Are You Smart Enough to Work at Google?

pull an unknown object out of a paper bag and devise an impromptu sales pitch for it

How many integers between 1 and 1,000 contain a 3

Look at how Google does spell checking: it’s not based on dictionaries; it’s based on word usage statistics of the entire Internet, which is why Google knows how to correct my name, misspelled, and Microsoft Word doesn’t.

because a round manhole cover, unlike a square one, can’t fall in the hole

Why are manhole covers round?”

Talking is also good because sometimes the brain follows the mouth. Rambling on about a problem may cause you to think of an approach you wouldn’t have thought of otherwise.

Your goal should be to avoid dead air.

m not saying you can fake your way through these kinds of interview questions. I am saying it’s better interview etiquette to keep trying to answer the question until the interviewer cuts you off. Interviewers ought to know that innovation takes persistence, intuition, and luck. You can at least show you’ve got the persistence part covered.

You’re in a car with a helium balloon tied to the floor. The windows are closed. When you step on the accelerator, what happens to the balloon—does it move forward, move backward, or stay put?

You are shrunk to the height of a penny and thrown into a blender. Your mass is reduced so that your density is the same as usual. The blades start moving in sixty seconds. What do you do?”1