beliefs that interviews should stick to a technical side? People should not interview personalities and only stick to technical merits and not consider whether the person would be easy/fun/acceptable to work with?



  • @DeLos said:

    People should not interview personalities and only stick to technical merits and not consider whether the person would be easy/fun/acceptable to work with?

     

    (can google jokes) =/= (funny person)

    Dance for us DeLos! Entertain!



  • @DeLos said:

    So the TRWTF is that you can't handle a little off the cuff thinking? A chance to improvise? Show that you are unbending in your beliefs that interviews should stick to a technical side?People should not interview personalities and only stick to technical merits and not consider whether the person would be easy/fun/acceptable to work with? 

    So let me get this right. A friend of yours is looking for work and responds to an ad. The company calls him in for an interview and he tells you what happened.

    Due to the wonderous anonomity of the internet he couldn't even tell the name of the company. There isn't even a sign on the door. He was ushered into an interview room with 3 people whose name tags say they are 'Shelly Head Wombat', 'Hi Lacy' and 'PaTrick', they could just as well have had red ball noses on. The first (and only) thing out of 'Hi Lacy's' mouth is 'Tell us your favorite joke or funny story'. Only 'Shelly' has said hi and nobody has introduced themselves or told him their real names.  Since he could not tell a joke, PaTrick who has not said a word, pushes him out the door, slams it in his face and locks it... end of interview.

    It just happens that you responded to the same ad and get called for an interview. Would you accept a job at this company? I'm all in favor of finding out what a person would be like to work with but do you really think that you should base a decision on wheher a person would be easy/fun/accpetable to work with based on any single factor. Do you think this company cares about people or just has some sadistic fun ethic? How many of you would even bother to go to the interview?

    On a side note, how many people think that people who are full of jokes are funny? The funniest jokes are the spontaneous ones. My kids are the only people I hear telling jokes and they are only funny because they are MY kids and because she is 6. Even then after the third 'Knock, Knock' joke it is time to change the subject.

    And, yes, I could have Googled a joke or even asked my kids for one. But that would have told them nothing about me, except that I knew where to find the E, G, L and O keys.

     

     

     



  •  Incidentally, I know those people. I went through the same exercise but I got through the joke nonsense. The real joke was everything else - their company, the douche who runs it, they themselves and then their godawful database. I had to excuse myself from the chat when I saw that monstrosity. I got out before I had to do any actual work it and thank god I did. They were a bunch wankers anyway.

    They were shady at best so that Mark guy should count his blessings and move on to a real job prospect. Not that joke of an ad. The guise of legitimacy was just, ugh.



  • @marc said:

    And, yes, I could have Googled a joke or even asked my kids for one. But that would have told them nothing about me, except that I knew where to find the E, G, L and O keys.

    It would have told them more than that!

     

    It would have told them you knew where to find J and K as well. 



  • @Doctor Destiny said:

    Incidentally, I know those people. I went through the same exercise but I got through the joke nonsense. The real joke was everything else - their company, the douche who runs it, they themselves and then their godawful database. I had to excuse myself from the chat when I saw that monstrosity. I got out before I had to do any actual work it and thank god I did. They were a bunch wankers anyway.

    They were shady at best so that Mark guy should count his blessings and move on to a real job prospect. Not that joke of an ad. The guise of legitimacy was just, ugh.

    Judging from an interview that starts with "tell us a joke", I'm not surprised. In fact that is a red flag for the interviewee. What is he being interviewed for, a programmer position or stand up comedy?



  • @DOA said:

    What is he being interviewed for, a programmer position or stand up comedy?

     

    Maybe he was being pressured to find a solution in a timely manor.  No programmer knows everything, and we ALL have to use google / boards at some time or another (espicially us Java guys).  Maybe they wanted to see if he was smart enough to find a quick easy knock-knock joke.  

    Really people, as said before in this thread already, you need to get off of this "only ask me questions like: 'what is the difference between inherritence and composition?' questions!!!" type of bullshit.  They ask you other kinds of questions for a reason: they are trying to see what, besides programming, you can do.  I.E. in this case use the internet to find a solution to a problem.

    Either that or they actually were wearing bobo costumes and red noses.



  • @amischiefr said:

    we ALL have to use google / boards at some time or another (espicially us Java guys).
    Because Java keywords are harder to remember than any other languages'? Justify your bold statement.



  • My take on this whole interview:

    1. Asking the joke question is not a WTF. Any number of things could justify it. They wanted to see if you were quick on your feet and how you reacted to unusual situations, they like having a light and funny work environment, etc.

     2. The rest of the way they handled the interview is a WTF.  No introductions, the rather rude kicking you out of the chat room, etc.

    3.  In the end, it was actually a successful interview.  They learned that you were not a fit for them and you definitely learned that they are not the kind of people you want to work with.



  • @Welbog said:

    @amischiefr said:

    we ALL have to use google / boards at some time or another (espicially us Java guys).
    Because Java keywords are harder to remember than any other languages'? Justify your bold statement.

     

    I say that because Java has so many different frameworks and third party jar files that get used that it is impossible to know all of the tag libraries and idiosyncrasies.  If you are using .NET, for the most part, you are using the standard Microsoft libraries, and if you have been doing it for a while you know them fairly well.  I mean seriously, do you find yourself looking up keywords (and by keywords I mean the ones you can't use for variable names within the language, not the frameworks tags)?  

    Where I work we have applications built in Spring MVC, Struts 1.X, Grails, Tapestry and JSF.  I have to frequently google how to do something specific for the Tapestry app because I don't know it that well yet.  I even find myself looking up stuff for Spring specific items as well.  Do you know every single tag and how they all work for the above listed frameworks?  I sure don't, and I am pretty sure that 99% of developers out there don't know them all either.  And I bet that a .NET guy with the same time programming in .NET as I have in Java doesn't have to look things up a fraction of the time that I do.


     




  • A friend of mine sits in on interviews for a non-tech company he works for that asks the interviewees (for a sales position I think) to tell a joke.  It's not the first question though.

    Best one they got:

    A little girl is taking a shower with her Dad.  She points between his legs and asks, "What's that, Daddy?"

    "That's a penis, sweetie," he says.

    "Oh really? That's neat! When will I get one?" she asks.

     "In a few minutes when your mother goes to Bingo."

     

    I don't know if he got the job or not.



  • @shadowman said:

    A friend of mine sits in on interviews for a non-tech company he works for that asks the interviewees (for a sales position I think) to tell a joke.  It's not the first question though.

    Best one they got:

    A little girl is taking a shower with her Dad.  She points between his legs and asks, "What's that, Daddy?"

    "That's a penis, sweetie," he says.

    "Oh really? That's neat! When will I get one?" she asks.

     "In a few minutes when your mother goes to Bingo."

     

    I don't know if he got the job or not.

     

     

    Probably not the job, rather the boss's daughter.

     

    (Did I just say that? :P)



  • @shadowman said:

    "In a few minutes when your mother goes to Bingo."
    +1 internets for posting nasty jokes



  • They want a plagiarist. I hope somebody tells them The Aristocrats.



  • @marc said:

    So let me get this right. A friend of yours is looking for work and responds to an ad. The company calls him in for an interview and he tells you what happened.

    Due to the wonderous anonomity of the internet he couldn't even tell the name of the company. There isn't even a sign on the door. He was ushered into an interview room with 3 people whose name tags say they are 'Shelly Head Wombat', 'Hi Lacy' and 'PaTrick', they could just as well have had red ball noses on. The first (and only) thing out of 'Hi Lacy's' mouth is 'Tell us your favorite joke or funny story'. Only 'Shelly' has said hi and nobody has introduced themselves or told him their real names.  Since he could not tell a joke, PaTrick who has not said a word, pushes him out the door, slams it in his face and locks it...

     

    ...The Aristocrats!



  • @cconroy said:

    ...The Aristocrats!

    inb4 "reload FAIL"



  • @DOA said:

    Judging from an interview that starts with "tell us a joke", I'm not surprised. In fact that is a red flag for the interviewee. What is he being interviewed for, a programmer position or stand up comedy?

     

    I should have known better right away that this was a big joke. At least I'm out and away from those freaks..



  • @DOA said:

    +1 internets for posting nasty jokes
     

    My housemate has been reading an offensive jokes website and been telling me some of them, much to the disgust of others in the house.

    The favourite at the moment: "What is the leading cause of pedophilia?"

    "Sexy kids."



  • @jimheem said:

    Shelly's got a point there.

    If I don't have a mainstream sense of humour, googling "joke" is unlikely to turn up anything I think is funny, let alone my favourite joke.

    Being a twisted weirdo, I would say "Well, I'm pretty sure we have the same favourite joke, so you know perfectly well why I can't tell it in an interview."

    And if they said "yes you could" or something like that, I'd say "isn't it the one about the rabbi and the hippopotamus?" or something, and they'd almost certainly say "no". And I'd say "well, I still can't tell it in an interview."

    I'd keep this going until I got tired of it and then say "actually, there's no such joke, but I think this conversation is hilarious."

    But in all seriousness... http://leasticoulddo.com/comic/20060818

    Gets me every time.


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