Job interviews unfair and insulting to people like us

Post Reply New Topic

My story I work in a warehouse environment I scraped past an interview in 1997 and that job closed in 2011.

One of my supervisors had set up an employment agency and I got a placement in a warehouse from her.

The company was impressed with my work and took me on and I said goodbye to the agency.

As you can see I have not done a job interview in 16 years and I have no C.V. as we call on this side of the pond.

________________________________________________________________________________________________

I have explained how I have managed to avoid them and I hated the idea even before I knew about my Autism.

Interviews are looking for good people skills good eye contact and so on and in my opinion this has nothing to do with a lot of jobs.

I assemble orders and my Aspergers Autism has helped me getting the things right and with my productivity I don't waste time chatting.

Is it time to get the idea of job interviews branded discriminatory towards a large section of the population?

Lots of people do great at interviews and then either steal from the job or are just plain useless.

Aptitude tests or work trails would seem much better?

I think the section of the population interviews may be inappropriate for is huge. Why does a dock worker or stock boy or architect or florist need to be able to use business buzzwords, fake great eye-contact, and sell themselves?

I've always felt that people should be hired based on their ability to do the job. Period.

Lots of people, not just people with Aspergers, struggle with this interview thing because it means they have to not only be great at the job but they also have to be great at sucking up and using the current business buzzwords, too. If I were hiring someone to put up drywall I'd rather have a person who is fabulous at putting up drywall than a person who is just competent but who is great at sucking up to people and selling himself.

Just remember, if you don't make the appropriate level of eye contact or shake hands properly, you must be dishonest and unreliable.

If you're being hired for a specific job, then your credentials should speak for themselves.

You don't have a chance of ending employment interviews. Except for the most menial jobs, employers aren't going to hire people without interviewing them. At higher levels, people might go through days or weeks of interviews before being hired. And if national security is involved, it may require multiple lie detector tests as well.

Doing away with interviews would likely mean that employers might hire you with the intention of putting you through the wringer to see if you could cope and lay you off immediately if not. If you think employment interviews are bad, imagine what would happen if your first month on the job meant you faced a major chance of being let go because you aren't right for the job.

Imagine quitting one job to take on a new job and then being laid off after three days. So you would no longer have that job and you would no longer have the previous job you just left since employers are often reluctant to hire people who left already. Would that be an improvement over having an employment interview? It would sure cost the employers more as well -- in many cases, the pay for the job or the number of people hired might suffer because of the additional costs.

Job interviews are not going to go away.

What you could do is to prepare for employment interviews. Get someone you know, friends or family, to do mock employment interviews so that you can get used to them. And maybe they know someone who you don't know so you could also practice interviews with people you have never met.

Something short l like it better then my long winded post.

Contrast that with a con man with great communication skills.

I've definitely done more than my share of long winded questions, answers, comments, etc. Lately I've been making a point of trying to make my questions and comments short. Sort of a little experiment.

Fourteen+ years at one company is solid. Even with the company changing and the job being closed, any way you could use one of your former supervisors as a reference?

I am in a new job already I used the supervisor as a foot in the door.

I was just thinking about the subject not just for me but for other people on the spectrum.

It's working I will have to give it a try.

For your last line of "aptitude tests", they also need to bring in fair tests that pertain to the job activities.

Companies are now using UNICRU, which actually looks for one "desired" personality type and will automatically dismiss your application if you don't fit it, and no ASD can honestly answer those questions and fit that profile. http://melbel.hubpages.com/hub/Unicru

I agree with the OP. I even agree with his word choice, that it's discriminating toward people with this condition. It's also ridiculous how much emphasis is placed social competence, but I think everyone here would agree with that.

I think I buck the trend here, I tend to be the one on interview panels these days and to be honest I am looking for peoples ability to do the job in question and not how good a story they tell.
Proof is in the pudding, I ask relevant questions because I know my industry (grounds maintenance, sports pitches, gardening) I know what the right answers should.
I always tell people to relax and take their time, explain I know they may be nervous etc, I even tell them I am nervous to jokingly to break the ice, in fact I am

Best thing in an interview is to start off by saying you are nervous and hope you don't fluff it... always worked for me..
Explain your strong points such as meticulous standards, time keeping, efficiency and so on..

Stu

I was once told (after not getting a "sure thing" job) that the person I would be working under didn't want me. Why not? Because he felt I was unreliable! I don't know how you are suppose to know this after a 5 minute informal meeting but I guess I didn't make enough eye contact to satisfy him. I just wish my impeccable work history would speak for itself. I was (and am) in a position of extreme trust yet because I suck at eye contact or hand shaking I must be a shady character even with zero evidence. Whatever

Companies STILL wonder why they can't seem to find decent workers. I love how companies all claim to be leading edge and only hire the best yet they all use these pseudo scientific, pop psychology "tests" even when its obvious all they do is promote the biggest liars and BS artists. Yes, these tests can work great.... in theory.


You know I had 6 years when I started looking for another job and I was told repeatedly it's a huge red flag since it shows I'm "lazy and unmotivated". I'm still thinking "WTF" to this day as to why: I thought loyalty was a good thing! Seems like no matter what you are f***ed unless you are a sociopath.

I had a job interview, and I had a friend on the inside who told me that I had secured the position. Then a couple days later I called him and he apologized, informing me that I had not secured the position -- the very last person who I met before I had gone home the day of the interview, was a VP and he shot me down because he did not like my hand shake.

On the whole we are decent people.

Those who rise to power seem to be as*holes.