Candidate spoke about WoW in an interview

fergie128

fergie128

fergie128

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Currently in my head, and I can't think of a better place to talk about it:

I'm a senior analytics manager for a large telco and I've been doing interviews for new analysts recently. One in particular was decent, and as part of his interview he wanted to talk about experiences he learned from in World of Warcraft.

Now I've played WoW since release, and have been in the top 50 guilds in the world before, so this really struck a chord with me. He spoke about all the theorycrafting that he put into his character to get the most out of it, the calculations etc etc, which I thought was good for an analyst. He also spoke about his time leading the guild, organising everything and dealing with conflict. Again, I totally got this as I did this for many years. In my view he drew out some really good examples from this, as well as from his actual work experience.

Afterwards, my assistance interviewer thought this was all a lot of nonsense and couldn't believe someone would talk about this in an interview. Whereas I actually thought, good on you for trying draw out some other different skills you might not have had exposure to in the workplace.

At this stage, I am most likely going to offer this guy the job. He ticks all the boxes purely from a work experience point anyway. But I am curious to know everyone elses thoughts on talking about these kind of things in interviews. Would you talk about them? As an interviewer would you even entertain them?
 
He was lucky he had an interviewer who understood where he was coming from (being a WoW player themselves)

If it was someone else, then no, I can't see it would have gone down that well.

Being an Ex-Guild/Raid leader myself, I've talked about online accomplishments to lots of people, not in an interview capacity though, and people who haven't played just don't get it and ascribe no value to the experience.
 
I've heard of people doing the same but the jobs revolved around gaming, brave of him to do it for that role as if you weren't there he likely wouldn't have stood a chance as anyone who hasn't played the game wouldn't have a clue what he was going on about.

Risk seems to have paid off for him :)
 
Many interviewers run a mile from candidates who say they're into online gaming (especially MMOs), having preconceptions about late nights, lack of attendence and slacking off when they should be working.

Not that I've ever been guilty of any of those... *cough*
 
He took a very big gamble and it paid off.

Personally I wouldn't make a habit of it though unless it was a role based around the industry.

While his points and experience may well be valid, most interviews will dismiss it straight off the bat due to it being online/gaming.
 
I tend to draw from my experiences in hobbies and interests, but I do ensure that I speak about them in plain English (no bespoke terminology), and try to make sure that they are directly relevant to skills required in any given role.

I guess if the guy started relatively light on the details to gain an insight as to whether or not he should pursue the WoW conversation, then you engaged, I fully understand why he continued in the detail he did.

I recently interviewed a guy who started talking in depth about attending an running early MultiPlay i-Series events, and I engaged quite heavily with him as a prior attendee to a number of them (unfortunately the events didn't overlap, but nonetheless it was a good conversation).
 
I don't think he did take a particularly big gamble, he's going for an analytics job - if the hiring manager doesn't get it then does he really want to work for such a person. If anything it allows him to filter naive/stupid managers too.*

I've never even played the game nor do I know too much about it other than it seems to be something fantasy related and you play competitively with others online. However if someone has explained how they've rigorously analysed/modeled it in order to be more competitive then I'd see that as a positive. I'd say the same thing about gambling, poker etc.. to the average pleb that is a potential red flag, for a quantitative role you'd expect the person hiring you to have a better understanding and realise there is a very relevant skill set there for the rather numerate non-degenerates who exploit poker games, betfair etc..




*I think the exception here is if the hiring manager isn't an analytics/quant person and the interviewee is potentially going to be the only quantitative person in the company.
 
Many of the best technical people I've worked with in IT were gamer's. I would doubt any of them would bring it up in a job interview, unless it was a gaming related . Gaming places, and some creative places might mention it, as they want people who match their existing people.
 
I get where he/you are coming from - as someone able to analyse and theorycraft complex game mechanics in something like wow, eve online, etc. can definitely be an asset if they can apply those kind of skills to a business environment and the management side of a guild, etc. can be as complex as any business - but I'd never bring it up in an interview personally :S
 
I'd think if it was started vaguely as... "as part of a committed online social community, it was my job to organise, analyse and help in the improvement of various members performance as...something of a leader in the community" you could.... MAAAYBE draw the interviewer in. It's still quite risky though. Even if they're not that interested that sort of talk is going to bait questions and they well still be off-putting. You'd probably have to be good at breaking it down quickly, in an interesting way to someone who DIDN'T (after asking) know much about it all or be excellent at crafting answers that didn't cover it explicitly but gave enough that you didn't come over a vague.

I'm yet to mention it in interview, don't think I would, personally.
 
TBH if you can analyse and theorycraft complex game mechanics you probably have a business subject that you can do the same thing with.
 
I think where the line is drawn is that games are games, work is work and you are here to work and it's not a game. In an interview you want to hear about work experience not game experiences even if in theory it relates to the job.
 
esoteric said:
I think where the line is drawn is that games are games, work is work and you are here to work and it's not a game. In an interview you want to hear about work experience not game experiences even if in theory it relates to the job.
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I'd also contend how well it translates over to a business environment - I find I can analyse, understand and theorycraft game mechanics at a far higher level than I do business - especially when put on the spot in a business environment I don't perform as well as I can with game stuff.
 
When I was interviewed for a job at the hospital I still work at, I was told to talk about any subject I wanted for not more than 10 minutes. I decided to talk about the very first Marathon I ran and the 3 women interviewing me turned into a good half hour because they had all signed up to do a Run For Life. I got the job.
 
I actually got a position at a company because I was chatting to their recruiter outside of work, they mentioned Farmville and I told them my wife had played it for a while until I came along and created a spreadsheet that allowed me to plan the best crops to plant for return on investment and that within 2 weeks I was in a better position than people who had been randomly playing for months.

Online game for me, as someone that has played Ultima and Eve Online, provide a great range of skills.

Planning, team work, management, how to deal with problems and loss. The skills from planning in a game can easily be transferred into a work team environment.

The subject doesn't matter, it is the methods and results that matter.
 
It's an interesting subject and something I've mused on before. Many years ago I used to play competitive online gaming to a high standard (representing the UK, travelling to an overseas LAN event in Sweden) and started taking on additional responsibilities such as being head admin of the leading UK league, the leading European tournament, commentating on matches and so forth (which is actually a genuine career now for some people, but this was years ago before Youtube even existed, never mind Twitch...). I think that some of the attributes I needed to do that would be value in certain workplaces (tenacity, organisation, analysis, dealing with others, dealing with internal conflict etc etc). I could probably talk about them at length with others, such as on nerd forums like this. In later years the level of analysis I used to go into with some of my teammates was extremely detailed - we'd spend more time discussing tactics for a specific phase of a single map that I do in business discussing issues that could could financial accounts to shift by millions of pounds - and ironically one of my ex-teammates (DDK) is now a reasonably successful professional video game caster who travels the world commentating on games.

HOWEVER - I've never brought up gaming in an interview because I've always felt there is a certain stigma attached to it. As others have mentioned it is a risk and even if I was being interviewed by a 'gamer' I'm not sure they would necessarily 'get it'. If I was going for a job in that industry, then sure, but certainly not in the straight-laced corporate sector.

To answer the original question - yes I'd hire him because you've said he ticks all the boxes in terms of experience, you aren't 'taking a punt' on him based on the WoW piece.

edit: One key point I think that does need consideration however in terms of the 'transferrable skills' piece, is that in most cases gamers are not dealing with people face to face. You are also in most cases dealing with people who share your passion for the game in question, whereas the same cannot always be said in business. The skills you need to get on in the workplace are not necessarily synonymous with with the skills of the same type you might utilise in gaming.
 
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In one interview I had I was asked if I was a gamer and if I was "Xbox or PS3" I asked if my answer would have an impact on their decision and they said "Only if you say Nintendo Wii"

That was one of the more relaxed interviews I've had.

Guy took a gamble, and it paid off. Fair play!
 
Freakbro said:
He was lucky he had an interviewer who understood where he was coming from (being a WoW player themselves)

If it was someone else, then no, I can't see it would have gone down that well.

Being an Ex-Guild/Raid leader myself, I've talked about online accomplishments to lots of people, not in an interview capacity though, and people who haven't played just don't get it and ascribe no value to the experience.
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This. I've also built up some incredibly successful guilds from the ground up and people often don't realise the time, dedication, organizational skills, people skills and dependency it requires. Imagine herding cats. Teenage cats who have just discovered women, red bull and other games but want all the glitz and glamour without actually committing. It's not an easy task by any measure, but it's very obvious why people can't relate to it.
 
Diddums said:
This. I've also built up some incredibly successful guilds from the ground up and people often don't realise the time, dedication, organizational skills, people skills and dependency it requires. Imagine herding cats. Teenage cats who have just discovered women, red bull and other games but want all the glitz and glamour without actually committing. It's not an easy task by any measure, but it's very obvious why people can't relate to it.
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See I've never played WoW but if someone told me they had key roles within certain big alliances in EVE then I'd appreciate what they had put into it.

Probably very similar in many ways.
 
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