Jobless Corner

What was the worst job interview question you were ever asked? Good interview questions can help employers judge the technical qualifications, people skills, problem solving approach, and team fit of prospective employees. Bad interview questions do none of those. Instead, they confuse, irk, or offend the applicant (often in combination). Our ten worst job interview questions exhibit one or more of the following characteristics:

Here are the ten worst job interview questions, along with the characteristics that got them on the list, and some possible rejoinders. Please note that being asked any of these questions should make you seriously consider whether you want to entrust your livelihood and sanity to this organization.

No. 20 - What interests you about our company?

“Um, I heard you were hiring?”

No. 19 - Have you ever brought a lawsuit against an employer?
You can’t ask about this or age, race, health/marital/personal/family issues, and arrests, among other things. You have a choice of responses to this one. You can use the old, boring “I don’t think that’s an appropriate question” line, or you can allow the interviewer to save face with something like “No, but I’m always open to new experiences”.

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You are sitting in the reception area waiting to be called back for your interview for a job you really want. Many thoughts are running through your head, some of these may include; How do I look? Will they like me? What questions are they going to ask? How prepared am I for this interview?

The vast majority of job seekers admit to emotions ranging from mild uneasiness to downright panic leading up to their interviews. The good news is there have been no reported cases of job seekers who died of nervousness during a job interview. So relax and follow these simple tips for keeping your anxiety at bay before and during your interview.

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Ever heard of that small company called Google? Well, I came across the co-founder’s résumé that really impressed me and I thought I would share it with you guys. We all know how much we have struggled to come up with impressive résumés. I have personally spent a lot of time designing and re-designing the layout of my résumé before each application that I consider myself a master of creative résumés (watch this corner)

I have a tendancy of trying to find out what exactly prompted my interviewers to grant me an interview and most of them predominantly say that they picked me because of the layout of my résumé. Now that does not mean that I am a nut head, but you should put some time and consideration into the appearance of your layout. The other important factor to put into consideration is the way you can word your résumé to sell your key skills. I guess if you have a résumé similar to his today, you may end up being worth US $ 18 billion in 10 years time.

NB - Its less than 2 pages.

Sergey Brin
Computer Science Department,
Stanford University,
Stanford, CA 94305
(415)723-9273
sergey@cs.stanford.edu

Education

September 1993 - Present: Stanford University, Computer Science Department

• Ph.D.: expected June 1997.
• M.S.: received August 1995.
• Advisor: Professor Hector Garcia-Molina.

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Through out our working lives, we are going to have at least 3 different careers and as a result, school students need not stress about making the “right” career choice. Any career path you choose that helps you build valuable skills is “right” whether it is also right for life or for just for three to five years (e.g. customer service skills, basic computer skills, teamwork, the ability to sell or even to persuade others and communication skills are used in nearly every job).

Key skills required
What really matters in these formative years is the process of building inter-personal skills which are used in every position at the ‘office’. For example, accountants should be good with numbers but they also have to talk to clients so people skills and strong verbal and written communication skills are very important.

Who else needs to be good with people? Wow, how long a list could I write? Pretty much every job you can think of from nurses, police officers, and entertainers to ski instructors, teachers, lawyers, builders, security guards and hospitality workers.

If you decide after a few years to then build on those skills or change direction completely and retrain you will have created a solid foundation from which to work.

So how do school students get career ideas?
Research shows that most people still get their career ideas from their mum and dad. Others stumble across a career idea while reading a book, watching a movie or surfing the net. Your career teacher at school can introduce you to a world of ideas. I got my career idea from my Aunt (she used to work weekends and would take me with her. To keep me occupied, she would let me play PC games while she typed away – Thanks Aunt ).
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Want to be an instant babe or chick magnet? Just tell your date you’re an actor, nurse or personal trainer.

Australia’s sexiest jobs list shows we like our women kind and buff, and our men beefy with a wallet to match.

For women, acting is the hottest job on the block, a poll of more than 500 singles for dating site RSVP revealed today.

The celebrity appeal of hotties such as Angelina Jolie has seen actors knock perennial favourite nurses off the top spot.

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