The leaderless group interview, also known as the group interview, is a common interview process in university club interviews and job interviews. The key lies in unifying ideas and coming up with a group plan.
The role played by an individual in the group, whether it is beneficial to teamwork, whether he contributes to the team, and whether he exerts his competitive advantages, becomes one of the keys to whether or not one passes the group interview.
This kind of group interview was the interview method that Mei Fang hated the most in his previous life, because as a 2D otaku, he was really socially anxious and introverted. In this kind of session where everyone expressed their opinions, he was often so nervous that he couldn't speak clearly.
In fact, in sessions like this, whoever shows a stronger side will often easily become an opinion leader, regardless of whether the reasons are sufficient or not.
Ordinary people like Mei Fang in his previous life are more likely to choose to accommodate and compromise for fear of making mistakes. They are forced to cater to the team's ideas by the team, which leads to their talents not being fully displayed. This also made his subsequent career planning a mess and he was unable to enter a powerful large company to display his talents.
This time, I suddenly decided to take part in the interview again. In addition to reviewing my past experiences, I also wanted to make up for my regrets and see where I was wrong in the first place.
After a short preparation, Mei Fang's group was divided. There were 7 people in the group, all of whom were interviewing for the position of game planner. The gender distribution was 4 men and 3 women. Everyone spent two minutes introducing themselves at the beginning. Most of them talked about their names, colleges, and favorite games. When it was Mei Fang's turn to introduce himself, he also stood up and spoke:
"Hello everyone, my name is Zhang Ming. I am a freshman majoring in game design at Pengcheng University. I play a lot of games and have been designing some game demos since I was very young."
Mei Fang paused, then continued with a somewhat provocative attitude, "I am a huge fan of Yuanbao and Miss. I have been following them since they debuted!"
Although Xia Yuan and Lin Youxi are now very well-known public figures, they are the bosses of this company after all. Although a few people mentioned the Big Three when introducing them before, almost no one dared to express their liking so directly. Instead, they showed admiration and respect. Therefore, Mei Fang's speech quickly attracted everyone's attention.
This guy... really thinks he is the webmaster!
Of course, the interviewers did not directly express their opinions on these. The HR in charge of the interview, Orange, came to the conference table and used a small projector to show everyone the topics of this group interview.
[If Yuanxi Interactive Entertainment's original work "The Early Bird Gets the Flow" wants to launch a sequel, where do you think it should improve its gameplay in order to have a chance to replicate the success of the first generation? ]
"The Early Bird Gets the Flow" is Mei Fang's debut work that he started researching in elementary school, but it was not officially released until junior high school. This work started in the early days of the smart phone era and eventually earned Mei Fanghao nearly 2 million yuan in revenue.
"The Early Bird" can be said to be the earliest breadwinner of Station C. The expensive bandwidth fees and expenses for the operation and maintenance of Station C in the early days were almost entirely dependent on this work and Mei Fang's income from football betting. After interviewing Mei Fang and learning about his story of becoming rich and famous, "The Early Bird" also has a high status in Yuanxi Interactive Entertainment.
Of course, since Early Bird Flies First has been popular for several years, in order to help some newcomers who have not done their homework in time to understand the work, Orange still briefly demonstrated the gameplay of Early Bird Flies First. Of course, it is still very simple and easy to operate, so there is no need to look at it too much. Everyone was given 5 minutes to think freely.
As soon as Orange finished speaking, everyone started writing things down on paper. As for his debut work, Mei Fang naturally didn't have much to take notes on. He was now observing the performance of his team members and interviewers.
Most people had obviously done their homework in advance. They took a look at the topic and started to make a tree diagram from the bottom. Only two girls were still watching the video demonstration of the early bird catches the worm carefully. Orange was walking around the interns who were being interviewed, as if observing everyone's steps and ideas. When it came to Mei Fang, he was found spinning a pen and staring at others, which surprised him.
This little brother... Is he not nervous at all? It's too much to not prepare... Or is he just too nervous? I don't understand...
Orange was surprised at Mei Fang's calmness, when two other interviewers arrived. One was Xiye, the current chief planner of Coconut Juice Studio of Yuanxi Interactive Entertainment, and the other was Bai Ge, a young lady who was recruited to do administrative and personnel work in Jiangcheng Times. As soon as they came in, Orange handed the resume he received to Bai Ge, his senior.
Bai Ge took a look at the resumes and compared them, then immediately asked in a puzzled voice: "Why did we only receive 6 resumes?"
"Sorry, Sister Baige, one of the interviewees forgot to bring his resume..."
After hearing this, White Dove immediately pulled Orange aside and muttered:
"If you didn't bring your resume, you can print it directly from our place. Why didn't you print it at the beginning? Have you confirmed that it's the person who passed the resume screening? What if he's an interview bully?"
"Ah, this..."
Chengzi scratched his head a little embarrassedly, "Sorry, Sister Baige, I didn't think it through... I saw that he was quite anxious, so I let him prepare for the written test and interview first..."
"You are too casual. It's hard enough for us to screen resumes. How much manpower cost are you wasting like this?"
"I'm sorry... Sister Bai Ge, I will pay more attention next time."
Chengzi scratched his head very embarrassedly and said, "Should I wait until the group interview is over before confirming that student's resume?"
While the two interviewers were grumbling, Xiye had been staring at Mei Fang's back with a frown on his brows. This feeling of déjà vu made him unable to help but walk forward to observe. When his eyes met Mei Fang's, he saw Mei Fang holding his chin and making a gesture of silence, so he immediately ran over in a hurry to greet the two of them.
"No, no need to confirm..."
"Do you know him?"
Bai Ge asked doubtfully.
"You'll know if you go and take a look yourself..."
Xiye wiped her face, then tilted her head and looked at the HR interviewer Chengzi who was standing beside her. After shaking her head, she asked, "Didn't you confirm his identity immediately before you met him?"
"Ah? I, there are a lot of people here..."
After a while, Bai Ge also made eye contact with Mei Fang. When she came back, her face was pale with fear. She was usually calm and capable, but now she was so worried that she could not even walk steadily.
"Sister Bai Ge...what happened?"
Bai Ge held his forehead and sighed, "It seems that during the induction training, you really were asked to remember the faces of the three giants..."
"Okay, okay... Time is up. Now it's time for a 10-minute free discussion. Everyone can speak freely."
"Let me go first!"
A boy who looked very lively immediately came up to speak. "Generally speaking, leaderless group discussions need to be timed, so I will be the timekeeper and record everyone's speaking time to avoid exceeding the time limit and affecting other people's speeches. Do you have any opinions?"
This interview was also the first time for many freshmen. Everyone just looked at each other for a while, and immediately expressed their approval. Then they started a verbal battle with each other. Everyone spoke in turn and expressed their own opinions, making additive designs around the gameplay design of the early bird catches the worm.
Mei Fang first stared at everyone, and then found that Orange, who was enthusiastic and cheerful, was now standing aside with his head down, wiping his eyes from time to time as if he was crying. So he lowered his head to play with his mobile phone, and added Bai Ge, Xi Ye and Orange to the work group to send a message.
[Don't put so much pressure on me. I'm not here to inspect your work results. I just wanted to experience the interview on a whim. Just treat me as an interview member! ]
[Actually, I think Chengzi did a pretty good job. She was very enthusiastic and proactive towards the students who came to participate in the interview, which is very consistent with our Yuanxi Interactive Entertainment's humanistic corporate culture! Okay, don't say anything about her! Come on.emoji]
Bai Ge, who was standing by, saw the message on the phone and immediately pulled Chengzi aside to show her. When Chengzi looked at Mei Fang in surprise, Mei Fang smiled and greeted her with her eyes, which made Chengzi feel relieved.
call…
How did I do this
If it was the CEO of another company, it would be fine.
Our boss had posters all over the place a while ago, how come I didn’t recognize him right away!
Obviously, Orange had never thought that the big boss Mei Fang would come to work, and he couldn't react at all at the first moment.
Finally it was Mei Fang's turn to stand up and speak. As the last speaker, although he was a little distracted just now, he also clearly reviewed the opinions of the previous six people.
“I think everyone has their own reasons. Improving the performance from the art perspective, changing the packaging to a more trendy style, adding various props, gameplay and level elements, these additions can indeed improve the quality of the product to a certain extent, but I hope to provide everyone with a new perspective.”
“That’s the development time and the core success of Early Bird.”
"This work was created not long after the birth of smartphones. Social apps such as Facebook and other international platforms had just emerged. Everyone was eager to show themselves on social platforms or find a common topic."
"And Early Bird is essentially a product that came into being at this time - it is actually difficult to be considered a game with deep gameplay, but rather a social software."
"This type of helicopter game has actually been around since the Symbian era, but it was only because of the sharing loopholes on social platforms that it became so popular."
"But now three years have passed, and the current Internet platform is no longer the scarce one it was in the past. We do not deny that there will be social games with different gameplay in the future, but can games like "Starting 1st" really become popular again? I think there is a question mark on this topic..."
Before Mei Fang finished his speech, one of the boys immediately expressed his dissatisfaction. He stood up and said:
"I have actually thought of this student's point of view, but I hope you don't rely on disagreeing with everyone to attract the attention of the interviewers. The premise of our topic this time is the strategy for the sequel of "The Early Bird Gets First", not whether "The Early Bird Gets First" should have a sequel. I don't think this is a topic that should be discussed in a leaderless group discussion..."
"The leaderless group discussion itself is a kind of brainstorming, but if the arguments themselves are not sufficient, I think it is okay to question them. Now we are not employees of Yuanxi Interactive Entertainment, but have you ever thought about it? If your superior assigns you a task that you think is impossible to complete, you have to bite the bullet and do it. Will you be satisfied if you can do it to the extent that your superior thinks it is OK?"
"I-"
"My dear students, please calm down now. It is time for everyone to express their opinions. Now is the time for free discussion."
The boy in charge of timing interrupted the two people's statements and continued, "Although the topic of this discussion is indeed based on "The Early Bird 2", after listening to Zhang Ming's speech, I have the same idea."
"In fact, when I was doing some calculations just now, I was also thinking that even if this kind of gameplay is added, the core essence is still a kind of jumping music, and to be honest, the appeal of the IP of "Old Bird First" is really limited to us, not to mention that it actually suffered polarized criticism in the market at that time, whether it was a game or not."
At this time, a girl stood up and said, "But doesn't this mean that we have to overturn all the results of our previous discussions? Giving a report is telling the interviewer that we don't have a way to make "Startling Bird 2" popular?"
Mei Fang nodded gently, "Haven't you ever encountered this kind of situation in group interviews at university? The group interview topic given by the club is a trap in itself. It doesn't mean that you have to give an answer that caters to the topic."
"Now that I think about it... I did encounter a similar situation when I was interviewing for a job at a psychology association..."
The other girl with glasses thought for a moment and said, "I also think that the success of Early Bird is hard to replicate. So, does this mean that we should give a negative answer and submit it to the interviewers?"
"Of course not. The key point at work is that when you express doubts about a plan, you must come up with a new plan to compensate. Otherwise, your superiors will just think you are looking for trouble."
As Mei Fang was speaking, the boy who had just opposed him stood up and said, "Yes, that's what I mean... If everyone just denies the point of view without proposing a new compensation plan, then when you report to the interviewer, won't it seem pale and powerless?"
“So, I think we can still make "Starting Bird 2", but we should not be limited to adding to the original. In fact, we can directly take the core selling points of the original, completely subvert the original performance, and make a "Starting Bird 2" with a completely different style. Wouldn't it be more interesting?”
Okay, the changes are done.
(End of this chapter)