Office: Office – Interview

Tis’ the season when companies loosen their belts and spend that last bit of budget available to them. The dumber ones will focus on splurging it on booze parties, team jackets, bags and other goodies. The smarter ones will focus on getting good candidates inducted into the company (so that the cocky team members fear for their existence in the next quarter and don’t care about their appraisal or bonus).

The most important part of candidate selection is the interview. The more important part, of course, is the feeling of security (some would mistakenly assume this is “power”) that you are on the other side of the table. In my limited experience, there are several types of interviews that are prevalent in the corporate world today. For those wanting to give interviews, what you see below could be like seeing a copy of the question paper the night before the exam.

(Image Courtesy: www.dilbert.com)

a)  “Know who’s the boss” interview - If you have ever faced an interviewer who had no time for scrutinizing your outfit, your resume or anything remotely concerned with you, then you have faced this monster. The type will only have ears, eyes and a voice for talking about his/her role in the company. He/she will ration out exactly 5 minutes for you to speak and that too only ask close ended questions.  As you leave the interview you will have only one question on your mind - who was being interviewed? The only way to tackle this is to chip in at the third minute from the start and ask those questions whose answers will be meaningful to you. Try taming the monster and you will realize how wasted your appearance and attitude is.

      b) “Errr…Ummm. Hmmm” interview – While you might mistake this interviewer for a case of ‘I’m substituting for you interviewer because he got sick,’ it is far from the truth.  Ever knew a chap whose idea of communication was giving confused looks and saying nothing more than “Hmmm”? Now, imagine if he was forced to interview candidates. How would he behave? Exactly like what your candidate-phobic interviewer is behaving. Chances are you might mistake the company for being filled with duffers and ruin that suit you wore to the interview in rage. Instead, do a role reversal. Ask questions and seek answers – preferably do both yourself. If nothing, you would have completed one mock interview session to boost confidence.

      c)  The pessimistic interview – These are the times you seek the ray of sunshine through the cold AC room. This is less of an interview and more of an audition for scary movie 14. Everything that you say will be used to position the role as unsuitable for you. It’s worse if you don’t say anything. Hygiene factors in the office are the some of the commonly exaggerated claims made by the interviewer – you will have to work 14 hours a day seven days a week, our canteen has watery dal that gives loose motions, forget work-life balance, you’ll have no life, officially you will be made assistant manager, but practically your role would be that of a Group Head. What the interviewer is desperately hoping for is that you ask him/her– “Oh! Wow. How do you manage all this? You must be awesome.” Once you ask that question, you have cracked the interview (and the interviewer).

If the interviews you have experienced fall in none of these categories, then you either have a boring role or work for a boring industry. After all what’s the fun in attending serious, predictable interviews?