You probably heard of Van Halen’s 53-page contract rider and how it required a bowl of M&M’s backstage– brown ones removed.
It’s not that brown M&M’s are necessarily bad. Rather, the band was checking for attention to detail.
If there were brown M&M’s there, they knew to expect sloppiness in the lighting, stage set-up, and other details.
So we’ve been following a similar strategy in our job postings.
In this particular one, we asked the candidate to say “INCEPTION” in their response.
We find it’s a good proxy for whether they will be sloppy when hired.
You don’t want people messing up on your projects now, do you?
Dennis Yu
Dennis Yu is co-author of the #1 best selling book on Amazon in social media, The Definitive Guide to TikTok Ads. He has spent a billion dollars on Facebook ads across his agencies and agencies he advises. Mr. Yu is the "million jobs" guy-- on a mission to create one million jobs via hands-on social media training, partnering with universities and professional organizations.
You can find him quoted in major publications and on television such as CNN, the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, NPR, and LA Times. Clients have included Nike, Red Bull, the Golden State Warriors, Ashley Furniture, Quiznos-- down to local service businesses like real estate agents and dentists. He's spoken at over 750 conferences in 20 countries, having flown over 6 million miles in the last 30 years to train up young adults and business owners. He speaks for free as long as the organization believes in the job-creation mission and covers business class travel.
You can find him hiking tall mountains, eating chicken wings, and taking Kaqun oxygen baths-- likely in a city near you.
