I keep seeing posts on my dash that say “why do job interviewers require that we lie and talk about being interested in the job when they already know the actual answer is ‘I need money and you have it and I’d like you to give some to me?’”
And I just keep wondering if the people saying this and talking about how it’s all a pointless social dance have ever interviewed anyone, or otherwise been in the position of having to select one person out of a larger pool.
I get that the “game” you see is degrading. But there is in fact another side of this and I’m not just pro-capitalist scum for saying so.
That is that in many jobs, maybe not all but many, part of the purpose is to create a team that works together to perform tasks, or perform different aspects of similar tasks.
If the team does not work together at least marginally well, the whole project of working becomes kind of like those projects you do in groups in like 7th grade, where all too often one person does much of the work and the others slack.
That hurts everyone, actually, because it does one of two things. Maybe the hard worker is so amazing that no one notices the general deficiency — but even in that case, the hard worker is likely to burn out or become bitter or otherwise leave. Maybe the hard worker is amazing but it’s impossible she do everything, in which case the whole team and maybe the broader division, department, or entity itself (especially if this is a nonprofit organization or a small business) suffers.
So, at interview, interviewers try to ask questions that help them to determine who among the pool of applicants is most interested in the organization, the job, or its functions. This is all a proxy for trying to find the person who cares enough to do his part to keep things working (and, in magical Christmas land where they get what they really want, maybe even to improve them.)
This is why if your honest answer is “I couldn’t care less, I just am desperate for money right now,” you’re likely to be looked over.
Yes, it does encourage some level of duplicity from a not insignificant number of people. And yes, I think we can talk about that being fucked up.
But just saying it’s a degrading game, as if there is absolutely no reason to it beyond making people squirm, is just really weird to me.
“I just need some money” is not how you group cohesion.
I understand this may be one of the goals, but admittedly it doesn’t do it’s job very well unfortunately.
The main reason people see it that way is because it really doesn’t work at what it’s supposed to do, in fact, most often it backfires entirely and you just get large teams of people that are really good at lying or hiding and just a tiny handful of people that actually work their best. It actively creates a more hostile work environment — and never heard retail go another way from others that have worked it in places with hiring policies like that. That just happens when you make false equivalences for what makes a good worker.
It also has a tendency of building teams with lopsided skill sets, which even in a simple business, like retail you absolutely do not want.
(There’s also the obvious issue of the unnecessary ableism involved in the ways it’s most commonly done, but that exists at every level of the work world, sooo…)
What kinds of questions do you think would be more effective to ask in an interview? Or are you saying none should be?
If none should be, should hiring be first come first served (minus any kind of necessary background check), or should it work a different way?
Should this be true across the board, or should different fields work differently?
Not saying anything about what should be done, only commenting that it isn’t working for the purpose stated and a small and loosely described part of why. Recognizing a problem is the first step only.
These questions are about something huge and complex that is going to need refined solutions that no, one, individual can give you. They are going to depend on the individual needs of the businesses in question, and those needs will even vary by location due to local culture, attitude, population, etc.
The point that was intended was just to explain that it doesn’t work very well for what you’re saying it’s for — and is part of why the problem you described is abundant in the retail world. It actively encourages people to lie, or more directly: it’s targeting a pool of employees that are either willing to lie or have no problems lying as the base and actually removing the majority of honest people from the hiring pool entirely (the majority of people do not genuinely care about major corporate retailers as companies).
Rambling about additional thoughts on those tests under the cut, it’s mostly for the sake of processing, so it’s safe to skip if you’re not interested. [cw: ableism]
“Not saying anything about what should be done, only commenting that it isn’t working for the purpose stated” is exactly the problem I have with a lot of social-justice-issue (using the term quite broadly) types of posts.
I used to be comfortable with “this is the problem” over and over, but over the years I’ve come to feel it’s very much not productive in the ways I personally would need it to be productive in.
I really appreciate your thoughts, and agree with a lot of them — “psych tests” don’t make sense to me either and I don’t think they should be a part of hiring — but I think we may fundamentally disagree in approach.
This is a standard part of problem analysis though, we all go through it. Different people are going to be at different levels within this process, so a level of discourse that may not be useful for you is actually exactly what is needed for others whom are still trying to become familiar with the fact that a problem even exists.
What we are about to say next may feel bitey, but we would like to say it’s coming from a place of having previously experienced the same thoughts and feelings you’re expressing about this kind of problem solving only a few years ago, and is not meant harshly. What you’re saying can be essentially boiled down to that you’ve experienced personal growth and are annoyed everyone else hasn’t caught up yet. You’re treating these stepping stones as though they no longer have value because you no longer need them, and in the process being a bit disrespectful to the people still behind you. We understand the frustration of watching the same problem get talked about forever, but not fixed, but it’s important to treat people whom are still learning and discussing the basic parts of these things with sensitivity and understanding.
There’s also the fact that average NT person has a lot of difficulty shifting their perspective to accept new information without a concept getting the approval of a great many people or people whom hold clout in their cultural hierarchy. So, things being repeated a lot is actually fundamentally important for advocacy and the awareness of the problem becoming part of the cultural pulse and a lot of the fixing can’t actually start till that happens.
trystabackingupherstuff 