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A comment on A list of lists of interview questions. Parent comment

Re:A list of lists of interview questions by whatshisface on Monday December 31, 2018 @02:39AM (#18793540)
Purposely saying something wrong seems a little dishonest, like you are setting a trap. It really sets things off of the wrong foot if your first interaction proves that not only can you conceal your true thoughts and express something that you aren't thinking, and not only are you willing to do it, but on top of it all it doesn't take much motivation before you start. It would be a lot better to wade in to something you honestly didn't know about, so that your expression of not knowing enough to ask good questions was not only completely realistic but also truthful. If you can't think of anything that you don't know enough about to ask good questions, then you either need to evaluate yourself better or get out more. ;)

To see it from another perspective, imagine what your response would be if you found out that someone you were interviewing was pretending to know something they didn't, just because they preferred to work with people smart enough to notice they were faking.

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Re:A list of lists of interview questions by JumpCrisscross on Monday December 31, 2018 @03:12AM (#18793617)
> Purposely saying something wrong seems a little dishonest

I agree. I never proposed that. I said I purposely ask questions the person at hand might consider dumb.

Note that many classic “dumb” questions are actually interesting, if not in their specifics then in why so many people ask them.

> imagine what your response would be if you found out that someone you were interviewing was pretending to know something they didn't

Again, asking dumb questions doesn’t require lying. Everyone goes through a dumb-question asking phase when learning. (I do.) The worst effect of this might be the interviewee walking away thinking me uninformed. Which, if I’m interviewing them, I probably am (relative to them). That’s why they’re being sought! In any case, people thinking I’m dumb is a fair price to pay for a well-tempered executive.

[1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning–Kruger_effect

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