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If you interviewed for a job as a customer service representative at one company you may be asked this question: "If you were in the movie 'The Wizard of Oz,' which character do you most relate with and why?"

“Why are manhole covers round?”

Most of us are prepared for standard job interview questions such as “What’s your biggest weakness?” and “Are you a people person?”

But what happens when you get hit with a bizarre and unexpected question from a hiring manager such as:

“How can I get to some gold in the middle of the Amazon in the cheapest way possible?”

This question was asked of a job seeker who interviewed for an associate project manager position at Google in Mountain View, Calif., and it’s No. 1 on the Top 10 list of oddball interview questions asked by hiring managers. The list — compiled by Glassdoor.com, a jobs website where people post their job-hunting experiences — was culled from thousands of questions submitted by job seekers this year. 

While unusual questions have always been part of the interviewing landscape, things have gotten increasingly weird in the employment trenches during the tough economy, said Rusty Rueff, Glassdoor’s career and workplace expert.

With more than 8 percent unemployment, some human resource professionals may think you guys are willing to put up with a lot.

Given that power seems to have shifted from the employee to the employer, Rueff said that some interviewers “take advantage of some people and there can be a little hazing that goes on. That’s not fair, but it is what it is.”

In many cases, he added, employers just want to see how creative you can be, and whether you can think on your feet and not get flustered by a curveball question.

His advice: “Put your best foot forward, roll with the punches and don’t get angry.”

He suggested talking out loud through complex and strange questions so a hiring manager can hear your thought process.

For example, if you’re asked, “Why are manhole covers round?” you should take a deep breath and think to yourself, “Why are they round?” Then, answer the question out loud in several parts if need be, such as: “They’re easier to move, or stake. And they could be round so they can’t fall through the hole.”

Bottom line, he stressed, you can’t prepare for such questions so don’t sweat them.

Or you can just write off hiring managers who ask such crazy questions, suggested communications consultant Mark Jeffries, author of "What's Up With Your Handshake?"

“If you’re asked how to get to a pot of gold in the middle of a jungle it’s time to say bye-bye,” he said, adding that employers are going through so many job candidates these days that they’ve “gone insane. Do you really want to work with a company that approaches employment like that?”

Here’s the rest of Glassdoor's Top10 oddball question list:

• “Tell me the restaurant where you dined last night?” – Ernst & Young consultant candidate (location n/a) 
• “Do you feel you had a normal childhood?” – Gentex mechanical engineer candidate (Zeeland, Mich.) 
• “If you can grow anything on a tree, what would it be?” – Red Frog Events event coordinator candidate (Chicago, Ill.) 
• “If you were in the movie 'The Wizard of Oz,' which character do you most relate with and why?” – National Contract Management Association customer service representative candidate (Ashburn, Va.) 
• “Would you rather be ranked No. 1 in the office and hated by everyone or No. 15 in the office but well-liked?” – ADP outside sales representative candidate (location n/a) 
• “If you were stranded on a deserted island, what three things would you want to have with you?” – Cisco Human Resources manager candidate (location n/a) 
• “Jeff Bezos walks into your office and says you can have a million dollars to launch your best entrepreneurial idea. What is it?" – Amazon product development candidate (Seattle, Wash.) 
• “My clock is nine minutes slow every hour. At noon, it tells the correct time. After how many hours will it again tell the correct time?” – Bloomberg L.P. financial applications engineer candidate (New York, N.Y.) 
• “If you had five red balls that contained four red balls and those red balls contained the original five red balls, then how many sets of sets of balls would I take to have a double set of red balls of varying sizes inside each next largest red ball?” – Goldman Sachs investment banking vice president candidate (New York, N.Y.)

 Have you been asked an odd interview questions recently? If so, what was it?

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While asking general questions about age or religion aren't clear-cut under discrimination laws, queries about a person's disability are not allowed.

Are you pregnant? What religion are you? How old are you?

There are certain questions most of us don’t expect hiring managers to ask during a job interview because we think they’re too personal or even illegal.

But while such inquiries aren’t always legal no-nos, they can be hazardous.

Cynthia M. applied for a job at Florida insurer, and believed she was more than qualified for the position. But during the interview she was asked about her religion and probed about her marital status.

“I was asked point-blank if I attended church and ‘which one?’ ” said Cynthia, who didn’t want her full name used because she feared it would hurt her continued job search. She was also asked if she had a family. When she told the recruiter she had a daughter, the interviewer asked, “Is that all?”

“That particular interview was very brief and there was zero response to my carefully thought-out letter I sent after the interview as a follow-up,” she explained. “I guess he didn't like that I was a single parent.”

A reader on our Facebook page, Linda Och, wrote recently that during a phone interview for a job she was asked her birth date and age. “I never heard from the employer again. I feel it was the cause of my not hearing about a second interview,” she maintained.

“Is this not discrimination?” she asked.

While you can’t refuse to hire someone based on a characteristic that’s protected under the nation’s labor laws, including things like religion or age, questioning a job applicant about such things by itself isn’t going to get government discrimination defenders banging down any company doors.

What happens as far as hiring decisions after the questions are asked is what ends up getting employers in legal hot water.

“Pre-employment inquires about a person's race, sex or pregnancy, national origin, religion or age are not technically illegal under the laws we enforce as long as they are asked of all people,” said Justine Lisser, a spokeswoman and senior attorney for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.

Dads, are you feeling pressure to do it all?

“Employment decisions made on those bases -- such as denying employment to all pregnant women, or everyone who isn't a Christian, are illegal, however,” she continued. “When investigating a charge of discrimination, the EEOC will look at these types of pre-employment inquiries as indications of discriminatory intent.”

Nigel Telman, an attorney with Proskauer, an employment law firm that represents employers, said questions related to protected categories such as age or religion may seem innocuous to some hiring managers but can end up causing problems down the line. “An applicant who didn’t get the job can allege they told the employer something about a protected characteristic,” he noted.

Indeed, if there turns out to be a pattern pointing to discrimination against a certain group or groups, such questions may become substantiation of illegal practices.

In the case of Texas Roadhouse, questions by hiring managers about age are part of anecdotal evidence in the age-discrimination case against the restaurant chain brought by the EEOC last year.

The EEOC case alleges that managers were instructed to hire younger job applicants, and that older unsuccessful applicants nationally were told: “There are younger people here who can grow with the company” and “You seem older to be applying for this job.”

Texas Roadhouse officials did not immediately return a telephone call requesting a comment.

While asking general questions about age or religion aren’t clear-cut under discrimination laws, queries about a person’s disability are not allowed.

Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, employers are prohibited pre-employment inquiries about an applicant’s disability, according to the EEOC.  

The agency states on its “pre-employment inquires” web page that:

• Employers generally cannot ask disability-related questions or require medical examinations until after an applicant has been given a conditional job offer. 
• Employers are permitted to ask limited questions about reasonable accommodation if they reasonably believe that the applicant may need accommodation because of an obvious or voluntarily disclosed disability, or where the applicant has disclosed a need for accommodation.

In addition, it’s illegal to ask questions about genetic information or family medical history under the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, the EEOC’s Lisser pointed out.

And, she added, “It is also illegal for an employer to advertise for specific characteristics such as sex, age or race.” 

Given that personal questions could lead to claims of bias, you’d think employers would have abandoned the practice already.

“Some managers need a reminder that these questions are hazardous to the company,” said Richard Howard, an employment attorney with Meltzer Lippe. “Hiring managers should absolutely steer clear of questions regarding age, race, religion, pregnancy, and marital status.”

Has a hiring manager ever asked you an inappropriate question related to age, race, religion, pregnancy, health, or marital status? Share your story below. 

Job seekers expect to have two or three interviews with an employer before they land a position. But 10 interviews?

Ebonee Younger’s interview odyssey began in September when she embarked on her quest to land an HR manager’s position at a rental truck company.

Ten interviews and a lot of sweat equity later, Younger, who lives in Birmingham, Ala., ended up not getting the gig.

“The whole experience cost me two new suits, a new pair of shoes, $40 in stationery and postage -- I wrote handwritten notes to almost everyone I spoke with -- two paid time-off days, and $200 plus in taxi fare,” she explained.

“I'm not so much irritated that I didn't get the job, I was just disappointed in the candidate experience,” she noted. “I really believe they could have, and should have, made a decision earlier in the process.”

Unfortunately, Younger’s interview purgatory is not unusual. Employers are increasingly putting applicants through a seemingly endless cycle of interviews these days, a byproduct of the tight labor market. Some hiring managers feel they have the upper hand because unemployment, at over 8 percent, is still relatively high so they can put candidates through a hiring rigmarole. Others are just too inept to trust their own judgment, or are fearful a wrong hire will get them in hot water.

“We have found employers take a lot longer to select someone these days,” said Charley Polachi, co-founder of executive recruiting firm Polachi Inc.

“During the boom, hiring decisions were made in a snap,” he explained. But now, “there’s this perception of a big supply of people so they keep interviewing.”

Besides, he added, most managers today aren’t good or effective interviewers because budget cuts have done away with any real training on how to hire.

And it’s not just employers looking to fill permanent jobs who are putting candidates through the interview wringer. Adecco, one of the nation’s top temporary staffing firms, has seen an uptick in the number of interviews required for temps as well.

“The interview process for those applying to these jobs are more frequently being conducted as if they are being looked at for permanent positions,” said Bob Kovalsky, senior vice president for Adecco Staffing. 

Some believe the lengthy process for all gigs today is all about money.

“Companies shouldn’t just settle for a seat filler because they need someone right away,” maintained Josh Tolan, CEO of Spark Hire, an online video job board. “A bad hire is more than just a mistake, it could be detrimental to the success of your team and your company.”

Tolan estimated that “nearly 46 percent of new hires fail within 18 months, and a bad hiring decision can cost a company upwards of 200 percent of a year’s salary.”

Despite such numbers, job seekers put through weeks of interviewing are beginning to feel like contestants in a never-ending beauty pageant.

Ginger Mathews, who lives in Phoenix, started her quest to land a trainer job with an insurance firm in January and eight interviews later she’s still in limbo.

This is how it all went down, she says:

• One phone interview that lasted 40 minutes.
• A few days later, that was followed by a one hour 15 minute Skype interview.
•  A week later, that was followed by a 45-minute in-person interview at a corporate office about 20 minutes away.
• That was immediately followed by another 45-minute in-person interview at the corporate office, which was followed by another 45-minute in-person interview.
• About a week to ten days later, a one-hour in-person interview at the corporate office about 20 minutes away, which was immediately followed by another one-hour in-person interview at the corporate office, which was followed by another one-hour in-person interview at the same corporate office, on the same day. 

She went through a similar endless chain of interviews for a sales coaching job with another employer, but ended up with no job.

Tons of interviews may seem like a good problem to have for many job seekers who have been unable to get past the online application to  talk to a human being, but endless interviews and no job can be just as frustrating.

“These jobs do not come with six-figure incomes and it is not as though I am applying for jobs where I am responsible for great sums of money, or working as an aide to President Obama,” Matthews explained.

“I have to ask, is this the new norm?” pondered Matthews, who is scheduled for her ninth interview with the insurance company on Monday.

Carlos Davila / Getty

While narcissists are good at landing the job, they ultimately tend to bring a toxic component into the office environment.

While most of us are careful to avoid over-advertising our talents, that may not be the best way to land a job, a new study shows. Researchers have determined that when it comes to interviews, narcissists do it better because they’re not at all shy about self-promoting, according to the study published in the Journal of Applied Social Psychology.

“The point is that these guys – and girls – are very successful in interview settings,” said the study’s lead author, Peter Harms, an assistant professor of management at the University of Nebraska. “Under high pressure they increase their self- promotion. They talk a lot and they talk fast. And people tend to mistake that fast talking as a sign of competence and intelligence. They think that fast talkers have a lot to say and know the material so well that they don’t need to pause and think about it.”         

While narcissists are good at landing the job, they ultimately tend to bring a toxic component into the office environment, Harms said. “It’s a terrible strategy long term to behave the way they do,” he added. “They have shorter relationships. And people rate them more negatively.”

To look at how well narcissists score in job interviews, Harms and his colleagues rounded up 72 college students and asked them to do a simulated job interview for a position as a research assistant. Before the interviews, however, the students were given IQ tests and a survey designed to ferret out the narcissists among them.

The study volunteers were told that the simulated job application was a way to hone their interviewing skills – and some probably assumed their performance might eventually turn into an actual job, Harms explained.

All of the simulated interviews were videotaped so that they could be reviewed later. Some of the interviewees were told that their interviewer was a lowly assistant, while others were told that the interviewer was an expert in the field.

Most of the volunteers were comfortable doing some self-promoting  –  except when they were talking to an “expert” interviewer who challenged them. The “normal” volunteers backed down when they felt they were being held accountable, but the narcissists just turned up the heat.

“When they feel challenged, they tend to double down,” Harms said. “It’s as if they say, ‘Oh, you’re going to challenge me? Then I’m not just great, I’m fantastic.’ ”

And that strategy, apparently works. In the second part of the study , 222 raters – some students and some experts in psychology – judged the competence of the videotaped job-seekers.

Sure enough, most people were more impressed by the narcissists than the “normal,” applicants. Harms was surprised to see that the experts,  graduate students and faculty from the psychology department who were well versed in narcissistic behaviors, were just as impressed with the narcissists performance in  interviews as everyone else.  

The study should be a lesson to us all, Harms said. If we can learn to be a narcissist for just the day of the job interview we might manage to level the playing field, he added. Until then, “they’re going to beat us.”

Bryan Smith / Zuma Press

Sure, a $500 million jackpot is big, but after taxes ... better just tell the hiring manager you would have to think about your options.

The Mega Millions lottery jackpot has hit a record $500 million. Would you quit working if you won it?

If you have a job interview this week, that is hardly an idle question.

The lottery, to be drawn Friday, is on a lot of people’s minds this week, and as a result hiring managers may pull out a doozy of an interview question.

Joyce Lain Kennedy, author of “Job Interviews for Dummies,” calls the lottery question one of the top 10 “prime-time tricky probes” employers lay on workers these days.

When you answer the lottery question -- or any interview question -- you want to leave out any inkling you’re not excited about working hard, no matter what the circumstances.

“Recruiters report that high numbers of job seekers blab negative information without realizing they’re making a farewell address to a job opportunity,” Kennedy said.

Even if you would dump work in a heartbeat following such a windfall, it’s best to keep your feelings to yourself.

Kennedy advised responding along these lines: “While you’d be thrilled to win the lottery, you’d still seek out fulfilling work because working, meeting challenges and scoring accomplishments are what make most people happy, including you.” And don’t forget, she added, to “say it with a straight face.”

Many of you would have no problem with the question, based on an unscientific poll of my 13,000-plus Twitter followers.  When I asked, “Would you stay in your job if you won the lottery?” more than 90 percent offered a resounding “yes.”

Most comments were along the lines of @heatherecoleman’s tweet: "Yes - I love what I do!"

But a few tweeters were contemplating post-winnings career adjustments.  “There would be major course change," said @ed_mcfarland.

For some employers, the best answer to the lottery question is one that’s honest.

“I think it is worse for the candidate to say that they would stay, never leave, etc.,” said David Lewis, president of HR consulting firm OperationsInc. “I’m looking for honesty and real people vs. fakers who are trying to tell me what they think I want to hear.”

Others believe an answer that sounds like you’re looking for any reason to get away from the daily grind is troublesome.

Ken Wisnefski, CEO of Internet marketing firm WebiMax, often asks applicants a lottery-type question: “What would you do with $1 million?”

“I have had one gentleman say, ‘I wouldn’t be here right now,’ and that gentleman did not receive a second interview," he said. "I have, however, heard responsible answers including, ‘I would invest it and grow it to $2 million.’  That response earned a second interview and eventually a position at my company.”

Patricia Siderius, managing director of executive outplacement services at BPI group, offered a good suggestion for an answer to the lottery question: “I would need time to understand how this fortune will or will not change my life.”

A life change is exactly what Benjamin Flynn, 38, a New York City cab driver, is worried about and why he’s not sure he even wants to win millions.

“Money is the root of all evil,” he said. But, he added, if he did win he’d quit his job and go back to school to become a surgical nurse.

Before we all start planning our lives post lottery-winnings, it may be time for a reality check.

Your chances of winning the Mega Millions is 1 in 176 million, according to Jim Lackritz, professor of management information systems at the San Diego State University’s College of Business Administration. “Not a good chance, and not worth it,” he said.

An individual winner of Friday's jackpot could elect to take an immediate cash payout of $359 million before taxes.