The worst interview question.........

[d000hg]

Would you be interested in a permanent position?

It's a fine question, I imagine lots of contractors do flit back and forth into permie jobs.

[ctdctd]

It's a fine question, I imagine lots of contractors do flit back and forth into permie jobs.

Fairy nuf.

To me the question translates to "Would you be interested in the same role for a lower income, the unwritten expectation of extra unpaid hours and being part of the office politics?"

I'm old school enough that "Permie" implies long term, jobs for life and all that. I guess those days are gone!

[GB9]

Usually from the HR rep: "Why do you want to work for company x?"

How do you politely tell them you don't give a monkey's if they are x, y or z? They just have work you want.

[LondonManc]

Usually from the HR rep: "Why do you want to work for company x?"

How do you politely tell them you don't give a monkey's if they are x, y or z? They just have work you want.

You've got a contract I want and a good credit rating. Oh and the agent told me you were nice to work for.

[westtester]

"Would you mind working away from home?"

"Yes, I've done that a few times and it's not an issue"

"Oh, I see from your CV that you've worked locally for the last six years?"

"Well yes, I'd be silly to turn down roles that I can commute to daily, but as I said I'm flexible with regards to location"

"We really need someone who works away more often, preferably all the time"

I gave up at this point.

[missinggreenfields]

"What are you looking for in your next contract - what excites you?"

What am I looking for? Lots of cash and not much work. That's why I contract.

[tomtomagain]

Usually from the HR rep: "Why do you want to work for company x?"

How do you politely tell them you don't give a monkey's if they are x, y or z? They just have work you want.

Easy. You tell them you admire their brand, product and have heard great things about their culture and are excited by the prospect of working with them.

It's a lame question, along the lines of "Where do you see yourself in 5 years time?", but if the HR rep is asking it you need to give them a positive answer they understand as they are unlikely to be able to judge you on your technical merit.

[SueEllen]

"Well yes, I'd be silly to turn down roles that I can commute to daily, but as I said I'm flexible with regards to location"

"We really need someone who works away more often, preferably all the time"

I gave up at this point.

Even if they live right next to the client's location?

[tomtomagain]

In years gone by I used to have to interview many, many, developers for C#/ASP.NET contract positions. I was interviewing 10 - 15 a week at one stage. It is so tedious after a while.

As such I have asked many awful questions. Sometimes simply because I was bored. My worst question was "How do you know when you are done?". That used to illicit some strange responses.

My "best" question to ask a developer though is :

Tell me the name of the last abstract class or interface YOU wrote.

The reason I like it is because a good or great developer will usually just answer it. Almost without thinking about it, maybe after a small pause whilst they trawl their memory and after that will almost always go straight into a description of why they wrote it and where they used it without any prompting.

As soon as they are talking about code they know they usually relax and you can go onto have a good interview.

Whereas a poor developer or faker will have almost certainly brushed up on Object Orientated Programming 101 and have some stock answer in his head about "Animals" or "Shapes" and will be able to trot out a text-book response on polymorphism but actually won't understand when he would use those language features or why.

[LondonManc]

Worst interview answer I ever received...

The question: "Tell me, how many data warehouses have you worked on, in terms of building or maintaining?"

The answer (bearing in mind that we were recruiting for a seasoned data warehouse developer and I hadn't sourced the candidates or seen the cvs): "None yet, but I'm really looking forward to it."

Clammy handshake as well.