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On 05/08/2002 8:36 PM, S Ryan (sryan -at- sryan -dot- com) wrote:
>I'd certainly give the manager the benefit of the doubt,
>but I don't want to work for anyone who thinks this sort
>of technique really is a Good Idea. But I'm still puzzled.
>Does anybody have any idea what these people are
>thinking? Has this happened to you?
Sort of... I've been hired (contract and full-time) a few times in
situations where I was being brought in to salvage a bad situation left
by a previous writer or writing group. In all of those interviews, the
engineers, managers, etc. who talked to me were obsessive in making sure
I'd handle situations or technology "correctly" that the previous
person/team had screwed up.
That kind of focus in the interview can be revealing... try turning the
tables, and ask why they're asking the question, or why they're asking it
in just that way... have they had a bad experience in the past with
(obsessive situation X)? What do they think went wrong there? If you hear
that they were unhappy with a solution, you can decide whether you think
they were *right* to be unhappy, which will tell you a lot.
Remember, you're interviewing the company exactly as much as they're
interviewing you... it just may not seem that way in a slow job market.
But, having jumped from a bad company to a worse company once or twice in
my life, I've learned to be suspicious of "unusual" interviews and try to
use them.
Hope this helps,
Mike
________________________________________________________________
mstockman -at- aol -dot- com AOL Instant Messenger: MStockman
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