The interviewer offered me the job at about half the salary I was making before. I mean, I was really more embarrassed for the interviewer/company owner. It wasn’t quite like the montage of TJ Miller “negging” all the VC firms in HBO’s Silicon Valley. But he could tell that I had zero interest in moving forward and just wanted to leave before wasting any more time.
Another was I showed up to the interview and they forgot that it was scheduled. I spend 30 minutes getting shuffled around the building until finally I just went home. The recruiter called back later but I told them it was too late.
I almost did the same thing because I vaguely knew that some Southwest state didn’t celebrate Daylight Saving Time but didn’t remember it was Arizona. Only the clock in the lobby of the hotel I was at put me straight.
I was living in Philly, but eager to move back to western Pennsylvania. I woke up early on a Saturday and drove six hours for an interview with the owner of the business. He took me to an expensive restaurant and we discussed the job over dinner.
I was offered the job before dessert arrived. I explained that I was seriously interested, but had already scheduled another interview for the following Saturday. He agreed to wait to hear from me.
The check came. His credit card was declined. Awkward. I passed my card to the waitress and paid the check.
The rest of the story: [spoiler]Later that week I recieved reimbursement in the mail, along with a copy of a letter from his credit card people explaining the details of the problem. Apparently he had considered several large purchases, but did not complete any of them, yet his card treated the inquiries as purchases and considered him way overdrawn.
I took the other job, but not due to the mixup.[/spoiler]
Embarrassing not for something I did, but just because it was a weird situation…
I had an interview with a company wherein I would do some writing for them. The guy interviewing me was explaining their process and used a random thing in the room to represent a product of theirs. In between us happened to be a bowl filled with random artsy crap, so he used that.
“Let’s say the product is…(looking around)…um (sees the bowl)…blue balls.”
He proceeds to giggle like a schoolboy for 30 seconds and then re-giggles every time he says “blue balls.”
Later in the interview my internship came up. I was by myself in Alabama for a summer and I was saying it wasn’t too bad because I had the MLB.com package and could watch the Brewers when they were playing. He proceeds to say “Oh yeah. Well, that and internet porn amirite?”.
I was stunned. All I could do was nod knowingly and all I said “erm…yeah obviously that too”. That was the weirdest interview experience ever. I ended up not getting the job.
Ms. Cups actually had one yesterday. She’s WELL into the job search thing, which means applying for jobs you can only kinda-sorta do in the hopes of landing anything. She was called for a job she isn’t wholly qualified for, and not only did the interviewer act as if this is the first time he’s ever read her resume, but once it was clear that she wasn’t the person for the job he said “Well we are really looking for someone with a lot of experience here, if we decide to ratchet down our expectations we’ll keep you in mind.” How rude!
I once had an okay interview with an organization of US state governments. So, and this is important, the job was all about states.
As I was leaving, I was a bit hyped/nervous, and therefore talking too much. Trying to show my knowledge of state issues, I foolishly raised a specific current event related to, um…North Carolina? Part of the way through my commentary, I realized I wasn’t sure if it was North or South Carolina.
The section of my brain responsible for controlling the words that came out of my mouth went into shut-down mode. That half-way intelligent section could only listen in horror as I babbled on, “Oh wait…did I mean North or South Carolina? Actually, I can’t remember now. Oh well, who cares…North Carolina, South Carolina, it’s all the same to most people, right? Oh geez, I guess I’m not going to get this job, am I?”
My interviewer managed to smile politely at me as I turned and ran away, but you won’t be surprised to know that I did NOT get the job.
In an interview I was being asked about my references. I was give a little bio about each one and why I chose them as my references. One of my references was a brilliant programmer I worked with; and I even said in the interview, something like “you’d never go wrong with this guy on your team!”
Yep, you see where this is going. I called my buddy after the interview to let him know that I used him as a reference and he said; “Oh yeah, I just interviewed there this morning.”
:smack:
I don’t interrupt people when they’re talking. I had an interview with a guy who just kept talking. He never asked a question. After about 30 minutes of him talking he said, “You haven’t said a single word.” I said, “You talked a lot but you haven’t asked a question.” He showed me the door. Silently.
Ouch 
Maybe 10 years ago, I was interviewing for a job I really wasn’t qualified for (chem lab manager at a local college.) I have a degree in chemistry but hadn’t been able to find that kind of work after graduating, and this was about 7-8 years after graduating. I only applied to shut up certain family members and I was almost certain they wouldn’t bother calling me back when they saw my resume. I honestly don’t know why they bothered interviewing me.
Neither did they, apparently. The head of the chem dept and one of the professors did the interview. At one point the dept head asked why I hadn’t pursued an advanced degree, and when I started to answer she said “I’m not really interested in your reasons.”
I realize now that I should have just stood up and thanked her for her time and left, but I was determined to power through.
After the interview those two and another professor took me on a tour of the labs. After about 5 minutes the dept head mumbled something about having to take a phone call and vanished, and she didn’t even reappear at the end to say thanks for playing. The two professors were very nice and almost apologetic, and I cried on the way home.
Way back in my 20s, I was working full-time but decided to look for a part-time side job. My younger sister was working at Target, and told me they were hiring, so I figured I’d try there.
I put on a nice pair of pants, a dress shirt, and a tie, and went down and requested an application. The lady handed me an application, along with a ball-point pen. I sat down at a nearby desk and proceeded to fill out the application, but used my own pen. Yes, I had brought my own. I had seen numerous job applicants at previous jobs who would show up, ask for an application, and then ask for a pen, and I just always thought that made them look unprepared. (Yes, this is important.)
Whilst filling out the application, another applicant came in, a teenager. He had arrived to ask for a job wearing jeans and a T-shirt. (Again, this is important.)
I finished filling out the application and returned it to the lady who would be interviewing me, whereupon I discovered that I really should have used the pen she gave me. She immediately called attention to the fact that I had used black ink. She explained that they preferred blue ink because it made it easier to distinguish between the original document and the photocopies. Mind blown! I was already pretty much settled into my restaurant career, and restaurants don’t usually have photocopiers, so the idea that they would need to photocopy my application never occurred to me. Lesson learned!
Nevertheless, she interviewed me. After a few standard questions about prior work experience, she asked what turned out to be the fatal question. If she had worded it differently, it may have gone better for me, but I imagine she was reading from an official corporate list of questions (I was accustomed to interviewing with small, local businesses):
“Why should I hire you over other candidates?”
The question immediately brought to my mind the image of the only other candidate I had seen: the (in my mind) inappropriately-dressed teenager. And I blurted out, “Well, I’m wearing this tie.”
:smack:
The most embarrassing thing to happen to me actually happened before the interview. I was early so I decided to stop at a shopping center behind where the interview was. With about five minutes to spare I suddenly realize that there’s a ditch between me and the building. The ditch looked dry and fairly shallow so I shrugged and made my way across. Of course the bottom of the ditch was covered in mud and I ended up getting it all over my shoes. I was able to clean most of it off in the bathroom while getting mud all over the floor… I kind of feel sorry for whoever had to clean that bathroom that night. Didn’t get the job BTW. I’m not sure if it was because of that or because they gave me one of those personality tests.
Nothing super embarrassing, except that I’ve discovered that it’s a really good idea to get a good night’s sleep before a job interview. Which, by their nature, is often difficult.
I had one interview for a one year teaching spot where the interview corresponded with crush time for a programming project. Stayed up late trying to solve an issue so I wasn’t at my best and brightest during the interview. At one point, he professor interviewing me showed me some teaching materials related to the Halting Problem, one of the Godel Escher Bach things where you can fox the system by feeding it an input specially tailored to create a paradox – something like “This system will only halt if the machine says it doesn’t halt when reading this sentence.” Needless to say, on not enough sleep, it’s hard to make an intelligent comment about this kind of logical trickiness. So I just nodded sagely, but I got the distinct sense that I was supposed to say something meaningful. They went with someone else.
On another interview, I had lunch with the manager of the group, but I had to travel for the interview and there were delays and I never sleep well in a hotel, so I’m sure it was obvious that I was dozing off while she talked. Fortunately, by that time, I’d decided I wasn’t that interested in the job. Interestingly enough, months later, long after I’d decided I’d never hear from them again, they called me up and offered me the job.
A case of “reflective embarrassment”.
I was interviewing for an academic position. Early in the day I had a meeting with the dept. chair. He asked me about teaching certain classes. Classes that were outside my area. I had to point out what my area was. Something clearly stated in the first sentence of my cover letter and on my resume.
(I had written a paper once that got fairly well known and is cited in books in the other area. But I never actually worked directly in that area.)
So, he was embarrassed, I was embarrassed by his embarrassment, etc. The rest of the day was a waste of everybody’s time since they weren’t looking for someone in my area.
I flew across the country (literally!) for a job interview. The search committee took me to dinner the evening I arrived; it was a pleasant, chatty meal . . .then the bill came.
It’s common academic job interview etiquette that the committee pays for the candidate’s dinner. Not at this school – after a very painful pause, the chairman asked “aren’t you going to pay for your dinner?” Alas, I didn’t have cash on me and had to borrow $20.00 from him to pay my share.
Chairguy picked me up the next morning at the hotel and the first thing out of his mouth was “do you have that $20 I loaned you last night?”
Humiliating and weird . . . I was offered the job, but this episode so poisoned the well I declined.
You’ve gotta name the school!
Please?!
I had an interview with an engineering firm in Houston, and the plan was I would talk to a few people in the morning, then they’d take me to lunch, then I’d talk to one more manager. Morning was fine, then lunch was at Amigo’s, part of a Tex-Mex chain here, and it was fine; I had a decent plate of chicken enchiladas. However after lunch, I was talking to the last manager and was not feeling my best. I’m sure I was also not sounding my best talking to him, since I was distracted by the weird things my stomach was doing. But at some point I basically yelled “excuse me!” ran out of the office, ran to the thankfully not far bathroom, and threw up everything I had just eaten. Miraculously, after that I felt much better and was able to finish the rest of the interview without much trouble, though I have no idea what he thought of me. I never heard back from that company.
I’ve never dozed off in an interview, but I’ve had trouble with yawning a few times. I remember one interviewer in particular being insulted and asked if he was boring me. After that, I’ve figured out a way to somewhat yawn with my mouth closed if I feel a yawn coming, although I’m sure it makes my face look weird and I don’t know if it’s better or worse than just yawning.
Well . . . since it has been 12 years: Minnesota State U. :rolleyes:
About 20 years ago one if the biggest employers in the county was a company called Danka. They had billboards all over the place with pictures of wild animals and different nature scenes and no text except the company name. I was very excited to see they had an ad in the classifieds for customer service and while I couldn’t imagine what customer service had to do with that kind of company I eagerly set up an interview. When we got to the part of the interview where I was asked why I wanted to work there I rambled on about my love of animals and nature, blah blah blah. The interviewer then explained that Danka was a copy machine distributor and the position was for the supplies dept. call center:smack: I didn’t even know what toner was. Amazingly, she didn’t offer me the job because I was over qualified and instead recommended me to the manager of another dept who did hire me. It was a great place to work for many years until it went under.
I came very, very close to pronouncing “human faces” as “human feces.”
Most embarrassing thing: Probably when I was interviewing for a sort of network infrastructure position supporting an oil & gas trading floor in Houston, and got asked whether I should use TCP or UDP for a particular problem.
My mind blanked out and I reacted about like Ralphie when Santa asked him what he wanted for Christmas. “Uh… TCP?” when in fact, I knew it was UDP, but the brain wasn’t working.
So there I was looking like a total moron (TCP vs UDP is super-basic kind of stuff for that sort of position). At least I got a free lunch out of the deal.
I interviewed at an electronics design company for a technician job. The interview went normally until the very end when they handed me a “survey” to fill out.
They parked me at a workbench in the corner of the shop floor to fill out the survey. It turned out it was an extremely creepy 50’s era psych profile survey that seemed tailored to detect communist spies. It asked many questions about homosexual tendencies, “secret thoughts”, revenge fantasies, religious affiliations…real J Edgar Hoover stuff.
While taking the survey, I noticed that there were double doors next to the desk slightly opened. Through the crack of the door hinge, someone was peeking through watching me take the survey. I looked them straight in the eye, heard them “eep”, and run away down the hall.
About 5 minutes later, I looked up again and they had quietly snuck back to the door jam and were peeking through at me again. I got up, walked out, taking their commie survey with me.