It all started like it always does. It’s a ritual. “Why don’t you tell
me about yourself?” —the ice-breaker question in the interview.
The interviewee took three minutes to cover an over-all “about-me” thing,
and finally when it came to hobbies, he mentioned about reading books etc., but
suddenly the interviewer interrupted and asked. “How was your trip to India
last month?” The interviewee was surprised, eyes widened, smiled and was all
enthused to tell about it.
When he finished that, the interviewer asked another question— “The guy
you were teaching at the charity- did he pass the exam?”
And then another …“Why do you think the client appreciated your team
member Mr. X and not you?”
And it went on like…
“Why did you choose to install TOR in your mobile phone?”
“Did you agree with Gary Vaynerchuck’s response to the question you
asked?”
“Tell me more about the disagreement pyramid you responded to Jeff’s
blog.”
“How far have you finished reading ‘how to win friends….’? Did you
happen to get a pre-1964 edition? BTW, why did you prefer the old edition?”
“What did you learn from on-startup community? Why were you interested
in it in the first place?”
“Why do you follow both Deepak Chopra and Richard Dawkins?”
“Have you seen the other responses for the question that you answered
about Pivoting the database?” “Do you think your response was better or did you
learn something new?”
…and the questions went on... They ranged from sports, to tourist
places, to photography, to politics, to music for a good 20-30-minutes duration.
Some side questions that were picked during the conversation were like,
“How would you have done it differently?”;
“How you pick the team?”;
“Your dream?”;
“Why do you think you are investing your time with us to catch your
dream?”
Finally, the interviewer asked, “So, what do you think about this
interview?”
And the interviewee responded saying “It didn’t seem to be like an
interview. It’s like catching up with old friend. I am not sure even if my
girlfriend knew about me this much. I had a good time.”
The interviewee curiously asked “Do you already know me?”
“You are all over the internet” said the interviewer.
Reluctantly the interviewee added - “But if I may ask, you did not deep
dive into my current job details, my experience etc., so has the vacancy been
already filled and you just had a chat with me(?) or I don’t know how to say… I
did not expect… this is different… Normally I have seen the interviewer seeing
the resume only during the interview… they just ask the question from the
resume… and then they ask some technical questions.”
The interviewer smiled and said “whatever I need to know about you, I
got it from the internet already… and I have got it cross-verified during our
chat… and that is more than enough to form an opinion”
Later, the interviewee joined the organization and in the feedback for
about the interview and selection process, the candidate mentioned that:
“I got two other offers but picked this one not because of the money,
rather this one wasn’t competitive package, but got a feeling that people
already know me and can relate to me better.”
Thanks to Shikha Ashok for reading the draft
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