The more time I devote to interview preparation, the more I realize that interviewing is all just one abstracted game from when we hunted in tribes approximately 10,000 years ago.

Look. I'm a software developer.

• I developed Open Source Software published on GitHub, where any interviewer can view it.
• I documented various technical projects that I created.
• I published technical writing about various technical topics that people find helpful.
• I have people with experience endorsing and getting "inspiration" from those projects.

So while other people may apply to a job without qualifications, it should be clear to an interviewer that I have the skills required to perform the job.

What more do you need to know?

Well... You may want to know how I behave. However, as someone who gets paid to communicate in various forms, I never have a problem with these "behavioral" interviews.

And this disclaimer isn't really about me anyways.

So what else do you need to know?

Well... You might also want to confirm that I'm a human. So to solve that problem, you schedule a "phone interview" with another employee whose job is to verify that I'm "fit for the role" I applied to.

And that interviewer may not understand software development, but let's look past that for now.

So what else do you need to know?

That I can do what I said I can do, I guess... So this interview process continues for however many things you need to know. And that interview process involves a whole lot of people and time.

Where did the time go?

It's all fun and games until your time is wasted. So to ensure you're not the unreasonable one (causing your time to be wasted), you must share your experience with others.

And that's when you must decide whether to rewrite history...

What Is Your Name?

A company is composed of a group of humans, and the interviewer is a human who participates in that group: The interviewer has a role and responsibilities that come with it.

The interviewer understands the company's policies and processes that result in a candidate acquiring a job. Sometimes, an interviewer even has the decision-making power to approve or deny a candidate.

I need a job to live. You need a job to live. We all need money to purchase food. Despite this, interviewers still ask stupid questions like "Why do you want this job?"

Ok. That's not a stupid question in many contexts. But let's be honest here... Interviewers around the globe are asking stupid f*cking questions!

The interviewer engages in this behavior to cope with their actions and avoid the guilt that comes with the fact that their decisions affect people's lives. If I don't get this job, I will starve. Your life continues to be great.

An issue arises when the interviewer cedes responsibility for their actions. On the one hand, it isn't the interviewer's fault for having a job that receives many applications. However, it is the interviewer's fault for using trivia and silly questions as a means of selection.

Just as you are allowed to justify your means of selection, other people are allowed to disagree with the "dance" your interview requires. That's really all it is: A bunch of begging for a chance to earn food.

It's no wonder attractive people become the most successful.

So when it comes time to name the characters involved in these experiences, people get antsy. Should you include a person's real name in a story or not?

A psychopath would argue to leave real names out of real stories: Including them only hurts your opportunities and increases the chance of the psychopath being outed.

A normal person may claim that including real names in a story isn't professional for insert reason here. That same normal person complains when unnamed politicians spend their entire careers milking their communities for millions...

This destruction continues until the politician retires, and that's when all the "news" stories come out about the politician's wrongdoings. At that point, the damage is done: What the f*ck are you going to do about it?

So does the decision to include real names always depend on what side you are on?

Let's forget about justice. When someone on the internet tells a sob story that does not include real names, I don't believe them by default. You can continue to consume your fake stories on the internet.

In any case, everything that I write about in the Interview category has only allegedly occurred.

In Other Words

I originally wrote about my interview experiences for feedback to improve my chances of securing a job. This strategy works because the internet will point out when you're wrong.

Going forward, I can't see any obvious benefit to writing about these experiences since all I need now is "experience". However, the question remains: "Why did you include my real name in your story?"

I thought about the question for a while and realized there isn't a single reason anymore.

• It might be because you did something right.
• It might be because you did something wrong.
• It might be because I love you.
• It might be because I hate you.
• It might be because you are so ineffective that you couldn't even get me a job, and I don't expect your effectiveness to change here either.
• It might be because you don't care about me, so I have no real reason to care enough to rewrite history for you.

but if i'm being honest, the real reason i add your name is cause i don't really give a f*ck!