If you have done some level of interviewing, you have certainly come across some interesting characters.  Monster.com highlights a few:

Wearing a tuxedo to an interview. I told him to dress nice and professional for his interview, but he definitely went overboard and crossed the line of dressing business professional. Needless to say, the hiring manager also thought it was a crazy move and the candidate did not get the job.

I caught a candidate lying in his resume. He had made up so much of his previous experience that he then forgot a company name where he said he had worked. The candidate actually asked me to look at the resume I had so he could see what he wrote.

This is one I have encountered a few times in sales interviews:

I had a candidate incessantly tell me they were “the best in the market” over and over again. This phrase was added to every sentence as a punctuation mark. It made for a very awkward interview. Confidence is good; arrogance is not.

Then there is this old favorite from CareerBuilder:

Candidate answered cell phone and asked the interviewer to leave her own office because it was a “private” conversation.

Amazing how unaware some people are in today’s world.

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This article from abcnews.com starts off with a terrific interview anecdote (emphasis mine):

John-Paul Lee, CEO of Tavalon Tea, a premium tea company based in New York, recently interviewed a job candidate he’s not likely to forget.

“The first two minutes were great,” Lee says of the recent MBA grad. Then Lee asked the candidate who he believed Tavalon’s biggest competitors were. To which the candidate replied, “I think Tavalon Tea is a formidable one.”

“I assumed he was nervous and had blurted out the wrong company,” Lee says, “so I played along and asked him, ‘Why?'”

The candidate’s answer? “I don’t think they have the right management in place. I know the CEO of the company and he is a real jerk.”

Rather than let on right away, Lee asked the interviewee if the two had met before, and if the grad knew where, exactly, he was interviewing.

The candidate, who finally noticed the Tavalon Tea logo on the wall, realized he was in hot water: “Oh my god, I’m sorry,” he fumbled. “I know this is no excuse, but I partied a bit too hard last night.”

I’m still laughing at that last line.  The article continues with many more laughable stories that will start your Friday off right.

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This post from Steven Rothberg over at CollegeRecruiter.com had me laughing.  Isn’t it amazing how out-of-touch some candidates can be during a phone screen or interview?

From Steven’s post:

• Candidate asked the interviewer for a ride home after the interview.
• Candidate smelled his armpits on the way to the interview room.
• Candidate said she could not provide a writing sample because all of her writing had been for the CIA and it was “classified.”

You have to read the other 7 mistakes in the list.  Unbelievable…and entertaining.

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