Welcome to 2012! Before we close the door on 2011, I wanted to share my favorite oddball interview questions of 2011. The top 25 oddball questions can be found at this link: Glassdoor.com, a free career community where anyone can find and anonymously share an inside look at jobs and companies. In 2010, I shared some “wacky” interview questions, but this “oddball” list puts the 2010 “wacky” list to shame.
Here are some of my oddball question “favorites”. Remember, these are actual questions asked during job interviews.
- How many people are using Facebook in San Francisco at 2:30pm on a Friday?
- Just entertain me for five minutes, I’m not going to talk.
- Room, desk, and car — which do you clean first?
- Name 5 uses of a stapler without staple pins.
- How many planes are currently flying over Kansas?
What is even more amazing is that these oddball questions have been used by companies such as:
- American Airlines
- Best Buy
- Hewlett-Packard
- Ernst and Young
As an interviewer, resorting to Oddball Interview Questions doesn’t help you or your job applicant(s). Both of you are looking for the right “fit”.
The ProfileXT is the most technologically advanced, state-of-the-art system available today for measuring human potential and predicting job performance. The ProfileXT can measure how well an individual fits specific jobs, or specific talent pools, or specific leadership positions, all in your organization. The “job matching” and “performance modeling” features of the PXT are unique, and it enables you to evaluate an individual relative to the qualities required to successfully perform in a specific job or a specific pool of jobs, unique to your company.
This less-than-one-hour, online assessment reveals consistent, in-depth, and objective insight into an individual’s thinking and reasoning style, relevant behavioral traits, occupational interests, and match to specific jobs in your organization. It helps your managers and you interview and select people who have the highest probability of being successful in a role, and provides practical recommendations for coaching them to maximum performance. It also gives your organization consistent language and metrics to support strategic workforce and succession planning, talent management, and reorganization efforts.
Best of all, the PXT is extremely cost effective, and the reports are written in plain language that do not require a specialist to interpret the results.
The ProfileXT does all this and doesn’t ask a single Oddball Interview Question.
Happy 2012! If your 2012 resolutions include improving retention and selecting employees that better “fit” your organization, call or email me today.