Killer Interview Question: How Do You Deal With A Bomb With 90 Seconds On The Timer?

Another entry in the list of killer interview questions: You work on the 60th floor of 100 story building. You walk into your office and find a bomb sitting on your desk. It reads 90 seconds and is counting down. What do you do?

Image: Alexandre Dulaunoy

Screaming “I’m A Teapot!” and hiding underneath the desk is almost certainly the worst possible answer. The question itself is a favourite of Dropbox, because clearly the movers and shakers there like dropping bombs of interview questions.

It’s a tricky one to answer, as well, because the more obvious answers — throw it out the window and such — are easily seen as you deflecting stressful issues, not to mention endangering public safety generally.

There’s only one genuinely good answer here — defuse the bomb — but it’s only really applicable if you’re going for an interview as a bomb defusing technician. So what you’ve got to show in your answer is that you’re somehow taking charge in what is a particularly impossible situation.

How would you answer the question?

How to answer 11 fiendishly hard interview questions posed by Google, Microsoft, and Dropbox [Business Insider]


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