You're not a real adult unless you've had at least one shameful job interview experience.
But I recently stumbled across a Reddit thread that made some of my interview flubs seem pretty damn insignificant. User u/LittleDraegynGirl asked hiring managers to share some of the red flags they've witnessed during job interviews, and boy did they deliver:
1. "We asked the typical, 'What do you like to do in your free time?' He said he really enjoyed taking his dog with him on long runs to decompress (so far so good) — then he went into excruciating detail about how his dog likes to lick every last drop of sweat off his body as he undresses for the shower."
2. "My boss had a Zoom interview with a dude who didn't bother to put on a shirt. He didn't get the job..."
3. "I was interviewing a candidate for a technical position (electronic design). I handed them a dry erase marker and asked them to draw a particularly easy circuit on the white board and explain how it works. The candidate stood in front of the white board looking uncomfortable and I heard them say under their breath, 'I hate the truth.'"
4. "Had a guy come in wearing his high school wrestling medals. I don't know exactly how old he was, but minimum age for the job was 21, so he was at least that."
5. "This one kid was very proud of the fact that he got so mad one time, he punched a couple windows on a bus and broke them. Somehow, he thought this was a good story to tell us in the interview."
6. "The interview went acceptably until I asked how he would handle a client offering him money or favors in return for privileges or contraband. He laughed and asked how cute they were. The job he was applying for would have had him on a ward with teenagers. I literally had a meeting about how we were not hiring this person ever later that day with others just in case."
7. "We had someone get up and leave upon the mention of a drug test, which we specifically stated did not include marijuana."
8. "They asked to take a cigarette break in the middle of the interview."
9. "I’ve interviewed/worked with multiple people who asked in their interview, 'What’s the fastest anyone has been promoted here? I want to break that record.' I’m not the ultimate decision maker on these things, but all those people turned out to be complete duds, so that’s now a kiss of death in any interview I’m a part of."
10. "The applicant was a senior in college. Front and center on his resume was his major, expected graduation date, and the line, 'GPA: 2.0.' I get that grades aren't everything, but if you're getting Cs, at least have the common sense to not advertise it so prominently."
11. "My boss was interviewing a lady who asked what the dress code was. My boss told her business casual. The lady then put her feet up on my boss’s desk and said, 'Good, because these are the only pair of shoes I am ever going to own.'"
12. "I used to manage a busy, successful restaurant. During an interview, an applicant told me that he didn't really need to work for money, but that he was hoping to land the job because he wanted to nail some of the waitresses."
13. "All the questions they asked were directed to my male colleague. Our lead architect happened to be female, so that wasn't going to fly very well."
14. "A woman that was 40 minutes late walked in on us interviewing the next applicant and demanded we see her first. She screamed at me that we had wasted her time when I refused to interview her."
15. "I asked a man to give an example of a time when he had a conflict or different opinion from a coworker. He said, 'Oh I've never had a conflict with anyone, I'm super chill.' When I asked for him to elaborate, he basically said he would pretend to agree with whatever his supervisor said and then as soon as that person wasn't around, he would just continue on doing whatever he wanted."
16. "Software development manager here. Asked a potential Sr. Developer candidate how he felt about mentoring staff. His response was, 'Well I don’t mind answering a question here and there, but I’m certainly not going to train my competition.'"
17. And finally, "A guy showed up in shorts with holes in them that were so big, when he sat down and spread his legs, we could see his balls."
Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.