If I was a Microsoft Office Program

While surfing the Internet, as I always am, I recently stumbled upon a list of weird interview questions. Weird interview questions have the highest degree of abstractions. They force you to think beyond conventions. In my understanding, this helps the interviewer assess our analytic skills; how well we can realize a seemingly abstract problem, and reach a formidable solution to a stupid question.

So, I was going through this list of weird interview questions, and a question caught my eye immediately. It read:

If you were a Microsoft Office program, which one would you be?

So, how should I answer this question, if I was asked the same? Let us analyze.

Firstly, we have to consider all the variables here. What job are we applying for in this situation? What is the job profile of the position in question? Does this question carry any meaning in the interview? How far into the Interview, am I? How has my performance been so far? Is he impressed enough, that I can be bold in my reply? Do I go for an analytical answer, or a witty remark? All these are the factors governing my decision and thought process at that period.

First, I will look at the limiting premise of the question. The moment I saw anything like Media Player, or SQL Server, (which people have posted in comment responses at this Glassdoor page) I am compromised. I have to choose among Office Programs only, and I have to choose wisely.

Microsoft Word

This is the first Office program that comes to anyone’s mind. It might risk my position as someone who knows Microsoft Word as the only Office program. Word can do some cool stuff like creating documents, formatting them nicely, mail merge, and proofreading documents. Now, that sounds like the job of a secretary, or a clerk. I am better than that!

Microsoft Excel

Well, this one gets everyone excited. Excel lets you carry out complex tasks, create and manage reports, perform calculations, and generate graphs and charts. That sounds like fun and is for someone who knows statistics like the back of his hand! Yeah. Maybe I want to be Excel. Nevertheless, I have more options.

Microsoft Access

Seriously speaking, who uses this database? Microsoft itself has a better alternative, and clearly, I do not want to name this program. I do not want to end up being in a school DBMS project. Access is like the old-school register file, in a computer age.

Microsoft PowerPoint

PowerPoint aids in presentations, lets us impress people with our pep talk and slides, and cut business deals. Heck, everyone would want to be PowerPoint! It is an option worth selecting, yes. But, let us look further.

Microsoft Outlook

No.

I am definitely not going for this one.

Microsoft SharePoint Workspace

Now, what do we have here! SharePoint is Microsoft’s proprietary technology. It is unique to Microsoft Office. All the work done by the above three comes to me for organization. SharePoint is like the president of the Office Nation! Using me (now that I am SharePoint), people can collaborate across networks. I am definitely going to be SharePoint.

Therefore, I am SharePoint, because no matter how hard Word, Excel and PowerPoint work, in a productive environment, I am the one handling all their files and sorting them out, and making them useful. I like to take responsibilities and I like organization. That makes me the best, at what I do in Office.