That Bad Advice: Help! I'm a Perfect Genius, but This Potential Employer Asked Me a Boring Interview

[minoanmiss]

Ask A Manager, 13 Feb 2024:

I was rejected from a role for not answering an interview question. I had all the skills they asked for, and the recruiter and hiring manager loved me.

I had a final round of interviews — a peer on the hiring team, a peer from another team that I would work closely with, the director of both teams (so my would-be grandboss, which I thought was weird), and then finally a technical test with the hiring manager I had already spoken to.

(I don’t know if it matters but I’m male and everyone I interviewed with was female.)

The interviews went great, except the grandboss. I asked why she was interviewing me since it was a technical position and she was clearly some kind of middle manager. She told me she had a technical background (although she had been in management 10 years so it’s not like her experience was even relevant), but that she was interviewing for things like communication, ability to prioritize, and soft skills. I still thought it was weird to interview with my boss’s boss.

She asked pretty standard (and boring) questions, which I aced. But then she asked me to tell her about the biggest mistake I’ve made in my career and how I handled it. I told her I’m a professional and I don’t make mistakes, and she argued with me! She said everyone makes mistakes, but what matters is how you handle them and prevent the same mistake from happening in the future. I told her maybe she made mistakes as a developer but since I actually went to school for it, I didn’t have that problem. She seemed fine with it and we moved on with the interview.

A couple days later, the recruiter emailed me to say they had decided to go with someone else. I asked for feedback on why I wasn’t chosen and she said there were other candidates who were stronger.

I wrote back and asked if the grandboss had been the reason I didn’t get the job, and she just told me again that the hiring panel made the decision to hire someone else.

I looked the grandboss up on LinkedIn after the rejection and she was a developer at two industry leaders and then an executive at a third. She was also connected to a number of well-known C-level people in our city and industry. I’m thinking of mailing her on LinkedIn to explain why her question was wrong and asking if she’ll consider me for future positions at her company but my wife says it’s a bad idea.

What do you think about me mailing her to try to explain?


Sir,

You have been wronged in the most grievous of ways by a coven of retaliatory, self-aggrandizing women who have failed in the extreme to recognize your brilliance, your talent, and above all, your general superiority.

Of course you should mail this mediocre "grandboss" on LinkedIn to inform her of the deep offense she caused you by interviewing you in the first place, let alone doing so using a boring question — indeed, you have a moral and professional obligation to do so in order to preserve your honor and the honor of scores of men like you who have never done a single solitary thing wrong in their lives, ever.

But I beg you to consider doing more. A single, private message to one incompetent bitch may not convey to the necessary parties the depth and breadth of the situation. Many, many people have important lessons to learn from your experience, and I encourage you to share it widely. Consider making a public LinkedIn post, and ensure that it is shareable across platforms. Depending on your financial resources, a billboard with your name, professional headshot, and contact information could go a long way toward ensuring that everyone in your industry who needs to know just how you handled the way these women treated you, does know about it.

I hope that in your continuing job search, you are able to connect with potential employers who have a much better grasp of all you bring to the table.

Comments

[azurelunatic]

I hope this LW steps on a lego, and I wish his wife the best of luck if/when she goes for a divorce.

[conuly]

What did I just read.

[swingandswirl]

This has to be a troll.

[oursin]

People in the replies at AAM are saying 'this sounds exactly like bloke we interviewed/I work with'. Possibly written by pissed-off interviewer, in persona.

[pauraque]

I used to work in HR and conducted interviews, and I can see that. Guys like this are definitely, painfully real. The only unlikely part is that one would ever consider asking someone else for advice, especially a woman.

[movingfinger]

I think he wore out his wife's ears carping about this and she grasped at a straw and suggested he write in.

[conuly]

That's the thing, though - I believe dudes like this exist. I'm not sure I believe they can stay in a relationship long enough to marry.

[jamoche]

LWs like this aren't looking for advice, they're looking for confirmation.

[azurelunatic]

I would believe Mr. Bad Email Address would do this. (But it couldn't be him as he has a husband, iirc.)

[jamoche]

Also he was very good at interviewing - he'd put all his skill points in Bluff, and he did know who I was, from the previous company we had in common, and was polite to me in the interview. (Alas, we never worked together there, so I was not forewarned.)

It wasn't until his first code review that he pulled the "I know better than everyone" routine.

[lannamichaels]

I wish advice blogs would ban discussions on if the letter is real or not because it's basically derailment. Especially because I have _so often_ seen it coming from people refusing to believe that other people will do $thing, even in the face of many other people coming in to tell them that, yes, people will do the thing. So let's say I'm the letter writer, writing in about an awful thing that happened to me, just to see the comments calling me a liar. It's not helpful to anyone.

While I'm banning things, I also want to ban "oh, I know where you work/you sound like my coworker" stuff. In an AAM open thread a few years ago, someone pulled "you sound like my husband" on me. I denied being their husband, and then that person responded with a long comment about oh, they know, their husband doesn't actually work that job, etc. But it basically denies someone their anonymity to play tee-hee games like that.

Yeah. I mostly stopped reading AAM comments section a while ago.

[adrian_turtle]

It *is* usually a derailment, which is one of the benefits of moderated comments. But sometimes a bit of discussion in that direction can be great, as when someone sent in a letter from the perspective of Frodo Baggins about what to do with the family heirloom his uncle had left him.

[cimorene]

I keep going back and forth between Has to be Troll and knowing that there's always SOMEONE.

[dissectionist]

I’ve had to conduct interviews sometimes during various jobs. While I hope this is a troll, I’ve definitely come across folks (okay, men) who weren’t able to hide that they think the whole interview process is beneath them, none of the hiring staff are on their level, and we don’t deserve to be doing anything but getting them a coffee or unzipping their pants. They try to hide it a little, but it’s so intensely within them that they keep inadvertently showing glimpses of their resentment.

(Thankfully now I only ever interview students, and they’re lovely to interview because they’re hopeful, enthusiastic, and excited. Often scared too by the interview process, but it’s usually not hard to calm them.)

[movingfinger]

I have worked with This Guy.

[cereta]

The LW is a man, and the interviewers were women. Color me stunned.

[movingfinger]

This letter was so sad and so funny and I am so, so sorry for this man's wife, but presumably she knew what she was marrying.

[shirou]

I told her I’m a professional and I don’t make mistakes

Ironically, that response was a big mistake.

[minoanmiss]

That was the point where I started laughing. It was just so magnificently oblivious.

[p_cocincinus]

Right? I'm frequently involved in the interview process for vacancies in my team (my department is a really good place to get your foot in the door at an excellent company, and people tend to get promoted away from us, so we hire often), this is literally one of the questions we ask, and the director (grandboss!) is usually part of the final interview. I don't think I'd be able to keep from laughing in the interview if someone responded to the question like this. White cishet men, I swear.

[summerstorm]

And then! "I told her maybe she made mistakes as a developer but since I actually went to school for it, I didn’t have that problem." I mean. Maybe they didn't hire you because you literally belittled a potential coworker? Even if that weren't to be your "grandboss," if someone said that to someone I presumably respect, their chances to be hired would right in the trash.