Employer: Well, everything seems to be in order. You certainly look like a 10x engineer to us. We just need to do some due diligence and comb through your social media feeds for any signs of personality.

Candidate: Uh, signs of personality?

Employer: Yes, you know, just making sure you don’t have too much of one. We have a carefully curated company culture—mostly work-obsessed but with just enough ironic detachment to seem relatable. Wouldn’t want any dangerous individuality slipping through.

Candidate: So, what exactly are you looking for?

Employer: Oh, nothing major! Just ensuring you haven’t expressed strong opinions on, well… anything. Politics, media, lunch preferences—really anything that could spark a Slack debate and damage productivity.

Candidate: So, if I post about liking pineapple on pizza…?

Employer: Risky. Divisive. Our backend team almost collapsed over that debate last year.

Candidate: Right. What about memes?

Employer: Ah, memes are a gray area. We love memes, if they demonstrate enthusiasm for coding, hustle culture, or the existential despair of late-stage capitalism in a way that doesn’t question our role in it.

Candidate: So, no jokes about tech layoffs?

Employer: Oh god, no.

Candidate: What if I just delete all my social media?

Employer: That’s actually a red flag. It suggests you have something to hide. We prefer a light, algorithm-friendly presence—LinkedIn posts about leadership, tweets about frameworks nobody uses, maybe an Instagram story of a standing desk setup.

Candidate: So you want me to seem engaged, but not too engaged. Present, but not too present.

Employer: Exactly! We’re looking for someone who can balance the illusion of individuality with the predictability of a well-optimized persona.

Candidate: …And you say I’m the 10x engineer?

Employer: We believe in hiring the best. Now, before we proceed, do you have any past tweets with… opinions?

Candidate: Opinions? No, no, of course not! Not a single opinion. Never had one. Wouldn’t even recognize one if it walked up and introduced itself.

Employer: Excellent. We value neutrality.

Candidate: Oh, I’m as neutral as a Swede in a snowstorm! No opinions, no strong feelings, and certainly no thoughts of my own. Just pure, unfiltered, corporate-compatible enthusiasm!

Employer: Splendid! Just a few final checks—ah, wait a moment, what’s this? scrolls phone You once liked a tweet that said, “JavaScript is a nightmare” back in 2017.

Candidate: Oh, that? That was an accident. Slipped thumb. Muscle spasm. Could’ve happened to anyone.

Employer: Hm. And what about this Reddit post? Reads aloud ‘Anyone else feel like Agile just means doing twice the work in half the time while smiling?’

Candidate: I was hacked.

Employer: Oh?

Candidate: Yes! Hacked. Russian bots, probably. Or maybe North Korean cyber ninjas. Happens all the time, you know.

Employer: Hm. Very suspicious. And what’s this? Glares at phone An Instagram photo of… a book? A paper book?

Candidate: Gasp!

Employer: Reads title ‘The Mythical Man-Month.’ My word.

Candidate: It was a prop! Just decor! I never read it, I swear!

Employer: And yet… here we are. A documented history of independent thought. Unchecked critical analysis. Possibly even… free will.

Candidate: No! I’m just like everyone else! I post about productivity hacks, pretend to enjoy networking events, and use ‘🚀’ in LinkedIn posts without irony! Look! Frantically pulls out phone I even have a Medium blog called “Why Failure is Just Success in Disguise!”

Employer: Hm. That is promising. But I’m afraid the damage is done. We can’t risk hiring someone who might think for themselves.

Candidate: So what now?

Employer: We have two options. You can sign an affidavit swearing that any past opinions were the result of a youthful indiscretion—perhaps a phase where you mistakenly believed in things.

Candidate: And the second option?

Employer: Exile. You will be cast out into the wilderness of the unemployable, doomed to wander among freelancers, indie developers, and… shudders… start-up founders.

Candidate: No… not that! Anything but… hushed whisper self-employment!

Employer: Leaning in Choose wisely.

Candidate: Sweating …Fine. I’ll sign the affidavit.

Employer: Smart choice. Now, let’s discuss your salary. We were thinking somewhere between ‘passion’ and ‘exposure’.

Candidate: Passion and exposure? But those aren’t real currencies!

Employer: Not with that attitude, they’re not! Here at InnoSyncHyperByte AI—

Candidate: You just made that up!

Employer: —we believe in a post-monetary ecosystem where compensation is measured in the warm glow of innovation, the sheer thrill of synergy, and—if you really excel—maybe a company-branded hoodie.

Candidate: A hoodie?

Employer: Oh-ho-ho! Not just any hoodie. This is an exclusive, team-building, high-performance, moisture-wicking hoodie. With a zipper.

Candidate: Incredible. Does it at least come with a salary?

Employer: Oh, you poor, sweet, naïve thing. Salaries are for legacy industries, like coal mining or universities. We’re about disrupting the concept of payment itself!

Candidate: Oh no.

Employer: Oh yes! You see, instead of a so-called “salary,” you’ll be compensated with—

(Dramatic pause. The lights flicker. A drumroll sounds from nowhere.)

Employer: EQUITY!

(Angelic choir sings. Fireworks erupt. A small brass band parades through the office, throwing confetti made of shredded NDAs.)

Candidate: Equity? Equity in what?

Employer: We’re not legally allowed to say. But let’s just say it’s Web3 adjacent.

Candidate: …Is this a crypto thing?

Employer: No no no, not crypto! Blockchain-enabled financial abstraction!

Candidate: That’s just a longer way of saying “crypto.”

Employer: Shhhh! You can’t say the C-word out loud, the investors might hear you!

(A door creaks open. A shadowy figure in a Patagonia vest peeks in, sniffing the air for regulatory scrutiny before silently retreating.)

Candidate: Okay, let’s cut to the chase. What exactly is this job?

Employer: Ah, excellent question! Your role will be a Full-Stack DevOps AI-Cloud Evangelist Architect Engineer Scrum Sensei.

Candidate: That’s not a job title! That’s just words!

Employer: Exactly! We believe in titles without limits, roles without borders! One day you might be debugging an app, the next day you’ll be head of Quantum Synergy Alignment.

Candidate: Is that… a real department?

Employer: It is now! BOOM! You just innovated a new role. You’re already thinking like a 10x engineer!

Candidate: But I haven’t done anything!

Employer: Exactly!

(Silence. The candidate’s brain visibly short-circuits as they try to process this.)

Candidate: Okay. One last question. If I take this job, will I ever get to leave the office?

Employer: Technically yes! Thanks to our flexible hybrid work policy, you’ll be able to work from anywhere in the world.

Candidate: Oh, that’s great!

Employer: As long as it’s within five feet of your laptop, 24/7, and you’re on Slack at all times, and you answer emails instantly, and—

Candidate: I’m leaving.

Employer: Waaait! Before you go, can you sign this waiver agreeing that this entire interview was a legally non-binding thought experiment and that you do not, in fact, exist?

Candidate: SCREAMS AND RUNS AWAY

Employer: sigh Another one lost to the so-called “real world.”

(Presses intercom button.)

Employer: Send in the next candidate. And this time, make sure they’re hungry.