Ok, I'm confused. Can you explain this?

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So, here is the story.

I recently graduated with my Masters in Mechanical Engineering (Huzzah), and I am out looking for a job. I sent my resume to a company that looked interesting, and had a job that fit my qualifications. After about a month's wait, they call me up and schedule an interview for next Thursday. Now, they definitely seemed interested in me. They purchased a hotel room for me to stay in, and were willing to fly me in for the interview. I declined the flight as it was only a 4 hour drive, and they told me they would pay for the mileage. So, obviously, if they were willing to invest that much in the interview, they weren't just passively interested. They were definitely pursuing me as a possible employee.

In preparation for the interview, they sent me a list of forms to fill out, and gave me a link to an online 'survey' that they wanted me to take. The forms were pretty strait forward stuff like formal identification, Social Security info, details about past jobs, proprietary information secrecy stuff, and so forth. Ive seen these sorts of forms before and they are nothing new. The majority of the information requested by the forms is on my resume. But the website they linked me to wanted me to fill out a 184 question long survey with unanswerable 'yes' or 'no' questions. For example, some of the questions asked:

Do most people follow the rules only because they fear repercussions?
Do most people lie to get what they want?
Do you prefer to work with a group over working alone?

So, obviously these are questions designed to determine one's personality/view points. My assumption is that the test relies on some people's tendency to externalize their ideals. For example, a person might think 'Well I only follow the rules because I have to, so other people must be the same way', and thus they would click yes for the first question. Or they might think, 'well I lie to get what I want, so other people must act the same way', and click yes to the second question.

The idea being that if you see characteristics in other people, you likely have those characteristics also. Basically, the test relies on the person taking the test to have a simplistic, YES/NO view of the world and make broad generalizations based on their own experiences. That way the test can be used to reject people who have a tendency to only follow the rules because they have to, or lie to get what they want.

The problem is that these questions don't work if the person taking the test has any sort of critical thinking. The answer to the first question depends the 'rules'. For example, there are laws against murdering other people, but most people follow that rule due to their own sense of morality, not because they fear jail time. If you removed the laws against murdering, I am pretty sure 99% of the population wouldn't start murdering other people. Simply put, most people avoid murder on moral grounds, not legal grounds. Conversely, lets look at speeding while driving. Most people only drive the speed limit because they don't want to get a ticket. They have no moral reason not to speed, and if the speeding laws were removed, 95% of drivers would exceed the speed limit by a good amount. Simply put, most people avoid driving over the speed limit on legal grounds, not moral grounds.

As you can see, whether or not the majority of people follow rules because they have to depends highly on the rule itself. Furthermore, the percentage of people who only follow the rules because they have to depends on the culture and demographic. The same rule may have the majority following it for very different reasons based on the average age of the person in question, their socio-economic status, their religion, and so forth. To make a blanket statement whether or not most people follow the rules just because they have to is an oversimplification of an impossible to answer question. The question must be more thoroughly defined, and a survey of the population in question must be done to achieve any practical results.

Likewise, with the second question. It doesn't specify what the person wants. Most people will tell a 'white lie' to get out of an unwanted social event, but most people wont lie on their taxes (at least hopefully not). Again, the question is poorly defined and cannot be answered with any certainty given the information available. Furthermore, both of these questions rely on the ability to determine what other people are thinking without any information. In other words, you have to make an assumption about what the question is asking, and then divine what other people are thinking without any information. And since I am neither psychic, telepathic, nor delusional. I don't have any ideal what other people are thinking without asking them via some sort of survey.

And the third question is just as unanswerable. There is no mention about what it is that I am working on. How important is the task? Do I have all the expertise I need to complete the task or do I need help? How long will the task take? Is anybody else available to help? And so forth and so on.

I could keep going, but I think you get the point I am trying to make. When a person actually thinks critically of these questions, they are impossible to answer.

So, I sent an email off to my contact at the company and told her (actual email), "I also tried to complete the online survey but found it impossible to do so. Half the questions were far to vague to answer with any accuracy. And many of the questions required me to determine the thought process of other people which is impossible for me to do as I am not psychic. I tried leaving the unanswerable questions blank, but the test will not complete when 2/3 of the questions aren't answered. So, I am not sure what to do here as filling in the questions cannot be done accurately due to the vague nature."

About two hours after I sent that email, I received an email back from the company which said that they were no longer pursuing me as a candidate for employment. They wished me luck, but there was no reason given as to why they were no longer interested. So, I am left puzzled.

It is possible that they simply found another person who they wanted to hire instead and thus they had no need to interview me. But it seems odd that they would be willing to pay for hotel + flight for a person that they weren't going to take the time to interview. If they already invested that much money into a potential candidate, then wouldn't it make sense to interview them anyways, just to see if they might be a better fit then the guy you like?

Furthermore, the information I was given indicates that there were a several positions they were trying to fill, and that were the case, then simply finding a good candidate wouldn't mean there wasn't any room for me. They would have to have filled all the positions they had available, and not have any desire to interview any more people despite already having paid for the hotel + transportation costs. Also, the timing of the rejection (2 hours after I sent the email) seems a bit suspicious to me. All that put together, it leads me to think that they rejected me as a candidate because I was unable to fill out the questionnaire provided. But this just doesn't make any sense to me.

Unless I am misunderstanding the point of the questionnaire, there seems to be only two possible ways to answer it. Firstly, one could answer it if they didn't think critically about the questions and merely made broad sweeping generalizations about other people with no evidence. The second way that the test could be filled out is if the person does think critically and realizes the questions are impossible to answer. But instead of pointing out that the test is useless, they instead just fill in what they think the company wants to hear. For example, they would answer these questions as No,No,Yes because thats what they think the company is looking for, not because they are actual viable answers. But if this is the case, then that only shows that the person is willing to ignore rational thought, and lie in order to get the job.

Neither one of these is a good option. But by requiring that people fill out this test, they are insuring that they only hire people who lack critical thinking skills (not a good trait in an engineer) or people who will lie and tell other people what they want to hear to cover their ass (not a good trait in anybody). Does the company not realize this? Are they not aware that by requiring this test they are intentionally hiring bad employees? And if they do realize this, why are they still requiring the test? What purpose does this test serve? The only way I could see this being useful is if it were some sort of trick were filling out the test disqualified you, but that apparently isn't the case.

Overall, I am not very saddened that the job fell out because if this is what is required to work for the company then I don't want to work for the company. But I am still confused as to this behavior as I can't figure out why this sort of testing is even considered, let alone required.

Can you explain it?

Possabilics of alternative questions read into the questions.

Do most people follow the rules only because they fear repercussions?

(Do you suffer from a delusional disorder of the fear of persecution.)

(Do you respect authority)

Do most people lie to get what they want?

(Are you suspicious of others.)

(Do you trust to easily)

Do you prefer to work with a group over working alone?

(Are you a team player.)

(Can you work alone or are you dependent upon others)

Yes, but Ci, thats not the confusion I have.

I understand that these are 'trick' questions that are designed to determine one's personality and weed out potential problem employees. But my whole point is that anybody who would be willing to fill out these questions is either incompetent, or lying. And why would the company want to hire people like that?

You're over-thinking it.

I've had to take EXACTLY the same test when applying to Wal-Mart and McDonald's. Basically, you give the company the answers THEY want, not the answers you think are best.

Furthermore, junk like this is mostly the purview of the HR department, and my general impressions have been that the folks who work in HR tend to be....morons. The people in charge of hiring you probably didn't even know the first thing about mechanical engineering.

Good luck on the job hunt.

They want people who won't rock the boat. The questions are designed to weed out those who might ask too many uncomfortable questions about company policies later on.



^This.

Honestly if killing were allowed for any reason, I would do it if anyone pissed me off that bad. I am walking my baby and someone makes a rude comment to me about I should have kept my legs shut, bam I take out a gun and shoot them and keep on walking as if nothing happened. I wouldn't feel remorse or anything because that person was a jerk and now there are less jerks in the world and less judgmental people. Only way to stop me from doing that still if killing were legal for any reason is if other peoples judgments and the crap I would get and the fact the news would show my name and reveal my name and people wouldn't give a s**t about what kind of person the "victim" was.

So that is why I think I must be a sociopath then but yet real sociopaths would actually commit crimes and actually act on it while I don't due to consequences. Everyone keeps telling me I am not one? Why? Because I don't act on it?

But I am not one according to the DSM and other websites about the word so technically everyone is correct about me not being one.

I bet everyone has some sociopath inside of them. How many people will feel guilt or remorse if they stood up to a bully and the bully got butthurt bu it? See everyone is a little bit one. Same as how many parents would kill a pedophile if they caught one molesting their child? I doubt they would feel remorse for it.


Now to get back on topic:

My guess is because you over analyzed the questions and said they were too vague to answer, they misjudged you thinking if you couldn't do the survey and answer the questions, how were you going to follow their instructions when you work for them? They probably don't want to do a long list of explanations for everything single instruction they give you because it was too vague. Work places are like that. They easily judge you based on your performance and what you have on and what you do in your personal life and how you live your personal life. It's stupid. Don't they understand people do alter egos so therefore they would do home behavior and work behavior. That's how I have always been. I did school behavior and home behavior as a kid. I would act different at school than I would at home.

But I find it odd they would set up an interview for you and the hotel room and pay for your gas before having you do the survey. They should offer all that after you have passed their survey.

I am not a neurotypical....but I can see why they lost interest in you. Aspie honesty got the better of you. Your email to them (from their view) said that you were not going to play by their rules because you knew better than they did.
In most job enviroments...they dont want independant thinkers as far as company policy goes...they just want those who can do the job effiently and not question athority. Sad but true. When trying to get a job....stand out from the herd, but dont go running the opposite dirrection either.

ohh well there's always another job prospect.

good luck,

Jojo

I only read the questions and don't have the attention span for the rest. If you do not trust people and prefer to work alone that might indicate an anti-social personality disorder. Yet if you trust to much and can work alone then you might be a good asset to determine foul play in the work place without needing to consult others. However if you do not trust others and need to work in a team environment and prefer to work alone you may not get hired.

Based on this post and nothing else, I would have hired you.

I think this was where you failed their idea of listening to and following instructions.
I agree with everything you said about the test, but I think the company has a policy for whatever reason that all aplicants must fill out and "pass" to their satisfaction the silly personality test before moving on to the in person inerview.
They could have thought... if it is so tough for this guy to fill out a bunch of simple yes/no questions, we can't expect him to do anything more complicated than that.
I would have taken your response as you looking for clarification on the instructions so that you could follow them more accurately, and seen that as a positive attribute in an employee. But I'm guessing whoever wrote you back simply thought it was less of a hassle to move on to an aplicant who turned in the answers they wanted to hear, rather than try to figure out what you were going on about. I doubt that they even considered your reasoning on why you hadn't finished the test.


Taking this approach would have likely resulted in you still making that 4 hour drive. It has worked much better for me than pointing out flaws in the logic of company policy to the HR lady ever did.

I would not call these "trick" questions. These types of questionnaire have been tested over many decades, on hundreds of thousands of people, to generate a statistically valid assessment of personality and outlook. And note that "statistically valid" just means that some repeatable numerical relationship holds up, not that it is logically valid, or ethically valid, or that I agree with it. Employers, especially big employers, strongly believe that these tests are an economical method of selecting applicants and that the method protects them from lawsuits on the basis of gender / ethnicity / disability discrimination.

If you quickly select the most likely answer for each item, without critical thinking, then you are doing what is expected. You might even discover that your results are consistent if you repeat the test. I have no idea if they rejected your application for failing to complete the questionnaire, but it is possible. In future, you should just comply with this kind of BS, or look for employers who have the same disregard for it as you do.

I did take one of these tests to try get a job...which I never got, for an icecream shop and the one question that baffled me was
all cops are good people t/f

I had no idea how to answer this.
if I was to say true...then I am a freakin nieve idiot
if I say false.. then I am oppositial defiant

I said false...but I didnt get the job either....go figure

Interesting post about the statitical reasons for these tests.

Yes, I can explain.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aj164/5817 ... otostream/

I would have answered false because some of them are jerks, some of them are bullies because they abuse their authority, lot of them manipulate and try and get people to tell them what they want to hear so thus they do a false confession. So no, not all of them are good.

Unfortunately this is the most likely explanation.

According to your resume, you would be quite capable of whichever assignment they gave you upon hiring. That's why they were going to sink so much money into getting you to the interview. So I don't think it's a fear that you can't follow directions. I think their fear was that whatever assignment they gave you upon hiring, you would find some reason why its' parameters were wrong and would continue in that manner until the final day when they said, "Tracker, you are a good engineer but we need somebody who will do the assignments we give them, not the assignments they they think we ought to have given them instead."


On the plus side, this thread has given you the answers you can use to fill out that questionnaire the next time

sounds like the MMPI.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_ ... _Inventory

the problem is that yes, these types of questions are in fact largely unanswerable to many people with Asperger's. they are too unspecific but NTs seem to have no problem with vast generalizations and answering questions like this with an emotional response instead of actually thinking of a specific application of the question.

i will guess the employer interpreted your inability to complete the test as a lack of cooperation, which they would immediately consider a bad trait for a perspective employee. perhaps they would have interpreted it differently if you told them you had AS (as your difficulty with the test is relevant), perhaps not.

with a degree in mechanical engineering i would not expect you would have a difficult time finding an employer who is ASD friendly, and i hope you do. meanwhile i agree these tests are lazy and misguided and really tell an employer nothing other than whether the person can "fake out" the test and give the answers that are desirable .. which is what a lot of job interviews do too. ("what's your worst quality as an employee?" for example is a common interview question .. how the heck do you answer that appropriately??? people who are good at interviews must have a way of putting a positive spin on the question.)

i'm very tired and just skimmed your post so i'm sorry if i missed something.

These tests are a crutch for HR people that don't want to exert themselves.

Would a person that lies to get ahead tell the truth about themselves on this test?

If the population consists mostly of liars wouldn't you get a statistically valid picture of liars?

If people game the questions by giving the answers the expect the company to like then don't you have a statistically valid picture of people that game the system?

I know companies use these things. But I find them suspect as valid screening tools.


As for why declined to pursue you - in your own words

You are asking us to determine their thought process and we are not psychic.

But they may have a blanket policy that automatically rejects anyone that does not complete the test. If they use this as a screening tool, that would be one thing taken into consideration.

Welcome to the corporate world. You are a drone. A cost center, not even an asset. A new laptop at least hits the financials as an asset with it's cost depreciated over time. You are a liability in the balance sheet. A cost to be controlled.