Millenials failing job interviews.

[child of wonder]

I'm 33 and have a 10 year old son. Interviewing is something I pride myself in. I'm looking forward to trying to teach my son interviewing skills and even seeing him fail a few times in the real world. It's the best way to learn.

 

[DisgruntledVirus]

Interviewing for my current job I had to interview with 2 VP's, my boss, and another manager on the second round. During the interview with the one VP asks "as a hiring manager would there be anything on your transcripts that would concern me?" I debated between lying or being honest. I went with the honesty route and told him yes, and explained why it happened. I got a job offer later that day.

 

[Exterous]

31, 32 in September, I am not a millenial.

I had no idea you were such an old man!

interviews are great for killing any hope you had in mankind

Eh - its not as good as retail is at that but yes it is depressing. I am still surprised at how many lack very very basic interviewing skills. Forget researching the company, forget preparing for questions how about making eye contact and not mumbling or offering a handshake and a 'Nice to meet you.' at the start

I do wonder if the lack of interviewing skills will be great for us in terms of job mobility or a deadly career killer later in life if all job interviews are done by text message:

U wnat job?

yes

y?

cuz I good

u hired!

 

[Red Storm]

Being rude likely not to land you a job. More at 11.

Seriously, this isn't news or thread worthy.

 

[Anubis]

if you are just out of college and had like 1 or 2 summer jobs in HS im not supprised that people have poor interview skills. its not like college teaches them. they did not when i was in school

 

[JM Aggie08]

I really don't think it's millenial-specific. The complete lack of social skills and tact that I see with some of my older coworkers often makes me question how they landed their positions in the first place.

America is not doomed. Quit being so dramatic.

 

[CZroe]

what would possess someone to bring a freaking cat to an interview....total wtf

The interview was at American Eagle. She probably just picked it up at the pet store while killing time in the mall before the interview.

 

[yinan]

The interview was at American Eagle. She probably just picked it up at the pet store while killing time in the mall before the interview.

If it was an orange cat I might hire them just for that

 

[Triumph]

Thats because you're not.
You are GenX with me.

But the article says that I am...

 

[ultimatebob]

I'm not a millennial.
I dont do anything stupid in interviews.
Havent had a job in 5 years.

You should probably stop bragging about your ATOT post count on your resume. It's not helping your image

 

[SheHateMe]

I was in a group interview for a job and one kid kept saying "Yes, I agree with what he/she said" in response to being asked questions after somebody else.

It was kind of hilarious because he thought he was doing so good. We came out of the interview room and he told a friend who was waiting to interview for a company in another room that he "nailed it".

 

[IndyColtsFan]

11. ASK questions!
it makes you look interested.

I had an interview yesterday and at one point, I told the interviewer that interviews were a two-way street and while they're looking for the right candidate, I am also looking for the right company and I intended to ask a lot of detailed questions once I was given the opportunity. He was impressed with that statement, so I'd gather most don't ask many questions.

 

[wotan]

my boss takes personal phonecalls in the middle of our meetings

i honestly want to kill him when he does this

My boss does this in EVERY meeting. He's building a hot rod and he'll make our team sit there and listen to him talk about the options for his intake manifold for 10 minutes and then hang up and ask what he missed.

 

[kranky]

I had an interview yesterday and at one point, I told the interviewer that interviews were a two-way street and while they're looking for the right candidate, I am also looking for the right company and I intended to ask a lot of detailed questions once I was given the opportunity. He was impressed with that statement, so I'd gather most don't ask many questions.

"When you go in for a job interview, I think a good thing to ask is if they ever press charges." -- Jack Handey

That's a smart approach. Both sides should know what they are getting into.

 

[PingSpike]

But the article says that I am...

The definition varies heavily, which isn't surprising since its just a crappy categorization. I even saw one generation table that listed Generation X ending in 1978 and Generation Y starting in 1983 or something. Apparently no people were born during the interim. I personally identify more with Generation X but I grew up in rural area where technological trends by nature lagged behind. Maybe if I grew up in a major city I'd think differently. Or maybe this is all just a bunch of horseshit.

 

[Spungo]

No generation prior to the Millenials has ever had a poor job interview. This is completely unprecedented and totally newsworthy.

It probably looked funnier in the 80s. Hold on bro, I gotta take this call

 

[Vdubchaos]

That's worse than not dressing up.

If I was interviewing someone and they took a call I would tell them to leave on the spot....

 

[rasczak]

No america is not doomed, it's the idiots who interview like this who are doomed. They won't be able to get a job, or if they do get an offer, they won't be able to hold it down for more than a week. Idiots. aslkjfa;lskjfa;lsjkf;alsjkf

 

[SheHateMe]

Wearing Jeans and a Dress shirt to the interview thinking its okay.


hahahaha

 

[wirednuts]

I'm 34 and don't consider myself a millenial. I feel quite different than the people graduating college today. Why in my day, we only had 1 ethernet port per dorm room, let alone having 4G cell phones!

we are the last of the kind. anyone 25 or younger is pretty screwed. especially the 20yo's today- they are the dumbest, laziest short sighted 20yo's ive known. im only 30, but when me and my friends were all 20 we didnt act like the kids do today. they might be old enough to drink, but theyre hardly qualified to drive a car.

part of it i think is the obscure future... it leads to apathy.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

Wearing Jeans and a Dress shirt to the interview thinking its okay.


hahahaha

I wore khakis and a standard button-up shirt to mine yesterday. I interviewed over lunch hour and had previously explained I was leaving for vacation on Wednesday so I couldn't afford to take time off to dress up in a suit and didn't want to arouse suspicion. They were fine with that.

I posted a story of the worst interview I've ever participated in but unfortunately, the hamster fell off the wheel here at AT and the post was lost. Maybe I'll start typing it up AGAIN.

 

[IndyColtsFan]

So, there are obviously two sides of an interview -- the interviewer(s) and interviewee. I won't tolerate rude interviewers any longer. Below is a repost of a post I made a few years ago describing the worst interview I ever attended as the interviewee:

"Several years ago, I interviewed for a network engineer position with a very well known manufacturer of computer cables, peripherals, wireless products, etc. The first 3 or 4 rounds were a breeze. They finally flew in the IT manager and director from their HQ for the final interviews. They were condescending and rude and asked stupid questions and the director, who was very impressed with himself, always had to tell me what the "correct" answer was even though his questions made no sense and by his own definition, weren't solved by his answer. The IT manager mentioned some of the Active Directory issues they were having and I told him how to fix it and he argued with me over the solution! Keep in mind I designed an AD infrastructure for a Fortune 500 company with 40+ global sites, so I knew what I was talking about and had seen my solution work.

So, I was fed up -- I knew I wasn't going to get the job, so I decided to have fun with it. At the end, when they asked me for questions, I nailed them to the wall and completely embarrassed and humiliated them. One thing they were bragging about earlier in the interview was their customer satisfaction scores for their help desk -- it was 80%. So when it got to my turn to ask questions, I actually said this:

"You mentioned that your help desk customer satisfaction score was 80%. Quite frankly, that is a terrible score and wouldn't be tolerated anywhere I've worked in the past. People would be fired or reassigned. How do you plan to remedy the situation?"

Their jaws hit the floor -- it was GREAT! I just kept nailing them with stuff like that. I figured if they didn't have respect for me, I didn't need to have it for them. I think at the end, I also recommended to the manager that they hire a consulting firm to help with their AD issue since they couldn't solve it on their own.

The funny part is that these guys were hiring these positions because the previous people they hired were an absolute disaster. So yeah, these guys REALLY had the right to act like they knew how to pick employees. "

I had a job at the time and didn't need another, so I had nothing to lose and these guys were such major assholes that I had no problem doing this to them. One guy argued with me over branding of one of their products and was rude about it -- I was just mentioning something that the HR person and I had discussed and he told me I was wrong. I said "Oh, well I'm sorry, that's just what the HR person told me. Maybe I misunderstood." When he was persistently rude after that, I decided the branding argument wasn't an isolated incident and I wasn't going to take their shit.

One of his actual questions was: "If you interviewed twins and they had EXACTLY the same qualifications (even exactly the same personality), which ONE (my emphasis) would you hire?"

I told him that would never happen and I would hire the one that meshed the best with my team in the interviews. "Well, it HAS happened to us before! Which ONE (again, my emphasis) would you hire?"

He finally said "The correct answer is to hire both!" Uh, no dipshit, you said I could only hire ONE. This ignores the fact, of course, that I wasn't even interviewing for a management position. To this day, I refuse to buy their products and this interview was 10 years ago. "

 

[xeemzor]

I wore khakis and a standard button-up shirt to mine yesterday. I interviewed over lunch hour and had previously explained I was leaving for vacation on Wednesday so I couldn't afford to take time off to dress up in a suit and didn't want to arouse suspicion. They were fine with that.

I posted a story of the worst interview I've ever participated in but unfortunately, the hamster fell off the wheel here at AT and the post was lost. Maybe I'll start typing it up AGAIN.

Please do! I just went through recruiting a few months ago and I need to know that others have shared in my pain.

 

[cubby1223]

Most worthless article I've ever seen.

Plus, I guarantee this stuff happened with older generations too, there just wasn't twitter to spread the news of weird interviews quickly across the country.

 

[Aikouka]

He was impressed with that statement, so I'd gather most don't ask many questions.

I don't usually ask many questions. If something comes to mind when they're telling me about the work, the area, or the company, I'll ask, but by the end, I'm probably quite satisfied with what I've garnered. So, I normally don't have anything when they say, "Do you have any questions?" Although, I should probably make a list sometime of some of the more fringe benefits that aren't normally mentioned. For example... whether they have any discounts on cellular plans -- can't beat an extra $10-20 off a month.