Interview 'gift of the gab' revisited - weaknesses question

Another great post on MoneySavingExpert about 'gift of the gab', this thread was specifically about the typical interview "what are your weaknesses" question. This post (22) is especially interesting as even without reference to Aspergers or disability still makes that comparison between conFIDence at blagging and comPETence at the job.

Post 32 has a parent contrasting her confident son who dropped out of A levels but interviews well, and her more reserved daughter still doing her A levels and in process of applying for university, who worries about how she will do at interviews in the future because she isn't a "blue sky thinking outside of the box" type of person. That phrase does my head in too!

At the end of the thread post 41 is also very good, a man who accepts his introverted partner as she is and firmly believes "there is a situation and a job for every kind of person, it's just being matched to the right one for their personality."

"Where do you see yourself in five years time" - a very different take

Was out last night and telling one friend about my new job as it was the first time I'd seen him since I'd started. I'd said about how it is an agency temp job and I still don't know how sure how long for but was just glad I'd been given the chance to start without being interviewed in the usual way. We came onto the malarky of the old favourite "Where do you see yourself in five years time", he'd got a brilliant take on this.

He had said how he once responded with "Look I don't care about five years time. I could even be dead in five years time. I'm here because I'm interested in the job you've got going right now." This is so true, they ask that question to test confidence and ambition, but most of the time people really are interested in the job going now.

In my programming days I'd told an agency that I was not suited to climbing the ladder and becoming an analyst and then a project leader, when I had an interview coming up they told me the interviewer wouldn't want to ask me the question and hear me say "I don't want to be a manager" yet that really was the truth, I knew in myself I didn't have either the ability or desire to be so. At the interview itself they said they were expecting the new person to manage the department at times and I told them the role hadn't been as described so I knew I'd ruled myself out.

Government contradicts itself

Two very contradictory articles from the BBC. First we have the Work and Pensions Secretary urging firms to hire unemployed Britons, but business groups replied firms needed the "best people" and migrants often had a better work ethic and skills.

However we then have this article where the government chose a preferred bidder in Germany for a train building contract, stating the bid "represented the best value for money, and that it was following EU procurement rules, which do not allow where companies are based to be taken into account." One wonders whether in deciding the "best value for money", have they factored in that if the British firm had the contract their workers would be paying the government in taxes, whilst going with the German bid it will be the government having to pay those same workers Jobseekers allowance instead.