Turned down after second interview. Twice.

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I am writing this with tears in my eyes. Background info: I am 36, diagnosed last year as ADHD. Many interests, a couple of very different jobs. Never got laid off. Even managed to write a coherent resume.

I was just turned down for a job. They invited me for the second interview. As it turned out, they didn't hire the other candidate either. To me, they told me they thought I would be able to do the job perfectly, but they had a hard time to "get to me" (don't know exactly in english). They were afraid I wouldn't fit the team.

What are they trying to say? I asked them, but they kept to this explanation. I myself had the feeling I would fit the team. I even was referred to the vacancy by a former boss, she would become my coworker again. (She kept out of the procedure, and I agreed that was a good idea.)

So they tell me I could do the job perfectly, but they hire nobody because... I don't know? It is not like a marriage, is it?!

And then three weeks ago: got invited for the second interview. Third person there for the first time. She turned me down, because of a lack of "connection". Or something.

Ok, so I do understand that people who work together should get along. I'd like the same. But it's not marriage! Is this my ADHD?!

I know it's a very good thing I got to the second interview both times I applied for a job. Probably third time right. Right?

But this makes me f*cking insecure! I am NOT an insecure person, but I am afraid I am becoming one.

I NEED a job, because right now I am a starving artist/graphic designer. It took a lot of guts to realize I need to take on a regular job (because of the structure that is good for me, and because of my capabilities that are in fact a little bit limited).

I know I am doing SO f*cking well, and I know things will work out, but I can't stand this.

So please, if you have any advice, I'd love to hear it!

Just remembered: could this have anything to do with the interviewers being NT women and me being a woman too? I've always done better in places where a lot of men work, and as far as I know this goes for a lot of ADHD/autistic women. ADHD women do get along fine though, it's just that we seem to have less trouble relating to NT men then to NT women? I'd like to hear your thoughts on this, although slightly off topic (or maybe not?)

Thanks!

Actually, it really is. I spend more waking hours at my office interacting with my co-workers than I do at home with my wife in any given average week. "Connection" and "good fit" are very important when it comes to serious, career-type jobs where I expect to invest large sums of company time and money with an employee. I have often turned down candidates based on the attitude and personality that came across during the interview.

I've said this lots of times in lots of places but the following can help keep some positive and motivated. Write yourself a list of your positive traits and abilities, then put these on small notes around your home (one trait or ability on each note) where you tend to look regularly (computer, phone, mirror etc.). Read the notes when you see them and they should help keep you motivated.

Hope this helps

I understand what you are telling me. But still: I presume you don't have to be as close with your co-workers as in a romantic relationship, or even close friends?

In this case there was no large sum of money and time involved, but even if there was: I myself would look for someone who would be a perfect fit regarding the work that has to be done, and then second I'd make sure their personality won't be a problem, and preferabele would fit perfectly. But no problem will do just fine.

[sarcasm] It is clear that in this case there was a mismatch. I'd rather have them put up a dating profile then a vacancy next time. "Looking for a co-worker (m/f) that loves to gossip during lunchtime, whines every morning during coffee time and has excellent Excel skills, even though using any spreadsheet software requires not much experience at all. Prepare for a firing squad, and even if you give the right answers we will might like you at all." (I guess a good night's sleep got me the right perspective. I even wonder if the application manager who was attending the second interview was worried I'd see right through her and stirred things up a little. You'd never know...) [/sarcasm]

Thank you, that is really good advice. I did do so (although I didn't put notes all around me because that would keep my mind at it all time, I just made a list) and it works fine to me. Would recommend the same to anybody.

While generally true, the BS is that interviewers make that call on the first 30 seconds to 5 minutes of what might be a 30-minute interview. A lot of "off" people would work out fine if you were willing to invest the time to get to know them better.

This is what works against autistics...we're likable people (on the whole) but our social awkwardness keeps us apart from everyone too A.D.D. (pun intended) to take the time to get to know us first.

It sounded to me that the OP detailed the he has worked before and got along well with co-workers who thought he would be right for this position. That the interviewers are making this negative determination on "feelings" is a disservice and, frankly, it's discriminatory.

It's a question of degree. A little "off" isn't always going to cost you a position, but "completely off-putting" will. For myself, the situation would be different if I was told up front that the applicant had a particular condition that I could familiarize myself with and would thereby explain away why the individual seems a bit "off". As an Aspie myself that particular kind of "off" is easy to recognize and would actually be seen as a positive for some positions and a negative for others.

True, but that re-enters the issue of "self-identifying" yourself as disabled. Employers (US) cannot ask if you have a disability. Once you wave that flag, odds are most employers won't touch you. Only if your condition is that prominent would you be no worse off for playing that card.

Many good people NT and AS, don't get chances because someone makes a judgment on only knowing them for a few minutes. This forces all applicants to be on their "best behavior" and fake their way through the interview process. How often do you feel good about someone then find out you should have never hired them? You need to invest a fair amount of time to know someone. Interviews put so much emphasis on first impressions.

I wish I could tell people about my ADHD. But I can't. I do tell the potential employers about my "symptoms" (I have to keep going, hard worker, divergent thinker, like to talk to co-workers now and then but tend to keep my focus on the work that has to be done, etc.), because it is who I am and how I do my job. The funny thing is people seem to not be bothered at all by this. What they might be bothered by is the fact that I tend to do everything. Even when I hand them a dumbed down cv they are puzzled by my career choices (which to me make sense: history, teaching, IT, creative, organizing skills.... some I developed as a "coping strategy", but that doesn't matter). I have always known that I need some luck with people that hire me. Either they get me or they don't, and in case of the latter it's most often clear right away. That is why I don't understand that they turned me down after the second interview.

Guess I might have used my hands to much when talking (ADHD and a deaf brother who uses sign language, I can hardly help it).

Telling about your "condition" without it being a problem functioning is the worst thing you could do I am afraid, even though there are laws. I told one of my former employers, and am very sorry I did, even though there were a lot more ADHD and AS co-workers there. They just didn't take me serious anymore. ADHD still equals an 8-year old bouncy boy (boy, never girl) and autism equals Rainman. I wish I had the guts to change this. Maybe one day I will, but I don't know how yet.



Very true if you ask me. That is why it is essential to keep your main focus on their skills and other facts, and never forget (at least in the Netherlands) there s a trial period for both employer as well as employee. If it doesn't work you can say goodbye within a month, no hard feelings.

But of course, in this case, there is just something off, so I guess I am better of this way.

On the issue of being a "good fit" and making a "connection", there is some logic to this. Most jobs require some sort of team work, albeit to different degrees. This may take the form of simply communicating with your colleagues to request information from them, or to provide information to them, so that individual tasks can be completed. In other situations, projects may be too large and complex to be completed by a single person within a reasonable amount of time. Consequently, the project has to be broken down into smaller parts, and then later assembled into the final product, with the team members interacting and relying on each other throughout the process.

To what extent a potential employer can determine this from an interview that may only last a few minutes is questionable. Many interviewers/ recruiters have an exaggerated sense of their ability. They can never know how the employees they did not hire might have done in the job. In some large organisations, recruiters may never bother to follow-up and see how the employee(s) they did hire worked out. Moreover, although business claim that they need employees with good "soft skills" --by which they mean communication skills, team-working / interpersonal skills, and creative and critical thinking skills-- success in the typical modern office has more to do with one's ability to engage in (social) networking, office politics and other Machiavellian behaviours.

To make matters worse, people on the autistic spectrum tend to give off strange "vibes" because of oddities in their body-language and other non-verbal behaviour. They unintentionally "creep-out" other people. (I jokingly refer to this as my Autistic superpower .)

Anyway, for some additional ideas you might what to read a book or two about interviewing (assuming you have not already done so). One I read was, "How to Impress For Success at Job Interviews", by Vaughan Vandenberg < http://www.interviewsolution.com/ >. Another one that some people like is, "The Complete Q&A Job Interview Book", by Jeffrey B. Allen. I know there are a couple of books about autism spectrum disorders and the workplace, but I have never read any of them, and so I do not know how helpful the are with respect to interviews.

My 'solution' was to find a job that by its very nature requires very little interpersonal interaction. This particular job seems to attract a lot of strange people because of the solitary, highly structured and repetitive nature of the work, along with the "unsociable" hours (i.e. night shift). So to some extent, I blend in. Moreover, management generally leaves me alone because I meet their processing targets and I do not mess around at work. In this way it is (fortunately for me) unlike most office jobs. The catch is, the job is a very low level position. I really don't see much of a future for myself. C'est la vie.

A lot of employers hire for personality, and figure they can train a lot of missing skills. They actually say this outright when discussing hiring people. I've been through a couple interviews where I was looking for the job, but I've also helped quite a bit and been involved in participating in interviews for adding additional people to departments, and it matters a lot. The fact that you got called back for second interviews is a positive thing, it means they didn't rule you out outright, they just decided as they told you that you weren't a good fit for the team personality-wise. I'm not saying this is right or wrong, but I think they're telling you the truth on some level. From an employers perspective, having been on that side of the table, they only call people with the right skill set for the interviews anyway (unless they're desperate, but there's probably not a lot of that right now), and certainly for the second interview. The job may have select and quirky skills that they don't expect you to have as well, which they figure they will teach you, but to begin with you and anybody else who got called in already has the right stuff on paper. So what they are primarily looking at in the interview is if they like you and think they and other people can get along with you. Often I think an interview simply turns on someone (especially the boss)'s gut feeling about the other person. It's not so say that you don't interview someone and they sound totally incompetent about what they supposedly knew, or it sounds like they were lying on their resume, or they make some off-putting comment, but I think much more often it comes down to personality/liking the person.

Is this fair? Yes and no. Obviously if your boss dislikes you from the get-go, it's going to be difficult to succeed at work if you have to interact with this person and depend on them for raises, appraisal, etc. Even if the dislike is completely misplaced. To me the more unfair part is the one that probably trips up people with Asperger's, and is a bigger problem for me, which is... if you meet me and talk to me for an hour you probably have no idea what I'm really like. Everybody who has bothered to get to know me has told me that they find out I'm completely different than their first impression was. And certainly bosses and interview committees don't always evaluate the "team personality fit" very well either... I've been in numerous occasions where somebody was hired who drove the rest of the team crazy.

The way I personally have combatted this is to really psych myself up for the interview and turn on my manic, happy smile likable version. This is the attempt to be great and above all enthusiastic and positive version of myself that is WAY too much work to use all the time, though it would probably make a lot of NT people like me more. The point of the interview is not necessarily that you have to give them an accurate impression of what you are like day to day, especially if that is not easily conveyable in a short period of time. Plus they expect you to "turn it on" for the interview, so it's not quite as deceptive as it sounds. If I were not to do this, the amount of nervousness going into the interview would cause me to be my worst version of myself, which isn't really more accurate either of how I will act day-to-day on the job and is far away from how people who actually get to know me view me. I will say that the jobs that I have gotten, I've worked at long and pretty well despite my "enhanced" first impression so they didn't turn around and throw me out the door once they found out what I was really like. It probably also helps that I work in the computer industry which is home to a lot of, shall we say, quirky and perhaps socially challenged people, so general weirdness doesn't turn them off by itself.

Practice doing interviews, look up sample interview questions online, have additional things to talk about, ask them questions, etc. so you are comfortable enough with the routine that you can concentrate on how you appear socially instead of what you are going to say. Do whatever works for you to psych yourself up, put yourself in the best mood, put a huge smile on and don't stop smiling and oozing enthusiasm (at least, if that's appealing in you). I would not suggest bringing out any negatives during the interview like conditions you have, the fact that you often have to take sick days to care for sick children, your car has been in the shop a lot lately, etc. You can get the specifics of the job (their policies) without mentioning these and decide for yourself if it fits. I have learned the hard way that it's not the fact that you HAVE these negatives that bothers most NTs, as everybody has various issues, but they think that the fact that you are willing to talk about them or bring them up in that situation IN ITSELF is a negative. In other words it's not who you are but your unusual (to them) willingness to reveal it. This applies to a lot of areas of life that I'm only beginning to grasp, the second level of communication. Not what you said but the fact that you said it, etc.

Also, from what I've seen, bringing extra stuff to an interview that tell more about yourself (a writing sample if the job involves writing, samples of work, etc) even if it wasn't asked for seems to make a favorable impression. And, since they are in fact looking at your personality and not just your resume (they already read that before they called you in), mentioning your interests in the interview if the opportunity arises isn't necessarily a bad thing as long as you don't go on about it, because it helps them remember you and there might be somebody else on the team with a similar interest so they'll think that's a plus.

Also, I'm just going to throw this in as an aside since I've seen it in a surprising number of interviews where I was on the company side of the table... don't go to an interview with an open, bleeding wound. If for some reason you have a noticeable open wound, gash in your head, burned face, bandaged hands, etc... don't pretend that it doesn't exist but at least acknowledge it. And I don't know why I've ended up in interviews with so many injured people.

@Logan5 and grendel:

Thanks for the additional good advise and insights.

I have thought things over and I guess maybe it's a good thing to sort of put together an act. Not really, but the way I do this now I give 100% energy into the interview and application in general. 100% of my energy might equal 500% of a NT persons energy. I guess they pick up on that, and it might scare them. Also, it is way to emotionally exhausting to me. I guess I have come to terms with the fact that at this time I might have to apply for a job maybe even 20 times before I get one, so I'd better get my act together.

Perhaps it's a good thing to focus on stuff that make me happy, and force myself to spend no more then 1 or 2 hours a day applying for jobs (including searches). That way I hope to get a job without freaking myself out in the end.

Also, applying for different jobs at the same time might help to prevent over-focussing on one of them, and enlarge the change of ending up with a job within a limited amount of time.

I agree, I would say this is definitely a good idea for the reasons stated. I have done that as a matter of course but I have known some people who only applied to a job they were really intent on, and didn't apply to another one until they heard back. It seemed more stressful.