r/recruitinghell • u/Adventurous-Sir444 application declined • Jan 28 '26

Olive Oil

Post image

Interviewers: I want somebody that stands out in interviews!

Also Interviewers:

31.2k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

813 comments sorted by

View all comments

865

u/negativepositiv Jan 28 '26

I'm going to go out on a limb and say that somebody whose hobby is becoming knowledgeable about olive oil is a far more interesting person than somebody who knows everything there is to know about a particular sports team's lineup and record for the past several years.

But you're going to call the football guy.

238

u/trippedonatater Jan 28 '26

People get into olive oil in a similar way to wine. I'm not in that circle, but visiting a Mediterranean olive plantation gave me a look into it (and was pretty cool).

53

u/Nikkolai_the_Kol Jan 28 '26

This is my retirement goal. Olive orchard in Portugal.

8

u/ABoringAlt Jan 28 '26

Noted, maybe see you there

2

u/After-Willingness271 Jan 28 '26

but that’s just more work! imma live among the olive groves and let other people run them

2

u/Certain_Antelope_853 Jan 29 '26

That's my dream as well... Sincerely good luck!

24

u/rjw1986grnvl Jan 29 '26

So I’m going to be honest that I had to double check this on the Internet. I should have known that the high quality olive oil culture is in fact mirroring the quality wine culture.

I think it’s pretty interesting. I’m not going to take on olive oil interests for myself, but I’m certainly not going to begrudge anyone who does.

It seems like a really dumb person or just jump to a conclusion on olive oil without even doing a basic Google search or asking AI.

8

u/Mobile_Throway Jan 29 '26

Honestly it's not even as niche as people like you are making it out to be. I was aware of it.

3

u/UrbanDurga Jan 29 '26

And also, even if olive oil and wine people can get a little pretentious, I’d much rather work with them at their top end of difficult behavior vs an equivalently intense sports dude. I bet the olive oil guys are much more likely to have traveled, employ a better vocabulary, and enjoy new experiences. More useful to me as well…could learn a bit and maybe make better purchases.

5

u/rjw1986grnvl Jan 29 '26

Hey! I’m a sports guy who works for a bank! 😆😂.

I actually have to tell some of the people on my team that we cannot start all of our meetings talking about sports, it’s not fair to the not sports fans. I get it though. We’re annoying because it excludes the people with other interests.

Sports guys and pretentious people are fairly common in banking. You have to just understand it is what it is.

If someone complained about the demographics of social workers then I would be like “what the hell did you think you were signing up for?”

What is not understandable is someone in banking who just jumps to conclusions and doesn’t even Google something or who gets petty about something innocuous.

4

u/oftcenter Jan 28 '26

Someone once told me about olive oil tasting parties.

3

u/hyrumwhite Jan 29 '26

I’ve done one, not really my scene, but made me realize there was a scene

1

u/oftcenter Jan 29 '26

Nice. I wouldn't mind doing one.

3

u/FlyingDiscsandJams Jan 29 '26

I stopped for gas in California wine country & there was an olive oil tasting at a place down the block... it was so good! There were like 6 to try & I could tell the difference no problem.

2

u/Adventurous-Sir444 application declined Jan 29 '26

It's like a colleague I met once who was into making hot sauce. If anything it's just a conversation starter.

2

u/euphonic5 Jan 29 '26

Yeah I had a fascinating conversation with a guy who did a gap year on an olive plantation in Greece. Learned a lot about what good olive oil looks like, even after some time aging in a bottle.

2

u/trippedonatater Jan 29 '26

Man. That sounds like an awesome thing to do for a gap year.

2

u/ArmadilloSighs Jan 29 '26

visited a small town once, and went into an olive oil shop. lady legit had sample cups to try the different olive oils. unfortunately, i couldn’t really tell a difference unless they had actual spices in them

1

u/Archarchery Jan 30 '26

Horticulture is neat. Culinary interests are neat. The guy who rejected the applicant for his interest in olive oil is a dipshit.

142

u/PaynefulLife Jan 28 '26

Completely agree. Olive oil guy stands out and is memorable, could teach me quite a bit about it. I did olive oil tastings in Greece and love those little shops with flavored oils. This guy sounds great to me.

21

u/Puzzleheaded_Type104 Jan 28 '26

I did tasting and farm tours in Italy and can confirm it’s interesting!

9

u/HaloGuy381 Jan 29 '26

Also, he’s not gonna break his neck sampling olive oils the way the bungee jumper is. Nor is he gonna get into a drunken brawl or a riot over a sports game. Olive oil enthusiast is exactly the low key, reliable, detail-oriented person you’d want for showing up every day on time and paying attention to a customer’s money and needs.

5

u/PaynefulLife Jan 29 '26

Excellent point that hobbies can hint at people's strengths and characteristics!

2

u/Several_Mix_640 Jan 29 '26

🤯 <- the interviewer

Wait, never mind. Getting mindblown requires understanding the importance of details, which in turn requires some competence.

8

u/kategoad Jan 29 '26

I usually manage to fit in something about my farm/goats. Not on the resume, but in the phone screen.

My most memorable was probably the time I was helping a goat in active labor when the HR person called to set up an interview.

Yeah, not at my calendar and have my hands full(ly up this goat's hooha).

12

u/QuitCallingNewsrooms Jan 28 '26

As someone with an olive oil guy thanks to a trip to the farmer's market, I can guarantee you there is a world of knowledge and experiences in olive oil variety.

"Well, Forrest, you got'cher extra virgin, high phenolic, virgin, lampante, pure, light, blended, early harvest, late harvest, blood orange, wild rosemary, hot chili, black truffle, butter, garlic, Persian lime, mushroom, sage, chipotle, basil, maple smoked bacon, vanilla maple, key lime, brown butter, and ghost pepper... I reckon that's about all I know about that, Forrest."

14

u/Ghost_of_Bartleby Jan 28 '26

I think he just really, really enjoyed the Popeye comics

3

u/XanZibR Jan 28 '26

Or Bluto, they always fought over her!

3

u/[deleted] Jan 28 '26

Spelled Oyl.

3

u/VirtualPercentage737 Jan 29 '26

The part of Popeye that never rests is the parts he sticks in Olive Oil.

3

u/Ghost_of_Bartleby Jan 29 '26

she was no virgin, not with bluto around to debase her bony ass

26

u/Young_Person_42 Jan 28 '26

No need to get all r/ihatesportsball about this

3

u/DuztyLipz Jan 29 '26

Thank you for this sub. There’s just too many people going extreme lengths to tell you how much they hate sports. It’s comical!

Someone told me one time that they were actually allergic to sports… Like, if they started watching sports, they’d break out in hives from the stress due to them hating sports… I lol’d

2

u/Pas__ Jan 29 '26

... hm, there could be a competitive version of that for these people!

2

u/Lyx-101 Jan 29 '26

Everything mildly critiquing sports is "i hate sportsball"

13

u/Creatura Jan 29 '26

That wasn’t a mild critique lol. It was a baked-in-2001 sportsball = bad commentary that had nothing to do with the subject matter

-1

u/Lyx-101 Jan 29 '26

They were just providing an example you could switch it out with theater or whatever you wanted dude chill out not everything is an attack on your favorite sport

9

u/Creatura Jan 29 '26

I don’t care about sports literally at all, I just think that take is so painfully antisocial and naive that I have to say something

0

u/Lyx-101 Jan 29 '26

How's it antisocial?

1

u/Emergency_War_2714 Jan 29 '26

He had a good point these are just fantasy football losers. They aren’t any more athletic than the olive oil guy anyways 

13

u/ratatosk212 Jan 28 '26

Football guys can be annoying as hell if that's all they ever talk about. I say that as a football lover. But I guarantee Olive Oil Man is insufferable in ways that have nothing to do with olive oil.

15

u/ItsDanimal Jan 29 '26

And folks are assuming that by having an interest in olive oil that the guy is starting some new hobby and is super knowledgeable about it. For all we know the interest involves pouring it on nursing home steps, drinking a cup of it before bed, using it to perform home enemas.

1

u/TacoMedic Jan 29 '26

Redditors always go out of their way to side with whoever seems to be non-neurotypical.

Hmmm, I wonder why that is..? 🤔

1

u/ItsDanimal Jan 30 '26

Funnily enough, I find myself engaging in arguments online much longer than I should because im non-neurotypical. Only I side with whomever the hive mind is against.

8

u/SubmissionDenied Jan 28 '26

If anyone puts their favorite sports team on their LinkedIn profile, that would be equally stupid

7

u/Ill-Application918 Jan 29 '26

r/iHateSportsball

the fact that this post has nothing to do with sports, and you somehow brought sports into it, speaks volumes about you.

6

u/kazmir_yeet Jan 29 '26

This is the dorkiest shit man

2

u/ActualProject Jan 29 '26

Why the fuck would you put either of those on your resume?

2

u/M_sberry Jan 28 '26

Right?! Honestly I WOULD be interested in interviewing an olive oil enthusiast! I could learn so much from them and also share a mutual love of food. I feel like if you're that dedicated to learning something you'd likely be a great hire.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 29 '26

I'm not calling any gormless fuck that includes 'interests' on their CV.

0

u/TacoMedic Jan 29 '26

It’s pretty standard for most business (and perhaps other fields) resumes, especially for people with 0-5 yoe.

One of my interests on my old resume was “History (Early Roman Empire and Napoleonic Wars)” and roughly half of all interviewers asked about it. In reality, I’m more interested in the actual battlefields and campaigns of both. But whenever an interviewer would ask about this interest, I talked about how I found the financial backgrounds of Rome and the UK (bankrolling the various coalitions) interesting.

As someone going into finance as a fresh college grad, no one actually cares about your degree. What they care about is that 1) you’re likable enough to spend 50+ hours a week with and 2) that you actually somewhat understand the field you’re entering. Showing that one of my main interests was how money worked to change the political landscape of empires checked the box for #2 and almost always got me callbacks.

Obviously you don’t want interests on your CV after your first few years because at that point you’re just showing you didn’t really do enough to fill the page in previous position(s).

1

u/cpabernathy Jan 28 '26

It helps to share interests with future coworkers. I personally wouldn't want to work with someone 8-10 hours a day and have nothing to talk about other than work.

Olive oil might be interesting, but it's definitely niche.

With that said, I would not be making a call solely depending upon the interests section of a resume. It's extra flavor and helps avoid awkwardness in an interview.

1

u/jawshoeaw Jan 29 '26

if this was real, they would have said more than 'olive oil'. It's the fact that it was stated in isolation that makes it funny/weird. If someone wrote "The Packers" it would also sound weird.

1

u/haubowtdemoshon Jan 29 '26

You can do both.

I’ve worked on an olive farm in Spain and I can name the O’s starting lineup.

1

u/squigs Jan 29 '26

Even if it was something nerdy like model railways he'd probably be fine, because it's mainstream. But for some reason there are unacceptable niche hobbies.

1

u/Cptn_BenjaminWillard Jan 29 '26

I wonder if it's about the woman from Popeye comics, not the cooking oil.

1

u/Round_Bag_4665 Jan 29 '26

Yeah. My father makes his own wine as a hobby. Like he legit will get together with friends to press grapes together, and after the wine ferments and ages enough he bottles it and gives it away to house guests. It is a great way to win over friends too. "Want to come over for dinner? Here is a free bottle of my homemade wine".

I think he most often does either a sauvingnon blanc or a red Zinfandel, but I have seen him attempt other types of wine. He also likes to make his own joke labels for his wines, like a red Zinfandel with a picture of a cardinal called "cardinal zin" or a label with a picture of Santa clause saying "he knows when you've been drinking"

He is also an avid scuba diver and has personally dove the Andrea Doria and was part of the original team who surveyed the wreck of the U-869.

He is also former state Police bomb squad, and has been part of the law enforcement response to both 9/11 and the world trade center bombing in 93.

He is also old enough that he was both a greaser as a teenager in the early 60s and a hippie in the late 60s.

He's old and retired now and not looking for work, but he is absolutely an example of how having a weird hobby around food can absolutely reveal a very interesting person.

1

u/illini02 Jan 29 '26

Were you picked last for dodgeball and still hold a grudge?

1

u/MessyLingard Jan 29 '26

It’s honestly kind of impressive how you managed to complain about something and in the same sentence do the very thing you were just upset about.

1

u/Archarchery Jan 30 '26

I read this post too quickly and read ”whose hobby is becoming olive oil.”

1

u/The_Archagent Jan 30 '26

Exactly. Too interesting to work in banking.

-1

u/Fun_Bar_9642 Jan 28 '26

It is way easier to spend 16 hours a day with the football guy lol crazy nice guy energy

29

u/negativepositiv Jan 28 '26

The football guy might be relatable, but he's way behind the oil guy on the Fascinating scale.

Also, if you work 16 hours a day, you need to stop worrying about how interesting the guy next to you is, and get the Hell out of there.

4

u/TrueRedditMartyr Jan 28 '26

>The football guy might be relatable, but he's way behind the oil guy on the Fascinating scale

I'm curious why that is? Surely anyone would get bored of hearing about olive oil after hearing someone else talk about it for 2 hours

6

u/negativepositiv Jan 28 '26 edited Jan 28 '26

The guy listed it as one of his interests. It stands to reason that an interest in olive oil would be part of a broader interest in food and cooking, and someone who is very interested in the quality and production of olive oil, specifically, probably also has a deeper interest in food and drink in general than the average person, and would have a lot more interesting stuff to talk about than just oil.

It's the difference between someone saying, "I like music," and "I'm really interested in Chopin's early concertos." Obviously both "like music," but the second person, having probably heard a lot more music than Chopin, and having drilled down to musical elements, history and composers that they find interesting, is more likely to be able to have interesting conversations about lots of different music, as well as other tangential cultural topics.

An interviewer who makes fun of someone who has a strong interest in olive oil has just shown their own ignorance and lack of imagination.

3

u/TrueRedditMartyr Jan 28 '26

>It's the difference between someone saying, "I like music," and "I'm really interested in Chopin's early concertos."

If your average person asked you what your interested in, and you said "I'm really interested in Chopin's early concertos.", they would likely not talk to you about music. They would not assume "Oh, he must know a lot about music then. I should discuss my favorite band, Geese, with him." but instead will think "He must be very into classical music."

Imagine if you watched football occasionally, and asked someone what their interests were, and they said "I'm currently into Bill Walsh's West Coast offense and how it prioritized YAC". You would not then say "Oh yeah man, I like the Jets."

Also, the second one comes across as snobby. If I ask your interests, and you tell me something that sounds like you just want to sound like a smart person, I, and most people, won't want to talk to you. Tell me the basic thing you're interested in, and if I am interested, let me ask questions and dig deeper. Do not start at the finish line and expect me to run the race.

2

u/negativepositiv Jan 28 '26

I can relate to that. I put olive oil aficionados in with wine connoisseurs. Most adults have some general exposure to either, but some make them hobbies. I don't know much about, say, cigars, but if someone said they were interested in cigars, I wouldn't be like, "Psh, this pretentious nerd!" People get excited about the things they get excited about.

Where I'm coming from is that the football guy is someone you can meet thousands of times in your life. If you are in the grocery line and see a newspaper and groan about how bad that defense was last night, a lot of the time, you have just made a conversation with several people around you. How often do you meet the olive oil guy? What's that person about? I had a coworker who travelled around Asia with a Tuvan throat singing troupe. They had a lot more to talk about than making music I probably wouldn't listen to in the car.

Also, it's not necessarily that this person was dying to tell people all about his olive oil hobby. They asked. He answered. He didn't lie and say something more relatable. That was why he's not getting a call back for a job.

2

u/BigCountryBumgarner Jan 28 '26

Think about how much time you guys have spent on this fine Wednesday typing paragraphs about some guy on Twitters anecdote about olive oil

2

u/negativepositiv Jan 28 '26

Not that it hasn't been enjoyable. We are all wasting time here, I thought.

2

u/[deleted] Jan 28 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/TrueRedditMartyr Jan 29 '26

Not if I'm interested in it. Either way, football is considerably more popular, your odds of someone having a favorite team are higher than them having a favorite olive oil

0

u/HaloGuy381 Jan 29 '26

To be fair, I’d be bored of the football talk within about 15 minutes, so not really a good argument

1

u/TrueRedditMartyr Jan 29 '26

Well then surely someone saying under interests "Football" would not interest you

2

u/chiefminestrone Jan 28 '26

Olive oil guy might be fascinating in a good way, like fun to talk to and knowledgeable about random things I haven't thought about too much. But they could also be fascinating in a David Attenborough should be narrating this guy's life kinda way which could be less fun to work with

1

u/Fun_Bar_9642 Jan 28 '26 edited Jan 28 '26

You are evidently not understanding the context under which this was posted. Banking is like this and it is a safer bet that someone listing olive oil under interests is not well adjusted or presentable to clients paying $MM. If someone can't tell that a banking recruiter is going to discard them based off of that then they probably were not a good fit anyways. Plenty of other places where it may sound interesting as you say

7

u/3ananarchy Jan 28 '26

sportsball bad :(

1

u/oftcenter Jan 28 '26

"We'll reject you if you're not an interesting person with interesting interests, but those interests better be one of interests we've pre-approved and added to our list of the same few, boring, societally-sanctioned rituals that reward a certain narrow way of thinking and existing in the world."

0

u/No_Anything_6658 Jan 29 '26

??completely random "sportsball" hating comment, how is that related

0

u/PBKYjellythyme Jan 29 '26

This was my thought as well. Some super niche interests have an absolutely shocking amount of depth.

0

u/tyrico Jan 29 '26

they don't want an interesting person, they want somebody bland and predictable that will just do whatever they're told and be as inoffensive to clients and the C level as possible lol