Tales of the Interview

[Flyer_PE]

My interview for this job was by phone. I called my current boss up and told him it looked like the "Game-Over" lights were flashing at the old company. His response was "Good timing, I was about to give you a call to see if you would be interested in doing some work for us." All that was left was negotiating a rate.

Disclaimer: I had worked for him before and had worked with almost everybody else in the company at one point or another.

 

[Dleg]

It's funny how different jobs have different circumstances. We have a hard time just finding people who are willing to move out here (of course we don't really advertise, either), so when I get someone who is reasonably qualified, my "interview" turns into more of a sales pitch for why they should uproot and move 7,000 miles away. The woman I "interviewed" this morning, for example, is an engineer with an M.S. and 2 years working at EPA in the same field I am looking for (clean air act regulation). My first interview question was "when can you start?"

I hired another engineer a month back on the spot, when she walked in to inquire about jobs (yes, she was actually already living here). And then there was the geologist friend of mine who moved away and then got laid off, I spent the last few months hunting him down and talking him into coming back and taking a job with us - which he is.

That's why when people tell me about these jobs that hundreds of applicants go after, and formal interview techniques, well, I just don't get it. That's so far away from my experience, I can't even imagine how I would deal with reviewing that many resumes, let alone having to suffer through dozens of practiced responses to the "biggest area of weakness" question.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

I bet it is hard to convince people to move out to what many people see as the middle of nowhere. In the states, those islands are generally known only by WWII buffs and then only for the actions that occurred there.