Worst Job Interview you have ever had?
Discussion
Many years ago, I'd just graduated and was looking for my first proper job. I had a lot of family who lived down St. Neots way and I quite fancied a move from Northumberland. My cousin put in a word for me with a company who were looking for a graduate software developer. They made clock in terminal systems.
I drove all the way for this interview and the guy seemed a bit agitated. Half way through my pitch he told me that he wasn't a fan of "Geordies" and only agreed to the interview me as a favour to my cousin. Things didn't improve when I told him I wasn't a Geordie, I was a Northumbrian. I also told him I'd be having a strong word with my cousin as I'd wasted a lot of time and petrol money on this interview. He could and should have just declined. He backed off a little, my cousin is a big bloke and had a bit of a reputation but what a nightmare the whole thing was.
I drove all the way for this interview and the guy seemed a bit agitated. Half way through my pitch he told me that he wasn't a fan of "Geordies" and only agreed to the interview me as a favour to my cousin. Things didn't improve when I told him I wasn't a Geordie, I was a Northumbrian. I also told him I'd be having a strong word with my cousin as I'd wasted a lot of time and petrol money on this interview. He could and should have just declined. He backed off a little, my cousin is a big bloke and had a bit of a reputation but what a nightmare the whole thing was.
Mine was quite recent <3 months ago.
Head of performance role, did some preliminary questions impressed the hiring manager, did a task and set up a final stage interview.
Within seconds she seemed disinterested and stopped the interview, said she hadn't read my CV and I'm not right for the role having just looked at it.
Head of performance role, did some preliminary questions impressed the hiring manager, did a task and set up a final stage interview.
Within seconds she seemed disinterested and stopped the interview, said she hadn't read my CV and I'm not right for the role having just looked at it.
Mine was a case of the recruitment agency messing both me and the employer about,
Back in 2006 I was contacted by an agency, given the details of a job that pretty much exactly matched my current role, about a half hour drive but almost 8k a year more, I was on about 20k at the time so a decent chunk more,
Arrived and all seemed to be going well for the first 10 minutes, then I started getting asked some very technical tax questions, I had no idea what he was talking about - I dealt with fixed assets from a finance assistant side, didnt go near the tax side of things, interviewer was surprised as it was the major part of the role,
I showed him the job spec I had which didnt mention anything about the tax, he then showed me the full job spec which it was the major part of, then my CV (which the agency had amended) which showed loads of experience of tax, capital allowances,
Waste of everyones time, I was offered a job as the assistant to the accountant they was recruiting, but turned it down as it was the same as I was paid but a half hour drive instead of a 5 minute drive.
Back in 2006 I was contacted by an agency, given the details of a job that pretty much exactly matched my current role, about a half hour drive but almost 8k a year more, I was on about 20k at the time so a decent chunk more,
Arrived and all seemed to be going well for the first 10 minutes, then I started getting asked some very technical tax questions, I had no idea what he was talking about - I dealt with fixed assets from a finance assistant side, didnt go near the tax side of things, interviewer was surprised as it was the major part of the role,
I showed him the job spec I had which didnt mention anything about the tax, he then showed me the full job spec which it was the major part of, then my CV (which the agency had amended) which showed loads of experience of tax, capital allowances,
Waste of everyones time, I was offered a job as the assistant to the accountant they was recruiting, but turned it down as it was the same as I was paid but a half hour drive instead of a 5 minute drive.
Attended an interview a few years back, arrived 5 minutes early as you do to make a good impression, was taken to a meeting room and told to wait there by reception. After about half an hour no one had come to interview me or apologise etc, a few people tried to take the meeting room I was sat in so I went to reception to ask if something had gone wrong, she told me to go back to the room someone would be right with me. 30 minutes later in walks the IT Manager (it was an IT role so not unexpected) admonishes me for being an hour early. I apologise and show her the email from the recruiter showing the date and time that also had an email from her underneath confirming. We swiftly move on and she lays into me about "would I have trouble working for a woman?" and then varying that question in different ways over and over and never actually asks me a question relating to my experience or the role. Interview ends I leave and immediately call recruiter who couldn't have been more embarrassed about the whole thing. Two weeks later they were recruiting to replace the IT Manager as she had been dismissed, mine was the last in a long line of issues with her it would seem. The whole thing was utterly bizarre!
bucksmanuk said:
TheGreatDane said:
....
Within seconds she seemed disinterested and stopped the interview, said she hadn't read my CV and I'm not right for the role having just looked at it.
.....
Almost a perfect example of a total lack of professionalism.Within seconds she seemed disinterested and stopped the interview, said she hadn't read my CV and I'm not right for the role having just looked at it.
.....
Jader1973 said:
First question I was asked was “What is the formula for the power output of a gas turbine?”.
Went to s
t from there.
I had one where they started asking about the electrical and thermal outputs of a combined heat and power plant. I was doing test and evaluation stuff on gas turbine combustors and injectors and was looking for a research and development job, turned out they were looking for a design engineer with a lot of experience of CHP plants. We all realized pretty quickly I wasn't the person they looking for and we spent the rest of the time having a nice chat about what they do and how CHP plants work Went to s
t from there.
I had another interview that while not bad could certainly have gone better. I'd been working for the civil service and went for an interview with a commercial company, interview went well and they asked what kind of money I was looking for. I gave them a figure a chunk above my current salary thinking it wasn't too greedy but they'd knock me back a bit. They made me an offer for a grand more than I asked for which turned out to be the bottom of their salary scale.
Interviewer had a very bad stutter, 5 minutes into the interview landline rings, he says "Mr coop.... coop ... coop ... coop but it's no good it just wouldn't come out, as a result he starts tapping the phone (1982 era type phone) on his bonce in time to the stutter but he still can get it out, the tapping turns into a banging until finally we have a "Mr cooper speaking" after that he seems to deal Ok ish with the call. However as a 17 year old it put me on tenderhooks waiting for the phone to ring.
I did get the job but only stuck it for 4 weeks as the guy I worked with in the office kept ringing my phone and mimicing Mr Cooper, as you can imagine when the real Mr Cooper rang me and I told him to fk off it didn't go down well.
I did get the job but only stuck it for 4 weeks as the guy I worked with in the office kept ringing my phone and mimicing Mr Cooper, as you can imagine when the real Mr Cooper rang me and I told him to f
k off it didn't go down well.Had been working in a senior IT consulting role at a major supermarket (that rhymes with wesco) reconfiguring their whole IT organisation, and the Head of IT wanted me to take a permie role, so turned up for an IT interview, and was put through a full retail management assessment day.
Unsurprisingly I knew nothing about the statistics of getting a ham sandwich instead of a cheese one (yep seriously) and the guy got quite irate with me.
I didn't get an offer!
Unsurprisingly I knew nothing about the statistics of getting a ham sandwich instead of a cheese one (yep seriously) and the guy got quite irate with me.
I didn't get an offer!
Bob-iylho said:
Interviewer had a very bad stutter, 5 minutes into the interview landline rings, he says "Mr coop.... coop ... coop ... coop but it's no good it just wouldn't come out, as a result he starts tapping the phone (1982 era type phone) on his bonce in time to the stutter but he still can get it out, the tapping turns into a banging until finally we have a "Mr cooper speaking" after that he seems to deal Ok ish with the call. However as a 17 year old it put me on tenderhooks waiting for the phone to ring.
I did get the job but only stuck it for 4 weeks as the guy I worked with in the office kept ringing my phone and mimicing Mr Cooper, as you can imagine when the real Mr Cooper rang me and I told him to fk off it didn't go down well.
I did get the job but only stuck it for 4 weeks as the guy I worked with in the office kept ringing my phone and mimicing Mr Cooper, as you can imagine when the real Mr Cooper rang me and I told him to f
k off it didn't go down well.
Got a call about a high profile role by an in-house recruiter in the consulting arm of one of my industry's biggest players. Really positive about my CV and background, role sounded very interesting so in I went for an interview with the function VP. Niceties out of the way he asked me the usual starter question - tell me about your background - so I go to start talking. I get maybe 3 words in when he stops me, and says "Sorry your CV is totally st, I can't understand a thing on here. Nothing makes sense". Slightly taken aback (as I know for a fact my CV isn't st and makes perfect sense whether you read or scan it) I ask him to explain, or what could I clarify for him.
He says "you haven't listed your university courses on here" (I'm in my 30s); I said my BA, PG Dip and MA quals should be listed at the very top; "yes I can see that I'm not blind, I mean what modules you did". The alarm bells start going off in my head; he's sat there, stoic faced, just staring at me. I said "in the interests of brevity I felt it wasn't necessary to list every course I completed on my CV; I was at uni for 6 years, there were a lot of courses."
This was like cat nip to him. In an interview for a fairly senior managerial role, he goes on to ask:
Where did you go to University? When did you go there? When did you graduate? Where did you graduate? What was your thesis on? Who did you interview for your thesis? What were the conclusions? Who were your tutors, your instructors? Who can I speak to there to verify everything you tell me. Each time I answered one of his questions he would do that 10-second pause where he just stared at me, dead behind the eyes.
We eventually start talking about my current role and the same thing starts again; this guy simply isn't believing a word coming out of my mouth - at least that's how it came across. 20 mins in and I stood up and thanked him for his time but that I didn't want to take up any more of it, and walked out.
Recruiter called me asking for feedback, told him the above, and he apologised and said he's been trying to find someone for the role for almost 9 months but keeps getting the same feedback about the manager.
fk that guy. He's probably still looking for someone to this day.
t, I can't understand a thing on here. Nothing makes sense". Slightly taken aback (as I know for a fact my CV isn't st and makes perfect sense whether you read or scan it) I ask him to explain, or what could I clarify for him. He says "you haven't listed your university courses on here" (I'm in my 30s); I said my BA, PG Dip and MA quals should be listed at the very top; "yes I can see that I'm not blind, I mean what modules you did". The alarm bells start going off in my head; he's sat there, stoic faced, just staring at me. I said "in the interests of brevity I felt it wasn't necessary to list every course I completed on my CV; I was at uni for 6 years, there were a lot of courses."
This was like cat nip to him. In an interview for a fairly senior managerial role, he goes on to ask:
Where did you go to University? When did you go there? When did you graduate? Where did you graduate? What was your thesis on? Who did you interview for your thesis? What were the conclusions? Who were your tutors, your instructors? Who can I speak to there to verify everything you tell me. Each time I answered one of his questions he would do that 10-second pause where he just stared at me, dead behind the eyes.
We eventually start talking about my current role and the same thing starts again; this guy simply isn't believing a word coming out of my mouth - at least that's how it came across. 20 mins in and I stood up and thanked him for his time but that I didn't want to take up any more of it, and walked out.
Recruiter called me asking for feedback, told him the above, and he apologised and said he's been trying to find someone for the role for almost 9 months but keeps getting the same feedback about the manager.
f
k that guy. He's probably still looking for someone to this day.I've just remembered another, not worst, but worth mentioning. I'm being interviewed and the leaving do for the bloke I'm replacing had been the previous evening. The interviewer had overdone things at the leaving do, and had to duck out of the interview for five minutes as he was certain he was about to chunder.
I went for an interview at a PE firm which specialised in distressed debt about 7 years ago.
As I was about to be made redundant and I hadn’t had to go to an interview for 4 years (and got the current job after just one informal interview) I was nervous, especially as part of the interview was a 2 hour financial modelling test. Back then, for me, nerves led to IBS.
I leave the house to get the train and my stomach is turning. By the time I got into the west end proper from Charing Cross I needed a poo, quickly.
No coffee shop was open/had a toilet and I was on trouble. I turned up to the building 10 minutes early and went to the floor, basically stting myself. The office was tiny, with the toilet directly behind the reception desk. This desk was manned by 2 very attractive girls, both in their early-mid 20’s and was just a fairly small 4m x 3m room.
I dropped the Bismarck, the smelliest, most gut turning liquid mud monkey imaginable. I left the stall and went into the single meeting room. 2 minutes later I was being shown the test. I’m then sat in the room sweating (nerves), stomach still rumbling and listening to boring but the 2 receptionists spraying air freshener for a solid 30 minutes.
Needless to say, I fked up the test, left the office as quickly as i could and never looked back...
As I was about to be made redundant and I hadn’t had to go to an interview for 4 years (and got the current job after just one informal interview) I was nervous, especially as part of the interview was a 2 hour financial modelling test. Back then, for me, nerves led to IBS.
I leave the house to get the train and my stomach is turning. By the time I got into the west end proper from Charing Cross I needed a poo, quickly.
No coffee shop was open/had a toilet and I was on trouble. I turned up to the building 10 minutes early and went to the floor, basically s
tting myself. The office was tiny, with the toilet directly behind the reception desk. This desk was manned by 2 very attractive girls, both in their early-mid 20’s and was just a fairly small 4m x 3m room.I dropped the Bismarck, the smelliest, most gut turning liquid mud monkey imaginable. I left the stall and went into the single meeting room. 2 minutes later I was being shown the test. I’m then sat in the room sweating (nerves), stomach still rumbling and listening to boring but the 2 receptionists spraying air freshener for a solid 30 minutes.
Needless to say, I f
ked up the test, left the office as quickly as i could and never looked back...Edited by kiethton on Tuesday 1st September 21:33
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