If I’d known about the anti-suit culture, I would have worn Dockers and a polo shirt. I just wanted to convey that I took the interview seriously. Apparently the feeling wasn’t reciprocal.

This isn't the first time I've heard of candidates being looked down upon for wearing suits to interviews, and I'm really curious what the thought process is behind this.

I've done interviews where the candidate wore a suit, and where they wore jeans and a button-down, and nobody felt offended. The only time someone's clothing made a truly negative impression was when it was clear their suit had most likely been crumpled up in a ball 30 minutes before the interview -- some of his answers to technical questions suggested he was generally sloppy, and his appearance was just one more data point to support that conclusion.

Is there some inherent distrust in someone who shows up in a suit?

I wrongly assumed that someone would ask me between sessions if I needed to use the rest room.

Perhaps I'm misunderstanding the local culture but in the countries I've lived this strikes me as a complaint valid only for a child. When adults need to use the restroom, they make their apologies, ask where the restroom is and go.

That aside, why would someone ask someone else if they need to use the restroom anyway? It's rude and isn't their business. If you think someone's being timid and really does need a break, it's more common to ask if they want to "take a break" rather than asking flat out if they need to go potty.

One of the last sentences: "This is not a true story but similar things have all happened to me or to my colleagues. "

You know, I always hear employers talking about how important it is for employees to be passionate and to show they want to work for them. But they forget that it goes both ways too. The end result is an interview where employers expect me to show them how absolutely thrilled I am at the prospect of working for them, but they make little effort to convince me that I'm anything more than an inconvenience to them.

When you have an interview where an employer does want you and shows it, it makes all the difference in the world.

There are places that interview people with no intent of hiring them, but rather to prove a point: "We can't find anyone with the right skill set, therefore we must do X." Values of X may include:

- Outsource

- Find a cheap, indentured H1B employee

- Choose another technology path that was ignored due to politics

- Stick it to a manager who insisted that "anyone" could do this

- Use the inability to hire a new person as an excuse to steal someone from another team in the company

In the end, the interviewee is merely a pawn in the scheme of things.

Other turn-offs:

1. Pull out an inconsequential suboptimally worded sentence in my CV and ask questions about it while wearing a half-smirk.

2. React negatively to anything about my CV or manner that is considered general practice among other interviewers. Is it silly and unnecessary of me attach a cover letter as PDF? Of course it is, but some companies' HR screenings require it, and I don't know your company's screening process.

I would love to read stories of interviewees who've decided to call it quits on the interviewers. It must happen right?

my goal is to reach a point where i never have to subject myself to an interview or application process ever again. they are fundamentally broken and often irrelevant or carried out amateurishly. once you've shipped enough code and had enough successful projects under your belt it gets rather old dealing with it.

An alternate title - "10 things that signal you should leave the interview and not even consider working for the company"

If any 2 of these had happened I wouldn't even consider working there. You can only image what the culture must be like there. There's something to be said for treating candidates like humans, even if you don't really want to be interviewing.

I have been known to bail from an interview as soon as it became evident we were wasting one another's time. I'm not sure why the author put himself through all that. As it stands, it really reads like someone who's bummed they didn't get hired.

sounds like they weren't that in to him more than anything else...

I've never worn a suit to an interview. I've always thought people in suits have something to hide, aka, if they really knew what they were doing they wouldn't be overdressing.