Google Admits Its Crazy Interview Questions Were a Complete Waste of Time

Google interviews are notorious. To be hired, applicants often have to endure dozens of phone and in-person grillings. And the questions asked frequently included brain-teasers with no apparent connection to intelligence, competence or skill.

The company now admits that some of those questions served no predictive purpose as it affected future performance. Making current employees feel intelligent and superior seems to have been the primary benefit.

But as dismissive as it may now be about that hiring style, there were probably some unintended attributes which the company should not overlook. In an intensely competitive industry known for the acumen of its employees, the company succeeded in establishing itself as the most elite. Surviving the Google interview process became a badge of honor, a sign that one was not just smart and well-educated, but clever, articulate and able to function under pressure.

The hiring process therefore became integral to establishing the value of the brand. The brains of its staff added to the corporate reputation for innovative thinking and executional adeptness. Even when compared to Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and Amazon with their famously talented workforces, Google stood out because they emphasized the importance of hiring the right people, whatever that meant or means at a time when human capital was becoming recognized as a strategic differentiator. For the individual, being hired by Google is the tech version of Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval. With that on your CV, other opportunities become manifest.

Although the company now says it is shifting to a more utilitarian - if no less elite - focus, with 50,000+ employees on multiple continents and constant pressure to deliver results, it has had to update the process by which it selects those who will contribute to the future that customers and shareholders have come to expect. But it is worth remembering that one of the reasons people still flock to Google is because its reputation for singling out the best and brightest has become emblematic both of its aspirations and abilities. JL

Alyson Shontell reports in Business Insider:

Until a few years ago, Google was infamous for asking brainteasers such as, "How much should you charge to wash all the windows in Seattle?" and "Why are manholes round?" It now admits that those questions were useless.

If you have ever experienced a job interview with Google, you know it can be grueling.

"We found that brainteasers are a complete waste of time," Laszlo Bock, Google's Senior VP of People Operations. "How many golf balls can you fit into an airplane? How many gas stations in Manhattan? A complete waste of time. They don’t predict anything. They serve primarily to make the interviewer feel smart."
In addition to trashing brainteasers, Google is also moving away from GPA requirements. Bock says there is a correlation between good employees and high GPAs and test scores if you're just a few years out of school. But for every other candidate, Google no longer asks for that information.
What's Google's hiring tactic now? Bock says his team uses behavioral interviews and asks for examples of how a person acted in a particular situation. It no longer asks hypothetical questions. Google also uses structured behavior interviews with a consistent rubric for assessing each person.
"The interesting thing about the behavioral interview is that when you ask somebody to speak to their own experience, and you drill into that, you get two kinds of information," Bock says. "One is you get to see how they actually interacted in a real-world situation, and the valuable “meta” information you get about the candidate is a sense of what they consider to be difficult."
Google also looks for leadership examples among candidates.
What's it like to interview for an internship rather than a job with Google? One intern tells all.
What did Google interviews used to be like? Here's one nightmare tale.