You are Hercules. Zeus has asked you to move 300 boulders from the Pantheon to Mount Olympus, do you:a) Enlist a team of your jacked friends to help you transport all the boulders.b) Devise a system to float the boulders through the aquifers.Sound like an odd question to be asked during a recruitment process? Good.It's one of the brilliant Weirdly quiz questions created and used by our mates at Paysavvy. Designed to jolt you out of the same-old/same-old job application mindset and get you answering honestly, this style of non-traditional questioning is being used by the most innovative companies in the world.Not just a gimmick, these quirky questions do actually have a useful purpose. As well as helping candidates break out of that "how can I make myself look better" mindset, it can demonstrate their ability to think on their feet. Showing you how they go about logically coming to an answer to an unexpected question is great and, especially in an interview, demonstrating a willingness to attempt an answer is actually often more important than the answer itself.But we reckon this is something that ALL businesses can embrace - not just the usual creative or techy-types.It's stuff like this that helps your recruitment process stand out; It can give less well-known brand a bit of pizazz or snazz or jazz.Here are a few fun questions that might whacky up your own recruitment process a little, as well and helping you get to know the real person behind that CV:
1.What do you want to be when you grow up? This question always disarms the applicant a bit. Talking about aspirations this way frees us (and them) up to consider bigger possibilities, . You will nearly always get a smile, so it’s also helpful if the interviewee is having difficultly warming up.2.What would you do if you had $100,000 and 1 hour to spend it? This question can uncover charitable tendencies, or someone who has financial goals. There’s quite a bit of pressure with this question as it has constraints from the get-go so seeing how someone reacts to that can be really useful.3.What is your favourite saying? Or What saying do you live by? This can be tricky because not everyone has one of these. If they don’t respond quickly you could flip it to something slightly more universal (like question 4).4.What is the best lesson your mum or dad ever taught you? This gives you some insight into one (or more) of their base personal values. It's a super useful question for trying to align them with the culture of your business and hints at the qualities and attributes they value in friends or workmates.5.What’s the craziest thing you’ve ever done? Or What is one crazy thing that you want to do before you die? Everyone has a different shaped comfort zone so "stepping outside of it" isn't the same for all of us. This question isn’t really designed to find out the candidate's level of crazy but more that they are prepared to get outside of their own comfort zone at some point. Finding out how they feel about that crazy thing can be very interesting. Are they nervous? excited? reluctant? What's holding them back? It's especially important to find out when they are considering a job in a new place, with new people and in a role that might require some personal stretch. These aren't as kooky as your typical "you're a tiny guy in a giant blender" question, but they're a big break away from the standard behavioural ones we’re all used to.The key thing to remember is that there aren’t any right or wrong answers to these questions. It’s about trying to gain a bit more insight into who these people really are. And, lets face it, it’s about making the interview (or your Weirdly quiz) a bit more fun and interesting for both parties.
If you're keen to inject a bit more life into your recruitment by asking interesting, insight-producing questions like this, give Weirdly a go.
