Interview Hell Hall of Fame

Now that I’ve been off the interview circuit for nearly two full months, I thought it was time to look back and make my selections for the Interview Hell Hall of Fame.

The first nod goes to an advertising agency that I interviewed with in December of 2009. I arrived at the office about 15 minutes early for my 9AM interview, and got busy filling out the paperwork that the receptionist gave me. (Hooray – an employment application! That must mean that there’s actually a job!) A few minutes later, my HR contact came to get me. As we strolled from the elevator, she informed me that I was going to take a brief test – an assessment if you will. Nothing to worry about she assured me. This was the same test that they had undergraduate analysts take. She was sure that I would do quite well. (If you’re so sure, then why do I still have to take this stupid test?) She got me settled into the test room (an empty office), and explained the logistics. I would have three hours (what happened to brief?!) to take the three part test. The first section was an Excel test, the second was a very short marketing case question, and the third section was composed of a couple of brainteasers. I immediately realized that I had not consumed enough coffee to prepare me for the morning that I was going to have.

I quickly read through all three parts, and determined that the Excel section would require the lion’s share of my efforts. I had seen both of the brainteasers before in trading interviews (ha!) and I was going to be able to easily answer the shit out of the marketing case question thanks to my good friends, the 4 P’s and the 3 C’s.

Resigning myself to the unpleasant task at hand, I opened the Excel assessment to find an unformatted spreadsheet with sales data for a theoretical retailer. My job was to summarize the retailer’s business performance over the past year, noting high points and low points, as well as make recommendations for the upcoming holiday season. Please note that said performance summaries and recommendations were to be put into a short Power Point deck. And the company was still running Office 2003, not 2007 (aka the version that I am better versed in). Ugh.

I scrolled through the sales data, and sat in momentary panic for a moment. I briefly entertained the idea of walking out, but I soon thought better of it. I told myself to man up, and I began my analysis in earnest. I pivot tabled away, and soon a clear picture of the retailer’s performance began to emerge. I sketched out a short deck on paper, and then began to put together the actual deck in Power Point. Unfortunately, I soon found myself in the middle of a no-holds-barred brawl with the Chart Wizard. What was wrong with the charting functionality in 2003? Why wouldn’t it behave nicely like the 2007 version? One thing was for sure: I wanted to kick that machine.

After wringing my hands for a few moments, I realized that I didn’t have enough time to turn in a deck with both quality content and stylish formatting. I made the game time decision to focus on content. Thus decided on the “basic” approach, I quickly pounded out a deck and turned my attention to the next section.

The marketing case was really a very simple product launch question. It was clearly no match for an MBA who had mastered the 4 P’s and 3 C’s. I got to work and in no time, I had concisely answered the question and made it my bitch.

Last section. First brainteaser: how many cats are there in the United States? The actual number isn’t what’s important; what they want to see is the logic I use to come to a solution. There are approximately 115 million households in the United States. I decided to assume that a certain percentage of households had cats, and out of that percentage, some had a single cat while others had multiple cats. In addition, I had to account for strays; I did so by assuming that the stray cat population actually outnumbered the adopted cat population. In layman's terms, I multiplied the adopted cat population by two to reach my final answer. (If I wanted to get cute, I could have noted the correlation between the number of single women and cats, but I decided not to go that route.) My assumptions were laid out so I just did a couple of quick calculations and presto, I had the cat population. Suffice it to say, some of my assumptions were off, but I thought my approach was valid. (Approximately 32% of households own cat(s)? Dang, I thought the number would be a lot lower.)

Second brainteaser: You have a balance scale and nine balls. All of the balls are identical, but one of the balls is heavier than the others. What is the minimum number of times that you would have to use the scale to find the heavier ball?

Thank you trading. You are about to save me a lot of time and brainpower. Two. Final answer. (Place 3 balls on each side of the scale and put 3 aside. If the scale balances, you know that the heavier ball is in the set sitting off to the side. If the scale doesn’t balance, you know that the heavier ball is in the set that is heavier on the scale. One you’ve narrowed it down to 3 balls, then place one on each side of the scale, and put one aside. The logic is the same as above.)

Incredibly happy to be done, I turned my test in. I had more interviews in the afternoon, but first it was lunch time. Unfortunately for me, it was a working lunch. To be clear, every time that you interact with someone from the company during the application process, it is an interview; that being said, was it really that crazy of me to assume that I’d actually get to eat during lunch? An analyst took me out for lunch at a nearby restaurant, but she couldn’t stop asking questions. She did not relent for the entire time that we were out, so I wound up trying to cram food into my mouth during the 5 second pause between questions. I was in famished super bitch mode at this point so I really did not appreciate the speed eating game. And I forgot to mention: I was the only one attempting to eat at lunch. We were running short on time (meaning 45 minutes instead of a full hour for lunch) so the analyst ordered her food to go after I ordered my food. Awesome. Thanks for making me eat by myself.

More or less sufficiently nourished, I returned to the office. I made the rounds and met with four different managers. I told them all about times when I had exhibited leadership and handled conflict on a team. At the end of my day, I debriefed with the HR manager who assured me that they would make a decision soon, but probably not until after the holidays. Fair enough. What was the outcome you ask? I heard nothing from this company for a full month, and then in mid-January, they had me come in for another round of interviews. After round two, I heard nothing. I called and emailed the recruiter but received no response. Finally at the end of February, I got a call from the recruiter thanking me for my time but telling me that they had decided the hire an undergrad instead. Cheaper labor, you know.

More Hall of Fame selections to come...