I went to an interview last week.  I was looking forward to the interview as I had heard good things about the company and they knew what good testing was all about.  It looked like a good opportunity and the project sounded interesting.

I liked the interviewer and I answered all the questions as honestly as I could.  Most of the questions were situational, of the format “what would you do if….?” Which makes you think about what you would do based on your own experience.

At the end of the interview, the interviewer told me that I would not be getting the position.  I asked why and was told that I was “too nice” for the role.  I know a few people who would disagree with any sentence that had my name and the word “nice” in it, however, the interviewer explained that the role required someone who, in the interviewer’s words, was a “b*****d” due to the nature of the project and the personalities involved and I didn’t have the personality required.  It became clear that the project had an aggressive character; there was a lot of political manoeuvring; conflict was the norm.  A female friend of mine calls such projects TDD.  No, not “Test Driven Development” but “Testosterone Driven Development”.

I left the interview somewhat disappointed and deflated.  One the way home, I reflected on the answers I had given in the interview and tried to work out what answers the interviewer was looking for.  I came up with some answers that maybe would have fit the bill and worked out that, had I given them, they would not have been a true reflection of the way I like to work.  I finally had to agree with the interviewer, I was not the right person for the position and I would not have done a good job in it.  Clearly, the interviewer was a good judge of character!

However, I was still non-plussed by the “too nice” tag.  I have been called a few things as a Test Manager, but “too nice” has never been one of them!  So, I examined the answers I had given and compared them with the ones that the interviewer wanted and I came to the conclusion (which I knew already) that I like to work in a co-operative environment where everyone is working as a team towards a common goal.

A co-operative environment does not mean that you are always nice to each other, hugs and kisses around the meeting room are not going to help the project, and I have my fair share of violent disagreements and arguments but they are almost always concerned with the project, not personalities.  I firmly believe that the co-operative environment gets the job done with better quality, lower cost and quicker than in a non-co-operative environment.  If you are all pulling together with the same aim and following the same agenda, things work better.

But, what do you do if you find yourself in an aggressive environment?  It has happened to me as I am sure it has happened to a number of us.  My first reaction is to be co-operative, even in that environment, and it can work, I have proved it.  I have one particular example where I turned an aggressive environment into a co-operative one.  OK, it took me some months and a lot of hard work, but I got there.  If trying the co-operative approach does not work, then you may have to get aggressive yourself, but if it is not in your nature you will find it difficult – I find it difficult and can only keep it up for a short period of time.

So, going back to this position I didn’t get.  A part of me wonders if I could have turned it around and made it into a co-operative environment.  I will never know.  The interviewer would not take the risk with me and in the interviewer’s place I wouldn’t have taken the risk with me either, the interviewer made exactly the right decision, in my opinion.

I’ll stick with believing in the co-operative environment, but I doubt I will ever hear anyone call me “too nice” again!