With questions like: When there's a wind blowing, does a round-trip by plane take more time, less time, or the same time?
the allowed multi-guess answers really don't allow one to demonstrate the thinking involved, which is the point of an interview.
Or to ask clarifying questions, which is another observation point. Candidates who snap out answers without asking for clarification of deliberately vague points lose the game.
For instance, on the question I listed:
they're asking about Time. Is it comparing the time to get to point B as compared to the trip back?
Or do they mean the total time of the trip with wind, as compared to a trip without wind.
Is the wind direction and speed constant throughout the entire period?
What direction is the wind, and the direction the plane will be taking, because head-on/tail wind may have obvious and simplified effects (it adds the same speed one way as it removes), but at an angle, the effect can be totally different, because of the shape of the aircraft.
This is the kind of stuff you'd want to talk about as the candidate, which demonstrates your ability to break down the situation into smaller parts and consider them as they work together. Even a non-aeronautics person looking for a job at Google should be smart enough to break it down this far.
Microsoft used to use puzzles as part of its interview process. When I went up to Redmond 2 years ago, they had stopped doing that. Instead, I got questions like "design a memory management system" which of course is the kind of thing I forgot how to do since college... Luckily, I already had a job another offer before I got there. Made the interview much less stressful. I made it past lunch.
