The 8 unlikely job interview questions asked by major corporations
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Redoubtable and dreaded, some job interview questions put candidates in difficulty despite rigorous preparation and great motivation to join the company!
Generally, we prepare for the rather standard questions asked in interviews about our qualities and faults, our motivations, our past experience... That was without counting on the giants Google, Amazon or even Tesla, to name but a few, who like to ask their future employees unlikely questions.
But in reality, these questions enable these companies to assess the candidate's ability to "think outside the box", his sense of repartee and deduction or simply hislogic.
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Here are 8 unlikely big-group job interview questions:
Google
At Google career, the ability to think "out of the box" is extolled by recruiters. To verify this in candidates, they are asked a seemingly innocuous question:
"A man drove his car into a hotel and lost a fortune. What happened?" |
The answer is funny, and you might think it's self-evident! But that doesn't mean it's obvious: he was playing Monopoly!
Amazon
"How would you react if you found out your closest friend had stolen something from work?" |
Do you think this question is disingenuous? So do we!
2 possibilities:
- Recruiters want to see how loyal you are to the company,
- They want to see how supportive you are with your colleagues.
In both cases, play the transparency card with both your colleague and the company!
Facebook
This is one of Facebook's most popular questions:
"This is your best day at work, the kind of day that makes you go home and say you've got the best job in the world. What did you do on this day?" |
Although there's no right or wrong answer, recruiters are waiting to see if you're in tune with the company values.
Audacity, risk-taking, rapidité or transparency must appear in your answer if you want to have a chance of continuing the recruitment process.
Apple
If you were a pizza delivery boy, what could you use a pair of scissors for? |
And no, you're not dreaming, this question was indeed asked during an interview at Apple ! But what kind of response can the recruiter expect?
He wants to see your resourcefulness and imagination. Feel free to come up with an answer as wacky as the question, but be careful not to overstep the bounds of beautiful!
Microsoft
This deceptively simple question is often asked of software developers who want to work at Microsoft:
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"How many times does the minute hand cross the hour hand in a 24-hour day?" |
No chance of getting through this question unscathed if you don't have a mathematical mind! Indeed, the answer seems obvious and in the rush we'd tend to answer "24".
In reality, the correct number is 22.
Explanations:
- The first time the two hands cross on a typical day is at 00:00.
Then at 1:05, 2:11, 3:16, 4:22, 5:27, 6:33, 7:38, 8:44, 9:49 and 10:55.
The hour hand doesn't stay stuck on its digit and moves along with the minute hand. They therefore never meet between 11 and 12 o'clock.
The two hands meet 11 times between 00:00 and 11:59.
- The next superposition won't take place until the next cycle, at 12:00.
Then on to 13:05, 14:11, 15:16, 16:22, 17:27, 18:33, 19:38, 20:44, 21:49 and 22:55, a further 11 times.
As they don't meet after 11pm and midnight marks the start of a new day, the two hands cross 22 times.
IBM
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"How will you weigh an elephant without using scales?" |
En ask him? Joking aside, the answer most often heard on the web is this:
I immerse the elephant in a swimming pool and note how much the water rises. Then simply multiply that volume by the elephant's specific mass.
Tesla
To find out if the candidate has embellished his CV, Elon Musk would have a foolproof method by systematically asking the same question:
"What were the biggest problems you faced and how did you solve them? " |
By asking for precise details on something so personal, Elon Musk would thus succeed in exposing liars.
There's another, wackier question that the creator of Tesla and Space X likes to ask candidates:
"You are on the surface of the Earth. You walk a mile south, a mile west, a mile north and then you're back where you started. Where on Earth are you?" |
And you, what would you have answered to these questions?
