Can You Answer This Tricky Interview Question Posed To An Analyst Applicant At Goldman Sachs?

Business Insider ^ | 12/31/2010 | Courtney Comstock

[SeekAndFind]

Goldman Sachs has a notoriously difficult interview process.

According to Glassdoor.com, interviewers are subjected to a number of tests including, a Phone Interview, a Group/Panel Interview, a Presentation, an IQ/Intelligence Test, a Skills Test, a Personality Test, a Drug Test and a Background Check.

Think you can handle it?

See how well you answer this one, posed to an applicant in the first-year analyst program, the lowest level at Goldman Sachs.

"If you were shrunk to the size of a pencil and put in a blender, how would you get out?"

[bray]

I would spend my last minutes of my life selling pencil derivatives. Happy New Year

[ldish]

i am also sure this was one of the questions govt sacks asks...”how can we actually screw every single person or organization we have or will ever deal with?”

[ModelBreaker]

“I’d give them the same general answer all economists give when asked how they’d get out of a hypothetical fifty-foot hole: “First, assume a ladder”...”

Or, if a broker, assume an every rising sea of liquidity. Your a pencil, you float.

[Leftism is Mentally Deranged]

If the guy who created that question had a brain would he be able to take the test?

[Leftism is Mentally Deranged]

Assuming the blender is not on, I would write “help” on the inside of the blender. Backwards, of course, so humans on the outside could read it and win a Nobel prize for discovering the first pencil that can write without a human helping it.

[Gaffer]

I would say, “Regardless of my current size, is there anyway I can get an internet connection, stock updates and a friggin’ phone. I need to line up some old geezer clients and sell them some frickin’ stock, by god...”

[Red Steel]

"If you were shrunk to the size of a pencil and put in a blender, how would you get out?"

The best Goldman Sachs answers they want to hear:

Interviewee:

I would lobby or hire lobbyists to persuade [bribe] DC congress critters to make laws that would get me or my company out of the blender.

A better answer.

Goldman Sachs will place our people inside key government offices who will get me or our company out of the blender, and increase our size to become giants by earning us trillions of dollars; destroy our competitors; forgo any taxes; not pay any taxes; and do anything we wish.

[andy58-in-nh]

I enjoy when companies (or schools) ask interview questions that have no "right" answer, but are essentially tests of character, comprehension or simply to see what's going on in your head.

My sister once told me she had a question like that on a college philosophy final exam: "Prove that the chair you're sitting in does not exist". In answer, she wrote only two words: "What chair?" She got an "A". True story.

[proudofthesouth]

The question doesn’t state that the blender is on so I would get on top of the blades and hurl myself to one side throwing my arms over the lip and climb out.

[Political Junkie Too]

I would say, "If the technology existed to shrink a person to the size of pencil, I would not want to work for a company that misused it by putting people into blenders like Saddam Hussein wannabes."

-PJ

[isom35]

I would claim I’m still too big to fail and ask for a bail-out.

[Delta Dawn]

The point of the question is to attempt to see how a person thinks. The actual question is irrelevant, how the applicant produces an answer is what the interviewer wants to witness.

My answer would have been to have to tell the first person that walks by to get the lead out!.

Part of the reason I don’t work for GS.

[papasmurf]

1st method: If the blender were not on, I would simply climb atop the spindle and jump up, grasping the rim, and hoist myself over the top. The average pencil is 7 inches long, the spindle on my blender is 3.25 inches from the bottom, my blender is 11.75 inches from the curvature of the bottom to the rim.

2nd method: If the blender were on, and full of a liquid, I would simply hold my breath, make myself as aerodynamic as possible, and catch the upward flow in order to grasp the rim.

3rd method: If the blender were on, and otherwise empty, I would lay low, beneath the spinning blades, and wait for it to be turned off.

Off course, I assume it is full of liquid, if on, otherwise it would be an egregious eco-faux pas to turn on an empty, carbon spewing, blender.

[Minn]

Goldman Sachs has a notoriously difficult interview process. According to Glassdoor.com, interviewers are subjected to a number of tests...

"Interviewees" maybe? There are apparently no editors at this publication.

[ReneeLynn]

I agree with the guy who said slam against the sides and rock it until it tips. That handles whether or not there is a lid on as well.

But, it is still a stupid question.

[savage woman]

Oh, a reality question! I would do like I always do - ask plenty of questions before answering.
Is the lid off? Is the blender operational? Are there other pencil size people around who can help? Are there bad pencil size people around just in case answer to question 2 is yes?

[philman_36]

"If you were shrunk to the size of a pencil and put in a blender, how would you get out?"
Tip it over and walk out.

[liberteeny]

Does not the base with blades detach from the glass? I’d Plant my feet firmly on the base, extend my arms and twist the glass to seperate it from the base. Knock over the glass part and crawl out the hole in the bottom.

Do I get the job?

[Kalvnz]

Simple...the same way David Blaine did...duh?