OP here, and I think it's really unfair for an interviewer to automatically make assumptions about people based on how long their commute will be. There are people (and a lot of them on DCUM, apparently) who will be grumpy after a 20-minute commute, which to me is quite short! It is also wrong for someone to assume that just because you have a lengthy commute, you will often be late. My DH and I have both had long commutes, and we'd both build in about 30 minutes of extra time in the morning because we hate to arrive at work late. Yes, sometimes traffic would still result in our being late, but our bosses were understanding and knew that it was an infrequent occurrence. There are people who live 15 minutes from the office who can never be there on time, just due to their personal nature.

After interviewing many, many applicants over the years, I have come to hate the question: what are your strengths and weaknesses. So when I was being interviewed and the guy asked me that, I told him what I thought about the question. I didn't get the job. But I walked in not wanting the job, just went out of curiousity.

if "tell me about yourself" is where you want to hear marathon stories or hobbies, then that is awful.

I think that should be framed as "what do you like to do in your free time" or what are your hobbies..
(both kinda of stupid or annoying things for an interviewer to ask in a formal way, BTW). It should come up more naturally.

Personally I don't want to be best friends with the interviewer or share my love of Thai food and that be the reason the company hires me. Not saying I don't want there to be personable nice people, I just don't want it to be one of the interview questions.

Also, googling the commute of someone from their resume.. I might do that if it were extremely far (more than say 30 miles) but otherwise that is pretty awful too. You have no idea what their home life or work expectations are, no matter where they live, so I hope you're asking everybody those commute options.

Anonymous wrote:I would NOT throw the question back at the interviewer with "what would you like to know?
It is an open-ended question for precisely the reason PPs have said--to get people to ramble, not focus, and accidentally reveal something telling like training for ultramarathons and the job being close to their house that have NOTHING to do with why you should be hired.

I would answer it like, "why should we hire you?"

Actually as an interviewer, when I ask this question (tell me about yourself), i want to know the personal interests/hobbies/cool stories etc.

I already ask the 'why here, why this position etc. questions' so i use the 'tell me about yourself' as casual/social type questions.

i would give a +1 to a responder that talked about their ultramarathon training and actually that's the shit that really helps because lets face it...most of us get a few candidates that could capably do the job....however the hobbies/interests/attitude part makes candidates more memorable.

as for house proximity....i already know that going in because i usually google map the address on the resume (if it is local) to get an idea if this person has a easy/hard commute. If it is a tough commute, i certainly ask about what are their expectations in terms of flexibility, do they have different commuting options, because that could impact their ability to get in on time or stay late or mood in the mornings (if they have a grind of a commute).

I think this is a dumb question. Interviews are kind of dumb. The whole idea is to catch people off guard. Everyone is on their best behavior in an interview. Then they get into the position and you realize they suck balls. When we interview people we give a writing test, a come up with an idea test, a follow directions test (copying an excel spreadsheet) and then make them stand on the street and say hello to people. What!

Glad to hear it OP! And if all else fails, there's always 11:38's approach.

"Sometimes I want to do very bad things."

Anonymous wrote:I would NOT throw the question back at the interviewer with "what would you like to know?
It is an open-ended question for precisely the reason PPs have said--to get people to ramble, not focus, and accidentally reveal something telling like training for ultramarathons and the job being close to their house that have NOTHING to do with why you should be hired.

I would answer it like, "why should we hire you?"

OP here -- I agree with the PP. Everything I read said never throw the question back to the interviewer.

I had an interview last week, and the first thing I was asked was "the dreaded question", but this time I followed the advice some of you gave and responded with why I was interested in the company and a brief description of why I felt I would be an asset. Thanks again for the help!