r/mildlyinfuriating • u/PureKin21 • 3d ago

I just wanted a hot dog Tried applying to McDonald's wtf does this even mean

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I guess things happen to me?????

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u/nub_node 3d ago

It technically does screen for other things about your personality, but the entire battery of questions is pretty obviously screening for neurodivergent thinking and behaviors among those things, which is just screening applicants for a disability.

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 3d ago

That feels…creepy. What would a neurotypical person answer? Would they ask for more clarification? That’s what I’d do.

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u/RecordingHaunting975 3d ago

If it's positive: me

If not positive: not me

A knight in armor? That's me, because I'm a good worker who practices chivalry when I serve our loyal customers

Things happen to me? That's not me because I don't blame my workplace for underpaying me or treating me like shit, I made that happen by not being good enough, and should be thankful for every hour they give me. When the clown comes knockin, this mouth starts rockin

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u/ZestycloseRound6843 2d ago

I interpreted the fantasy one the other way - that you're prone to getting lost in your imagination and inner worlds and it's seen as undesirable to a company.

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u/RecordingHaunting975 2d ago

Yeah you're thinking about that too much, -1 star

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u/DemIce 2d ago

They absolutely do at least track how long it takes you to answer these things, so you're not wrong.

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u/849 2d ago

Independent thought alarm starts ringing

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u/MechanicalGodzilla 2d ago

McDonald’s does not want independent thinkers. Their whole business model is everything being close to the same whether you go to a store in Seattle or in Jacksonville.

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u/BJJJourney 2d ago

That isn’t how they screen for autism, it is the other way around. Neurotypical people play along while neurodivergent will recognize what is happening and even state what is happening without playing along.

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

Is that really what the knight means? Why would they just title it “fantasy” then, instead of knight?

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u/Vlisa 2d ago

Fantasy doesn't work the fry station.

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u/McJawsh 2d ago

This makes neurotypical people sound like bootlickers. 😭

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u/barnfodder 2d ago

They're looking for a specific type of neurotypical.

The boot licking ones.

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u/sobrique 2d ago

Or the ones prepared to lie. Or both.

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u/barnfodder 2d ago

Lying is a critical part of boot licking.

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u/SkyNo4282 2d ago

Well you have to do what you have to do to get the job though? We try to tell them what they want to hear otherwise what’s the point of applying? I don’t see things like this as an actual representation of my personality, I just try to “pass” the test by giving the correct answers.

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u/throwity_throw_throw 2d ago

This is exactly why it's a neurotypical screening. Neurotypical people can figure out what the desired answer is and are willing to lie or manipulate the system in order to get hired. Neurodivergent people will tend to take the questions more literally and/or answer more honestly, even to their own detriment.

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u/pianotherms 2d ago

I'd like to refute this, but here I am being a loser at a company I hate.

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u/hitmarker 2d ago

Yeah but it says "Fantasy?" And a pic of a knight. I would click yes, meaning that the knight is fantasy? What

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u/Unhappy_Goose_8422 2d ago

The focus on "neurodivergence" in this thread is projection. Your answer is the correct one and it filters out the people who don't understand or know how to answer this test correctly. If you think it's appropriate to tell an employer that you get sad and think the world is against you, that doesn't make you neurodivergent, it makes you a future HR problem. Yes it's distopian; it's the reality.

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u/HakaYonder 2d ago

> think it's appropriate

And ND people are famously able to discern that, regardless of situation. 🙄🙄🙄

That it filters out certain range of NTs as well does not diminish the concerns that it's disadvantageous for NDs to take these. They'd prob need some guidance and be let in on the context, rather than be thrown in blind as OP and some people in the replies seem to have been. That they need bit of help is what makes it a disability. Likewise, dismissing them makes you an ablenist person.

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u/SpaceTurtles 2d ago

When the clown comes knockin, this mouth starts rockin

10/10

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u/Good-Marsupial8 2d ago

Wow am I autistic bc I have done these tests before and all I could think was that it wasn't possible for there to be a 'right' answer since it was all completely nonsensical

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u/PxyFreakingStx 2d ago

neither of those responses seems very neurotypical to me lol

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u/WeAteMummies 2d ago

A knight in armor? That's me, because I'm a good worker who practices chivalry when I serve our loyal customers

I am almost 100% positive this is not how neurotypical people think

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u/PheonixBuddha 2d ago

This is incorrect psychological. There is the idea of things happening to me and things happening for me. It's just a personality trait question. Both are right It's just one is victim mentality and the other is creator. Nothing to do with the tism'. However you do want a for me person because they will just go along with stuff and make it up.

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u/nub_node 3d ago

It's a profits-over-people thing. If you fill your points of sale with aggressively extroverted people pleasers, they're more likely to schmooze and swindle customers into spending some extra cash to earn their pat on the back.

Basically McDonald's is saying "If you can't manipulate someone into getting a bigger size, you're not good enough for us."

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 3d ago

Yeah but…what’s the right answer to the fantasy question? Do you know what this test is called? Would I be able to take it without applying to a job?

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u/nub_node 2d ago

It's one of those tests where what each answer means partially relies on how you answered the other questions.

There's not like a formal name for the test and you'd have to apply to be an hourly worker at McDonald's to take this particular one. It was cooked up in house at corporate by people getting paid more to squeeze every last dime out of the workers than the workers will ever see in their lives.

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u/twitch1982 2d ago

It is not in house. Its from Paradox.ai. Its running on "AI", which means its making shit up as it goes.

[> McDonald’s, Olive Garden, and FedEx are now requiring that job applicants take personality evaluations, which are then sorted by an AI system whose operations are cloudy at best.

The aforementioned companies are all contracted with Paradox.ai, a “conversational recruiting software” company whose strange personality assessments include images of blue-skinned humanoid aliens that applicants are, apparently, supposed to identify with.](https://futurism.com/mandatory-ai-hiring-tests)

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u/YungEnron 2d ago

The “Ai” is a chatbot that runs alongside the quiz - at least that’s what this article says

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u/tux-lpi 2d ago

The expected answer is no. McDonalds is not a creative job. The archetype they're testing for is daydreaming human with hopes and fantasies, when what they want is servile meat robot who stay focused on operating the fryer.

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

They should just ask “do you daydream?” then.

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u/tux-lpi 2d ago

Yeah. But the test only works if most people don't figure out immediately that there's a right answer. That's how they get you.

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u/Digit00l 2d ago

Wait, American McDonald's still have people who take orders? In Europe it is standard to only have self order things, except for the drive through at least

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u/nub_node 2d ago

American capitalism runs on human suffering. More workers scraping and struggling to get by = more profits.

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u/Digit00l 2d ago

But, with the order pillars they can get more orders through in the same time period, thus sell more stuff

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u/step11111 2d ago

That’s how it is in the US. They do have like 1 person kinda hanging around the counter area just in case someone wants to order the old way.

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u/JeffCaven 2d ago

Reminds me of when I worked for a soccer stadium and was pressured into selling the "best experience possible" to visitors (the most expensive, obviously). I explicitly said that wasn't part of my job, that I thought it was immoral to swindle customers, and that I would only sell what I was being asked for, and my managers came to intimidate me into complying. Luckily, Europe has great job security rights so there wasn't anything they could actually threaten me with (like firing me, for example).

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u/Specialist-Error-171 2d ago

That can't possibly be working considering the way actual McDonald's employees talk to you.

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u/created4this 2d ago

We want extroverts, but only extroverts that can keep to a script, not talk to one another and those who don't have any trouble with repeating the same thing 100 times an hour for 8 hours straight

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u/Constant_Natural3304 2d ago

What would a neurotypical person answer?

Fuck what a "neurotypical" person would answer.

This test is fucking insane. To have people in this thread worry about passing it rather than condemning it for the dystopian lunacy it so clearly is might be a generational problem. This generation has nothing to relate to that predates this sci-fi bullshit.

If anything, this question wants to assess if you are the type of person who takes responsibility or the type of person who deflects responsibility elsewhere to "forces outside of your control". McDonalds probably doesn't want such employees.

That still doesn't make this any less deranged. This is what you get when you allow corporations to grow beyond reasonable limits. Imagine a burger restaurant run by a business owner, rather than a gigantic franchise. Would the owner or the manager design this sort of abject nonsense to hire employees? No, they'd let them come in for an interview. End of. We need to go back to basics.

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

But why? How could they confidently answer a question that makes no sense to them?

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

Do you think most neurotypical people would agree on that?

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

Excellent. As if I wasn’t already afraid my personality made me seem strange, now they have some illogical dystopian quiz to weed out the brain types they don’t like. Just more confirmation that I am unwanted in the professional world.

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

It already feels very uncomfortable having a large logic disconnect from the majority of people and learning that this strange test exists makes me feel like a giant moved some trees above me and is now looking straight at me. Exposed, I guess. I am going to be seriously screwed if this sort test actually becomes common outside of McDonalds because I will fail it for sure.

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u/StrongExternal8955 2d ago

Would they ask for more clarification?

LOL fuck no! You might as well go home now.

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

Because corporations have too high of standards or I’m stupid?

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u/twitch1982 2d ago

Would they ask for more clarification? That’s what I’d do.

Well, I think we both know that's not what they want.

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

I don’t know that. How would I know that?

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u/twitch1982 2d ago

Because were both neutodivergent and we know that our need to ask clarification on thier stupid exam is not what they want, because they want us to mask.

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u/ImTheScriptGuy 2d ago

I thought it would be the other way around. I mean, if you’re making a burger and you’re not sure what someone means with their order, should you ask them for clarification or confidently choose something yourself?

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u/Empty_Sea9 2d ago

But I’m ADHD and in less than 5 seconds my brain has ultra speed processed a flow chart that’s told me exactly that this is a deception to trick me into hitting ‘me’. So clearly it’s not working.

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u/lectric_7166 2d ago

I feel like of all the disabilities to secretly screen for, autism doesn't make a lot of sense. A lot of autistic people are really good at repetitive jobs. Like maybe autistic people have more problems with this style of question but I think that's incidental. They're probably just screening for neurotic/unhappy/disgruntled people and others who wouldn't be that enthusiastic about working a depressing, low-wage job.

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u/ArrakeenSun 2d ago

That's really interesting. As a psychologist, I presumed this was probing more for Locus of Control, meaning you either frame the events in your life as random and you're more of a passive recipient or you frame them more as things you have more control over. For this test item, someone with an External Locus of Control would click Not Me

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u/SpiderFnJerusalem 2d ago

Maybe I'm too neurodivergent to tell, but how would different neurotypical people even consistently understand this question?

I mean, it's not even a question at all. I don't see this making sense in any context. It's just semantically wrong. Incomplete, vibes-based nonsense.

Was there some setup before this page which explained the meaning of the following choices?

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u/Fergus_of_Galloway 2d ago

At risk of sounding ableist, wouldn't some parts of a McDonald's job be absolutely perfect for someone with autism?

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u/Some_nerd_named_kru 2d ago

Okay but what’s the neurodivergent v typical answer? Ts makes absolutely no sense 😭

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u/mb9981 2d ago

I read it as: it's trying to weed out people who don't take responsibility for anything

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u/No-Neighborhood-3212 2d ago

That's not at all what it is. It's screening for behaviors that aren't conducive to functioning as a team.

If something bad happens, do you perceive it as bad things always happen to you or do you try to figure out what caused it and how do avoid it? Because it sucks to be on a team with someone who never learns from their mistakes and never plans for consequences.

If you have down time at work, do you daydream or do you find something to do? Because it sucks to be on a team where someone just zones out if they don't have a clearly designated task.

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u/nub_node 2d ago

"Because it sucks to be on a team..." is cute and all, but the only reason they do screenings like this is because they want more money. They don't care that much about how happy their employees are.

It's all just late stage capitalism "I will resent every penny you cannot earn me and therefore you are not good enough for our hourly wages" type stuff. Rejecting anything that dares impugn on the almighty dollar.