Hi Mirza,
All of us do come across odd interview scenarios. A couple of experiences of my own,about a decade back would probably make an interesting reading!! All you need to do is - stay confident and get on with life.
Fag end of 2005. He- one of the Personnel Managers with an IT giant. He had a sheet in his hand to fill up the blanks. There he goes after the customary pleasantries. The first question:
What is your father? Where? Which branch?
Then.....
What does your mother do? Where? Which subject?
Sister? Which co.? her qualification? subject?
My date of birth…
When am I planning to get married? In the next 1 year perhaps, I said. I wasn't sure; but it would be after my sister's wedding-when he persisted with the query. Again- will you get married in 2006????
Why did I shift so many jobs? I said I was always looking for better prospects; but since I never had the opportunity to work with a reputed cmm level company where I would get a learning experience I was still on the lookout- in the process gradually moving from a hospital to an IT company- and the compensation increasing from a meagre 3.5K to 25K per month over 6 years.... (Am I to be blamed?)
Again the same question- but why do you change jobs every year? Well, I said as already pointed out, I didn't shift from an Infosys or a TCS or an IBM or a … ….(that was where I was being interviewed). He was far from convinced!!! There he was- all the time dutifully filling up the blank spaces against each question. The guy would make a great data entry operator, I thought.
Just another of those farce!! But then on the positive side, this chap made me wait for just over half an hour after the scheduled time and duly apologized for the same before getting started with the data entry process. At least he was punctual when compared to an HR Manager at another IT major. Here the HR counterpart had made me wait for 3.5 hours from scheduled interview time and acted as if everything was perfect. I had reached the venue after a fifteen-hour journey and had booked the return ticket for the same evening with enough buffer time. The last thing I wanted was missing my work the following day. By the time the hero turned up, my return trip was already jeopardized. To me it was my chance to let him know how unprofessional he was (when you are young you do that!).
Then, after waiting for a month I had to send the first of nearly half a dozen follow up mails to get the travel re-imbursement that was promised to lure me into attending the interview! A wonderful weekly exercise to improve your business communication skills, if you haven't tried yet; that too for about 1,500/- bucks....May be there is something by name destiny or luck that takes people to heights! Who's wrong- the interviewer or the interviewee??? Unfortunately there's no room for such a question!
Regards
Robin Thomas