Preparing for an interview – traps

Another article in the cycle on what to do, how to live, how to prepare for an interview.

Although I have already described the preparation for the interview in another post, today I would like to focus on what are the most common mistakes made during the interview. The topic seems to be completely trivial, but more and more anecdotes of what this candidate did at the interview do not come out of nowhere. And worse still, there are more and more of them.

 

Light-mindedness of interlocutors

You are a technical person. You plan to write huge applications, create a perfectly scalable architecture. Squeeze the last juices out of C++. Like Yoda Darth Vader (the dark side has always been more interesting…) solve stack overflow problems. Sure, I understand everything – I still have such plans for the future. But the sooner you understand the basic life truth of IT, that outside the compiler there are other beings involved in your work, the better for you.

You will often have to deal with non-technical persons (or technical persons, but from other areas of specialization) to whom you need to explain this or that phenomenon in simple words, not necessarily using IT slang. Often it will be those responsible strictly HRowo for the recruitment process, which – believe – is not one of the easiest tasks (from here we cordially greet the Girls of The Hidden Heroes).

A very common problem faced by the entire Crew of Dorwij Nerd was the foreign treatment of non-technical people. The recognition that yogi teddy bear is not overwhelmed by anything. That where I have a grandmother from recruitment will duby smalone bredzić about how I solve problems in the team. Przeca I’m a programmer where i’m with these rencoma! [pisownia oczywiście zamierzona] – um, as you put it: you’re in a lost position. Even very technically good candidates have been knocked out by inappropriate behaviour.

To sum up – even if you have an interface in the heavy genre, try your best to suffocate in yourself. Be cultural and treat everyone with due respect – after all, we, people from the IT world, are not the Prometheus of the 21st century. And it’s a pity… Although as if to think deeper, at least we will not be exposed to not very friendly birds.

Unflattering opinion about the previous employer

… euphemistically.

It will be a short paragraph, because it can be summed up in a short sentence. But it will be in a moment. Putting the previous employer in a bad light is, unfortunately, a fairly common feature, most often in the form of putting internal affairs on the light of day. It’s not about saying that I’m changing jobs to work with newer language standards, or that I need new technical challenges – it’s more about saying outright that the previous/other company is bad. How poorly managed it is. How decisions were made were stupid and nonsensical. Even if you had the misfortune to hit the company with such nods – none of the above should fall during the official conversation. How do you make sure your potential future employer doesn’t tell you the same thing about them someday? And that’s where the promised short sentence will fall: never make the dirt from your previous job/third-party job public in an interview. This proves wrong, only and exclusively, about you.

 

Storytelling

Ach, river theme. How many times did the candidates, having not adequately explored the subject, refer to themselves as an expert in the field. And then the recruiter comes in and proves them wrong. Half poverty, if, in the face of logical arguments, the candidate understands his mistake (or recruiter – this is not such a rare situation at all) and withdraws from his ignorance. However, when executing the following piece of code (we assume no compiler optimization, undefined/unspecified/implementation-defined behavior etc.)

int a = 2;
int b = 2;
int c = a + b;

according to the candidate is dependent on the compiler, well… In fact, at such a moment the conversation can be interrupted, mutually thank you for your time and say goodbye. If the recruiter finds that you are wrong and you are not 100% sure of your knowledge, then think twice before going into further disputation.

Maybe I’ll slightly expand my mind: if you’re completely sure of what you know, don’t worry about the recruiter’s different opinion. It is possible that the other side was wrong. However, when you know that you have gaps in your knowledge, it’s just better to admit it. And certainly do not go in the direction of your erroneous thesis. The human thing is to err and there is nothing wrong with admit ignorance. However, being in strange and often illogical assumptions usually provides a red alert for the recruiter. And for you – dear reader – quite a serious obstacle in receiving an offer from a potential employer.

 

Betraying secrets

Before you say that we are writing a guide for agents in the service of her majesty, think about how you talk about previous projects for various clients. Consider whether this project has already seen the light of day. Think for a moment about whether or not you are (yet) covered by a specific NDA. The problem that we often observed was very prosaic – talking about past projects with specific customer names for which these candidates worked. Unless you are working on projects that can be talked about openly (if in doubt, ask your supervisor), the general rule is that it is better to refrain from praising „the project I am implementing will be delivered for XXX”. There is a question of the whole ladder (sub)contractors, where the rules are no longer so restrictive, but working, for example, in a super secret project delivered to a well-known and respectable company DorwijNerda during the conversation better boast about the technologies used and what was actually done. And the customer to call simply a customer.

 

All the rest

Very descriptive, very helpful. Wow.

Well, I did not want to write about talking stupidity already at the level of the headline, so do not do without reading the next few sentences. Forgive. The problem that we have often noticed is very simple – candidates do not realize that in one opinion you can effectively kick yourself in the head. Or shoot himself thirty times in the back. Well, because as otherwise throwing a woe at the board, bragging that the police in Germany are looking for me, therefore, business trips can be a little difficult, or to say directly that the task set is stupid, and its solution is a waste of time. Ok, if you are sure that specific recruiters approach the conversation very informally – it is clear that throwing a joke, moving away from rigid rules is as good as possible (we push ourselves and value very informal conversations). However, if you burn one of the above texts, or something of an even heavier caliber, then do not be surprised that the response after the recruitment process can be negative. Or you may not receive it.

To sum up – mistakes during an interview can happen to anyone. However, appropriate preparation should significantly reduce the risk of their occurrence. Focusing on what we don’t say is as important as what we should emphasize. Because while being confident, knowing the answers to the questions posed by recruiters, we earn the sympathy of people who question us so unfortunately by making one smooth kick in their own head, we can bury the chances of successful recruitment. And I’m sure that’s not your goal.