5 ms·

Two years ago, I had a similar experience with Chainlink. I underwent hours of interviews and completed an extensive work assignment, only to be offered the job

Two years ago, I had a similar experience with Chainlink. I underwent hours of interviews and completed an extensive work assignment, only to be offered the job _after a personality test_. Simultaneously, I interviewed at a startup. There, I spent about an hour discussing my experience and providing feedback on their current system with the person who would become my manager. I chose the startup, and it has been the best job decision I've ever made. Personality tests can disclose a lot of personal information. It's unclear where this data might end up or who might have access to it. I detest this practice and consider it a major red flag. (edit: typos)

Beijinger 3y ago
This reminds me when I tried incredibly hard to get a tiny scholarship to study abroad in country X and got rejected. In fact, there were several rounds and I didn't even make the first one. My Prof. told me to go to country Y and I hesitated because of the immense administrative burden to apply again and since I was de facto not qualified for a postgraduate scholarship. But application was easy, I got it, and they stuffed me with money. I always remember the words of my Professor: "Don't you know that everything where you have to invest a lot (I assume effort, time, money, energy) nothing ever comes out? So if your IT job requires a letter of recommendation from the pope and even if you are able to get the letter, you are unlikely to get the job. :-)
- jstarfish 3y ago
  Corollary experience: the more effort/time/money/energy you expend in a successful transaction, the more likely it is they'll impose a shitty condition at the end of it, expecting you to be too invested to challenge it.
  - shermantanktop 3y ago
    Weaponizing the sunk cost fallacy, once again. Just like a time-share condo pitch.
- namaria 3y ago
  This reminds me of an investment maxim that has helped me a lot over the years: You don't make a profit on the sell price. You make a profit on the buy price. That's something I lot of people seem to not understand about investment, it's not about how high something can go. That's random chance. It's about how deep a discount you can find on something valuable. If you can't estimate what something might be worth, you're not investing, you're making a bet on things you don't understand.
ipsento606 3y ago
> Personality tests can disclose a lot of personal information In my experience the only thing personality tests disclose is how good the testee is at guessing which answers will be viewed most favorably
- pbae 3y ago
  IQ test with extra steps.
- everybodyknows 3y ago
  When a measure becomes a target ...
- nerdbert 3y ago
  I assumed that's the point - can you see things like a "normal" person does?
  - datavirtue 3y ago
    This guy gets it.
  - nitwit005 3y ago
    These tests usually don't have a "normal" outcome, as they are intended to group people into categories.
    - kqr 3y ago
      Normal was a bad choice of words. "How well are you able to empathise with the organisation" might be a better phrasing.
      - red-iron-pine 3y ago
        how well are you able to guess what the test wants you to say, and game the system? i remember doing these like 20 years ago when i got out out of the military and just needed a bartending job. corp chain, had you take a bunch like "if I see an employee slacking off I'm 1) very offended, 2) slightly offended, 3) indifferent, 4) okay with it, or 5) very okay with it it was obvious what answer they wanted, and empathy had nothing to do with it
bloqs 3y ago
Personality tests are screening principally if you are Conscientious and Agreeable. The hack is: Suggest you answer every question to imply you are orderly, hardworking, calm, stable and cooperative with others.
- mewpmewp2 3y ago
  Weren't disagreeable people more successful though?
  - curtisblaine 3y ago
    For themselves, not the organization they work in.
    - lazide 3y ago
      Notably, organizations are almost always led by disagreeable folks. It’s a pain in the ass to lead disagreeable people. Agreeable people are often terrible leaders, as they’ll as often lead a team off a cliff as say no. Or be unable to actually drive action among a group of disagreeing people. leading often requires coming up with your own answer based on the circumstances you’re seeing - someone can’t ‘agree’ their way out of that. That said, someone too disagreeable will just cause friction and internal issues all the time for no value add. Disagreeing with the right/proper thing to do is just being a pain in ass for the sake of being a pain in the ass. Usually, the organization has settled on a middle ground somewhere for each level of it’s hierarchy. Very top down organizations usually need very agreeable ‘bottom’ layers to do the grunt work. It has predictable consequences - good and bad. There is a reason why militaries pride themselves on ‘breaking down’/‘rebuilding’ people in basic. And why officers almost always go through a separate process.
      - bloqs 3y ago
        All completely true. Neuroticism seems to be the most complex one for leaders...
WalterBright 3y ago
> Personality tests can disclose a lot of personal information. Only if you want it to. Answer in a way that suits your purpose.
hinkley 3y ago
Part of being a grownup is coming around to the fact that if someone you just met clearly doesn't trust you, that's 95% about their issues, not yours. Then it becomes a question not of whether you're 'worthy' of a job with these people, but whether you really want to walk into a place that is telegraphing this much paranoia. I don't know how to gracefully bow out of the middle of an interview and I wish I did. What I do know is how to sandbag an interview, and I'm sure there are a few people out there who have poor opinions of me that are the direct result of my poor opinion of them. Places with calm confidence during the interview process may be their own kind of delusional, but they may also be really great places to work, with a good sense of teamwork.
- HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
  > I don't know how to gracefully bow out of the middle of an interview "Hey, thanks for taking the time to talk to me, guys, but I don't think this is a good fit. Let's cut our losses and give each other some time back. Bye." Get up and walk out.
- PH95VuimJjqBqy 3y ago
  > Part of being a grownup is coming around to the fact that if someone you just met clearly doesn't trust you, that's 95% about their issues, not yours. Trust is earned, not given. part of the reason you feel as if you can trust them is because you don't have to trust them _fully_. You're protected by the system, life circumstances, etc. Put another way, it's easy for me to trust that someone I don't know will pay back the $20 they just borrowed because if they don't the damage to me is minimal, it's a hell of a lot harder for me to trust that someone will pay back $20k that they borrowed. If someone isn't showing the level of trust you would expect it's generally two things. 1. That person is themselves untrustworthy and they view the world as if everyone is like them, or 2. That person doesn't feel as safe and protected by the systems in place as you do. Sometimes due to general anxiety, sometimes due to life experiences, etc. Even someone in category 2 may show themselves to be untrustworthy because they're going to cross you due to a perceived slight or as a means of protecting themselves so 1 & 2 can often blend together. But make no mistake, you don't trust them either, you just know they can't truly hurt you so it's safe to assume they're trustworthy. Trust is earned over time, not given. For a personal anecdote, there's a developer here who had major problems with me, it got heated a few times to the point we both had to walk away from the conversation. He just took everything I said in such a negative light. We would talk it out and then it would happen again. And then it came out that he had medication for anxiety, my gf of 12 years has anxiety too so I understand it better than most I suspect. Once I had that understanding I approached him differently and we have a great relationship now. Some if it was serious heart-to-heart conversations, some of it was my behavior changes. That combination and time has earned me his trust and earned him my trust. He'll very publicly challenge me and I never take it personally, I'll publicly challenge him and he doesn't take it personally either. Sometimes he'll contact me directly and tell me something I said looked bad to others and he helps me keep a lifeline into the team as a whole (I'm an architect). I'm not saying it's all sunshine and roses but it's definitely a good working relationship now. I say this just to say be careful of dismissing people outright. Sometimes you have to but make sure you have to before you do.

Beijinger 3y ago

This reminds me when I tried incredibly hard to get a tiny scholarship to study abroad in country X and got rejected. In fact, there were several rounds and I didn't even make the first one. My Prof. told me to go to country Y and I hesitated because of the immense administrative burden to apply again and since I was de facto not qualified for a postgraduate scholarship. But application was easy, I got it, and they stuffed me with money. I always remember the words of my Professor: "Don't you know that everything where you have to invest a lot (I assume effort, time, money, energy) nothing ever comes out? So if your IT job requires a letter of recommendation from the pope and even if you are able to get the letter, you are unlikely to get the job. :-)

jstarfish 3y ago
Corollary experience: the more effort/time/money/energy you expend in a successful transaction, the more likely it is they'll impose a shitty condition at the end of it, expecting you to be too invested to challenge it.
- shermantanktop 3y ago
  Weaponizing the sunk cost fallacy, once again. Just like a time-share condo pitch.
namaria 3y ago
This reminds me of an investment maxim that has helped me a lot over the years: You don't make a profit on the sell price. You make a profit on the buy price. That's something I lot of people seem to not understand about investment, it's not about how high something can go. That's random chance. It's about how deep a discount you can find on something valuable. If you can't estimate what something might be worth, you're not investing, you're making a bet on things you don't understand.

ipsento606 3y ago

> Personality tests can disclose a lot of personal information In my experience the only thing personality tests disclose is how good the testee is at guessing which answers will be viewed most favorably

pbae 3y ago
IQ test with extra steps.
everybodyknows 3y ago
When a measure becomes a target ...
nerdbert 3y ago
I assumed that's the point - can you see things like a "normal" person does?
- datavirtue 3y ago
  This guy gets it.
- nitwit005 3y ago
  These tests usually don't have a "normal" outcome, as they are intended to group people into categories.
  - kqr 3y ago
    Normal was a bad choice of words. "How well are you able to empathise with the organisation" might be a better phrasing.
    - red-iron-pine 3y ago
      how well are you able to guess what the test wants you to say, and game the system? i remember doing these like 20 years ago when i got out out of the military and just needed a bartending job. corp chain, had you take a bunch like "if I see an employee slacking off I'm 1) very offended, 2) slightly offended, 3) indifferent, 4) okay with it, or 5) very okay with it it was obvious what answer they wanted, and empathy had nothing to do with it

bloqs 3y ago

Personality tests are screening principally if you are Conscientious and Agreeable. The hack is: Suggest you answer every question to imply you are orderly, hardworking, calm, stable and cooperative with others.

mewpmewp2 3y ago
Weren't disagreeable people more successful though?
- curtisblaine 3y ago
  For themselves, not the organization they work in.
  - lazide 3y ago
    Notably, organizations are almost always led by disagreeable folks. It’s a pain in the ass to lead disagreeable people. Agreeable people are often terrible leaders, as they’ll as often lead a team off a cliff as say no. Or be unable to actually drive action among a group of disagreeing people. leading often requires coming up with your own answer based on the circumstances you’re seeing - someone can’t ‘agree’ their way out of that. That said, someone too disagreeable will just cause friction and internal issues all the time for no value add. Disagreeing with the right/proper thing to do is just being a pain in ass for the sake of being a pain in the ass. Usually, the organization has settled on a middle ground somewhere for each level of it’s hierarchy. Very top down organizations usually need very agreeable ‘bottom’ layers to do the grunt work. It has predictable consequences - good and bad. There is a reason why militaries pride themselves on ‘breaking down’/‘rebuilding’ people in basic. And why officers almost always go through a separate process.
    - bloqs 3y ago
      All completely true. Neuroticism seems to be the most complex one for leaders...

WalterBright 3y ago

> Personality tests can disclose a lot of personal information. Only if you want it to. Answer in a way that suits your purpose.

hinkley 3y ago

Part of being a grownup is coming around to the fact that if someone you just met clearly doesn't trust you, that's 95% about their issues, not yours. Then it becomes a question not of whether you're 'worthy' of a job with these people, but whether you really want to walk into a place that is telegraphing this much paranoia. I don't know how to gracefully bow out of the middle of an interview and I wish I did. What I do know is how to sandbag an interview, and I'm sure there are a few people out there who have poor opinions of me that are the direct result of my poor opinion of them. Places with calm confidence during the interview process may be their own kind of delusional, but they may also be really great places to work, with a good sense of teamwork.

HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
> I don't know how to gracefully bow out of the middle of an interview "Hey, thanks for taking the time to talk to me, guys, but I don't think this is a good fit. Let's cut our losses and give each other some time back. Bye." Get up and walk out.
PH95VuimJjqBqy 3y ago
> Part of being a grownup is coming around to the fact that if someone you just met clearly doesn't trust you, that's 95% about their issues, not yours. Trust is earned, not given. part of the reason you feel as if you can trust them is because you don't have to trust them _fully_. You're protected by the system, life circumstances, etc. Put another way, it's easy for me to trust that someone I don't know will pay back the $20 they just borrowed because if they don't the damage to me is minimal, it's a hell of a lot harder for me to trust that someone will pay back $20k that they borrowed. If someone isn't showing the level of trust you would expect it's generally two things. 1. That person is themselves untrustworthy and they view the world as if everyone is like them, or 2. That person doesn't feel as safe and protected by the systems in place as you do. Sometimes due to general anxiety, sometimes due to life experiences, etc. Even someone in category 2 may show themselves to be untrustworthy because they're going to cross you due to a perceived slight or as a means of protecting themselves so 1 & 2 can often blend together. But make no mistake, you don't trust them either, you just know they can't truly hurt you so it's safe to assume they're trustworthy. Trust is earned over time, not given. For a personal anecdote, there's a developer here who had major problems with me, it got heated a few times to the point we both had to walk away from the conversation. He just took everything I said in such a negative light. We would talk it out and then it would happen again. And then it came out that he had medication for anxiety, my gf of 12 years has anxiety too so I understand it better than most I suspect. Once I had that understanding I approached him differently and we have a great relationship now. Some if it was serious heart-to-heart conversations, some of it was my behavior changes. That combination and time has earned me his trust and earned him my trust. He'll very publicly challenge me and I never take it personally, I'll publicly challenge him and he doesn't take it personally either. Sometimes he'll contact me directly and tell me something I said looked bad to others and he helps me keep a lifeline into the team as a whole (I'm an architect). I'm not saying it's all sunshine and roses but it's definitely a good working relationship now. I say this just to say be careful of dismissing people outright. Sometimes you have to but make sure you have to before you do.