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Comment by muse900 | Hacker News Reader

Well if thats what you practice on your interviews then you might miss out at some people that might react the way you want them to react and be a good fit.

I would personally walk away as well, its not like am some kind of superstar, I just feel that I won't be a good match to a company that asks questions that I feel are not needed. The way I see it an interview is always two ways. The company is interviewing me to see if am a good fit and I am interviewing the company to see if they are a good fit for me since I'll be spending at least 8 hours a day 5 days a week of my time working for that company.

Personally so far what I've seen working ok for us in human systems is to just have a talk with the person we are interviewing, see what his/her hobbies are and generally feel if he/she is a good fit.

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> Personally so far what I've seen working ok for us in human systems is to just have a talk with the person we are interviewing, see what his/her hobbies are and generally feel if he/she is a good fit.

Bingo. Thats basically our interview process. I could ask stupid technical gotchas but thats idiotic. Better to ask pointed questions like: oh you like to program micros on the side, if you've programmed SPI before tell me what your most fun debug session involving that entailed.

These questions tell me more than anything like fizzbuzz can. You dig into details as much/little as you need to based on the replies but I honestly think the people you want shine though with their stories, not their rote knowledge.

If someone started spouting off intentionally wrong things in an interview as stated in this comment tree, I would call it a day and say thanks for all the fish, but I'm not starting off having to rebut 2+2=5 for this company. Even if that is a tactic for discussion, lets just have the discussion, as it stands that just makes me not want to work there as now what is the day to day like? Do I have to prove the world isn't flat constantly? Better to not find out and look elsewhere, even the weird cs quizz jobs are better than trying to deal with those kind of dynamics.

> I would personally walk away as well, its not like am [sic] some kind of superstar

You’re a perfectly-reasonable person. I also think you’d find the work those positions do frustrating.

You can’t tell a multibillion-dollar client they’re asking stupid questions. You also can’t ignore the potential problems their asking them hints at. Walking away, usually, isn’t an option. Similarly, a CEO and CFO must be able to productively field “dumb” questions from potential investors, acquirers, distributors and yes, employees. “Dumb question” shouldn’t frankly exist as a category in certain relationships. Only opportunities to improve mutual understanding.

Not every role is for everyone. And not everyone is for each role. Part of interviewing, in my opinion, is not only qualifying for fit with the company but also fit with the role. (For solely internally-facing roles, I prefer a let’s get a walk/beer/take a hike together chat.)

Purposely saying something wrong seems a little dishonest, like you are setting a trap. It really sets things off of the wrong foot if your first interaction proves that not only can you conceal your true thoughts and express something that you aren't thinking, and not only are you willing to do it, but on top of it all it doesn't take much motivation before you start. It would be a lot better to wade in to something you honestly didn't know about, so that your expression of not knowing enough to ask good questions was not only completely realistic but also truthful. If you can't think of anything that you don't know enough about to ask good questions, then you either need to evaluate yourself better or get out more. ;)

To see it from another perspective, imagine what your response would be if you found out that someone you were interviewing was pretending to know something they didn't, just because they preferred to work with people smart enough to notice they were faking.

> Purposely saying something wrong seems a little dishonest

I agree. I never proposed that. I said I purposely ask questions the person at hand might consider dumb.

Note that many classic “dumb” questions are actually interesting, if not in their specifics then in why so many people ask them.

> imagine what your response would be if you found out that someone you were interviewing was pretending to know something they didn't

Again, asking dumb questions doesn’t require lying. Everyone goes through a dumb-question asking phase when learning. (I do.) The worst effect of this might be the interviewee walking away thinking me uninformed. Which, if I’m interviewing them, I probably am (relative to them). That’s why they’re being sought! In any case, people thinking I’m dumb is a fair price to pay for a well-tempered executive.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect

A better way to frame this type of question might be "[Important Person X] asks you [Stupid Question Y], how would you respond?"

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