Interviewing Part 1

If an interview is going badly, try to cuddle

the interviewer! (Seriously, don’t.)

I have been terribly remiss in not posting to my blog for quite a long time. In my defense, I taught a class on game narrative at UC Irvine in the interim. As well as working at that job thing I have. And that life thing I try to do occasionally.

I also struggled with this post for  a while. I wanted to talk about some common mistakes I see in job interviews, but I suddenly realized that my blog might be turning into “how to get a job!”, which is not a good idea. I have been a hiring manager, and so I might have some insight on this stuff – but really, there are better sites out there, created by people far smarter than myself, who have a great deal more experience. So I’m going to share my thoughts on interviewing… and leave the how2job thing there. After this I’ll expound on really important stuff, like my opinions on storytelling and cats.

This is long enough to be a three part blog post.

Interviews

I have interviewed a fair number of job candidates over the years, and I notice a few common themes in bad interviews and good. I figured I’d share what I’ve experienced interviewing people for the writing positions in the game industry, since that’s a very specific niche.

Since I may interview someone reading this blog someday, I should point this out up front:

I don’t speak for Blizzard. Blizzard’s staffing department, or other Blizzard entities, may have official tips for interviewing at the company, but this blog is not official. You may very well interview with other Blizzard professionals who disagree with the things I say here. They may even be in the same interview as I. So nothing herein is a guarantee of success for interviewing at Blizzard. Nonetheless, I hope it can be useful.

I’m going to take a yin/yang approach to this, where I first talk about the negative side of an interview trait I’ve seen, then look at the positive side of the same issue.

Rambling: This is one of the most common problems I’ve seen, especially in entry level interviews. People tend to get nervous, and they want to include as much information as possible in every answer, so they babble. A simple “Tell us about yourself,” can lead to a ten minute, rambling, meaningless answer that, in the end, only communicates: “I am mentally disorganized.” Worse, if it’s a 20 minute interview, you just wasted half of it making a bad impression. People often start by trying to explain what they’re not saying. “Well, I’m not a console player…” That may sound bizarre to you, but if you listen to conversations around you, you will hear this all the time. However, an interview is not a casual conversation. Don’t waste time explaining what you’re not answering. People who are rambling often end with “I hope that answered your question,” (it didn’t,) or “I don’t remember what the question was.” If you hear yourself say something like that, you need to mentally slap yourself and resolve that every answer thereafter is going to be on-point.

Be concise: I have seen other people nail the pacing of their answers, and this is what I’ve observed: they hit a few high points, three at most, but sometimes just one, and then wait for the next question. So whatever their answer is, they think “This is the one take away I want you to have, so I’ll say that, and then I’ll stop talking.” They know that if the interviewers feel like they didn’t get what they wanted from the answer, they’ll ask a follow up – and that’s good. Now they’re engaged. Better to give too little than too much.

My suggestion:  For easy, predictable questions, you can think about answers in advance, but for unexpected questions, you’ll need to be fast on your feet. Remember: what is the impression you want them to take away from your answer? Say that, and only that.

Attempts at humor: I have seen attempted jokes crash and burn in an interview – or worse, not be understood as humor. This is so terrible. Humor is relative, and some people have an anemic sense of humor.

Cost benefit analysis: It’s true that if you can make your interviewers laugh or chuckle early on, the rest of the interview will probably go better, so there is a real benefit to landing a good joke. But the upside is balanced against a very heavy downside.

My suggestion: If you know you’re very good at drawing laughter out of people, and reading a room, maybe try humor. If you’ve spent time on stage as a stand-up comic and this is an area you’re accomplished in, this can be a powerful weapon. If the previous two sentences don’t exactly describe you, I’d suggest avoiding humor. You’re under a microscope, and even a self-deprecating joke that would make your friends all laugh could be misinterpreted.

I have never been a stand up comic and I don’t know that I’m that great at reading a room. So have I ever tried to make a joke while being interviewed? Yes, and I’m sure that early on, it hurt me. I have, in the later years of my career, very rarely made jokes, and only when I was sure it was safe. So here’s an example of a joke I thought (correctly,) was safe:

When asked about going back to the well on ideas when many earlier versions were thrown out, I said “Sometimes that’s when the best stuff comes up – when you think you’ve got nothing left and you have to go for another round, and then things start popping. Occasionally, there really is nothing left, and then you just have to take me out back and shoot me.”

The interviewers laughed and it was good. So here’s why I think that joke worked:

I was relying on common experience: I was very experienced at that point (15+ years) in creative endeavors, and the people I was talking to were likewise over the 15 year mark. So I’d been down that road of looking for creative solutions when there seemed to be nothing left, and I knew they had as well. So I knew, for a fact, that when I said “Sometimes that’s when the best stuff shows up,” they were thinking “and sometimes not.” So my joke showed that (forgive me,) I knew they knew. And that’s a powerful insight. It was humor that drove home a point: I’m experienced. I know this stuff forward and back.

So it can work – but rarely, and unless you’re sure it will work, I’d avoid trying to make jokes.

 

Next time: Interviewing Part 2