Is it a good idea to mention skydiving in job interviews?

[ShcShc11 0]

A definite random question, but

I'm 21 and going through a job hunt in the accounting/auditing field and a question that is re-occurring is:
"what is your hobby/activity that you do for fun?"

Is it a good idea to mention skydiving?

I'm a little weary to give the impressions to the firms (whuffos) and give them the impression I could get severely injured (death) after a few years working with the firm.

Secondly, older partners (50 yrs old+) might perceive it as a rather juvenile activity?

Just wondering.
Thanks.

[BrokenR1 0]

I remember another thread that talked about it or at least it got sidetracked into it. But I don't see the point. What does it have to do with your job? Unless you get into talking about hobbies or what you like to do outside work, then it's your call.

ETA: Found the similar thread, http://www.dropzone.com/cgi-bin/forum/gforum.cgi?post=4114308;page=unread#unread

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Rap is to music what etch-a-sketch is to art.

[Amazon 7]

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A definite random question, but

I'm 21 and going through a job hunt in the accounting/auditing field and a question that is re-occurring is:
"what is your hobby/activity that you do for fun?"

Is it a good idea to mention skydiving?

I'm a little weary to give the impressions to the firms (whuffos) and give them the impression I could get severely injured (death) after a few years working with the firm.

Secondly, older partners (50 yrs old+) might perceive it as a rather juvenile activity?

Just wondering.
Thanks.

http://www.accountingdegree.com/blog/2011/the-10-best-hobbies-to-boost-your-career/

[Nataly 38]

I'm taking a stab in the dark here, and guessing your are a bit of an enthusiastic newby who finds it hard NOT to talk about skydiving all the time... Don't worry, practically everyone has gone through that phase... In time, skydiving will become less of a novelty and you will find less and less of an urge to yammer on about it to everyone and their dog!!

As for your question... Companies don't give a rats ass about what you do in your spare time... What they are trying to gather by asking personal questions is all the intangible stuff that makes you a good (or a bad) fit for the company/job. It's not so important what you answer - what counts is the impression you leave behind.

My guess is that as a new jumper, you will come across as an unreliable adrenaline-junkie if you mention skydiving because let's face it, that is probably how you see yourself! So the simple answer is: don't mention it.

"There is no problem so bad you can't make it worse."
- Chris Hadfield
« Sors le martinet et flagelle toi indigne contrôleuse de gestion. »
- my boss

[masterrig 1]

#1


Chuck

[airdvr 210]

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Companies don't give a rats ass about what you do in your spare time

They do if you're going to be on their group plan.

Please don't dent the planet.

Destinations by Roxanne

[JohnRich 4]

No.

If it comes up somehow, put the positive spin on it, by making the analogy about how jumps are organized; picking your people, knowing their strengths and weaknesses, practicing your role within the bigger plan, and so on. You can equate all those skills to business organization tasks too.

[CanuckInUSA 0]

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I'm 21 and going through a job hunt in the accounting/auditing field and a question that is re-occurring is:
"what is your hobby/activity that you do for fun?"

Is it a good idea to mention skydiving?

The vast majority of the job interviews I have ever been through (trust me I have been through a lot), I am hardly ever asked about "hobbies". Of course in my field (software development) if I am ever asked about my hobbies, what they really want to know is "what open source projects do I work on" and "what white papers have I published". A few years ago I was really into the swooping scene and the topic of "hobbies" did come up and I mistakenly told them that I was a competitive swooper. Guess what ... I did NOT get the job.

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I'm a little weary to give the impressions to the firms (whuffos) and give them the impression I could get severely injured (death) after a few years working with the firm.

Secondly, older partners (50 yrs old+) might perceive it as a rather juvenile activity?

There a plenty of activities that can kill you in life. I used to ski patrol at Lake Louise back in the 1990s and we would have several deaths per season at this major ski resort. Is telling your employer that you love to ski mean that you may die one day skiing? How about dying on the way to the ski resort? It happens. Skydiving is NOT a safe activity. Stay in the sport long enough and you will have dead friends and "knock on wood" you too will have your share of close calls. If I tell my work colleagues about skydiving, I tell them after I am in the door. Then I tell them that the gear is remarkably reliable (which it is). It's just too bad that the human using this remarkably reliable gear is not as reliable.

Oh and while the majority of skydivers are young. There are plenty of 50+ year old skydivers out there. So it's not a juvenile activity. I'm not 50 ... yet. But I am closer to 50 that I am to 20.

Try not to worry about the things you have no control over

[zen_mtn_climber 0]

I agree with Nataly that most likely the employers are using a personal question to guage how you'd fit within the organization.

I've been on a number of interview panels myself at a couple of different organizations and I've specifically asked questions that try to do just this.

Regardless of whether you bring up skydiving or some other hobby, be sure to follow John Rich's advice and immediately talk about the positives it brings in a business sense.

You can answer a hobby question in a couple of different ways . .

(1) "Well I like to skydive . ." and then stare at the interviewers. In this case you are allowing them to come to their own conculsion about you.

or something like

(2) "Well I love to skydive. One of things that I really love about it is that it's taught me how important it is to stay cool, collected and make decisive decisions in stressful situations. Group formation skydives has also really taught me the value of making a plan in advance and that each person's role within the team is equally valuable"

Here you're taking the initiative to shape their impression of you.

That's really what interviews are all about . . quickly giving interviewers a strong sense of your skills, personality, talents and how those will fit into the team they are building. This is your chance to sell yourself so do so when you can.

Just my $0.02
ZMC

"Whatever the future holds down the road, being true to yourself is something you won't ever regret doing. " - airtwardo

[billvon 3,096]

>Is it a good idea to mention skydiving?

Not unless it includes a skill that directly impacts your work. If you are applying for a job as teacher, for example, being an AFF-I has some validity. But so far my pilot's license has had far more applicability to my job than my AFF-I rating.

[MikeJD 0]

I think if it's going to be useful to mention it, then it will probably be for your next job when you've been around the sport for longer and have more jumps under your belt. As a relative newbie you may just appear gung ho or reckless.

After some time you've more chance of giving the impression that you can manage risk, assuming (fingers crossed) you've had no serious injuries. Hopefully you'll also have been part of a dedicated team, maybe even captained one, and have taken part in big organised events.

On the rare occasions that skydiving comes up at work, my managers sometimes joke about adding it to the project risk register. When I tell them I've been doing it for nearly 20 years and I'm relatively unlikely to die on their watch, they tend to ease off a little!

[shah269 0]

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"Well I love to skydive. One of things that I really love about it is that it's taught me how important it is to stay cool, collected and make decisive decisions in stressful situations. Group formation skydives has also really taught me the value of making a plan in advance and that each person's role within the team is equally valuable"

Very well put! Very well!

Life through good thoughts, good words, and good deeds is necessary to ensure happiness and to keep chaos at bay.

The only thing that falls from the sky is birdshit and fools!

[adagen 0]

Do your homework, find out who'll be interviewing you, and do a bit of research on them, then decide whether to mention skydiving. There are quite a few 50+ year olds out there who are into adrenaline sports. Researching the company leadership will give you an idea whether the culture is likely to be in favour of people who do adrenaline activities.

Anne

[davelepka 4]

Why would you bring it up? Think about this - how many people have responded, 'You're crazy' when you tell them you took up skydiving? Most people think it's crazy, and don't see it as something reasonable people do.

When looking for an employee, you want someone who will show up on time everyday, do the job correctly, and not make trouble in the office. What they do with their free time is not much of a concern.

However, when interviewing someone for a job, you're trying to predict their behavior in the above areas over a long period of time. So they take your resume, what you say, how you say it, and what you wear, and try to make an educated guess about you. Anything you do that could subtract from their impresson of you is going to hurt your chances for getting the job.

In terms of people who say that there might be a skydviver (or the like) in upper managment, that's not much of an argument. If there was, they would know that most of their employees will be non-jumpers and won't discriminate against someone for not jumping. On the other hand, I wouldn't be surprised at all to hear that a non-jumping manager chose to pass on hiring someone because they do jump.

I'm not suggesting you have to hide your jumping forever, just long enough to get the job and prove yourself to be a 'normal' and 'productive' employee, once you have that established, nobody will care what you do in your free time. (I mean that literally too, nobody is going to care that you're a jumper or want to hear anything about it beyond an initial 2 min conversation)

[BIGUN 1,468]

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Companies don't give a rats ass about what you do in your spare time

They do if you're going to be on their group plan.

They cannot ask questions regarding your hobbies or extracurricular activities, health or other issues that _may_ impact the group health plan.
And for the OP: if you _choose_ to answer the question, make it an activity they feel will be of benefit to your job or the organization (Golf, Chess, Volunteer organizations, etc).

Nobody has time to listen; because they're desperately chasing the need of being heard.