With all due respect to cigar aficionados, most people couldn’t care less how many cigars are smoked in a year. (It’s fairly likely that your interviewer doesn’t even care all that much.)
Yet, there you are, sweating bullets as you struggle to calculate the “correct answer” to the cigar question. Why? What possible reason could your interviewer possibly have to ask you this silly, who-cares-about-the-answer question? Simple. He wants to see you demonstrate your facility with details.
When you are asked to solve a puzzle like this, it’s critical to:
1. Make certain assumptions about the problem (and share them with your interviewer as you go along).
2. Throw in certain telltale details that will demonstrate that your answer is more thoughtful than other job seekers’ answers.
For example, in the cigar question, the detail that “women live longer than men” is important. Subtracting the number of men who “haven’t reached smoking age” from the general pool of men is another significant detail.
Never be afraid to cite those telling details that show you are a thinking person possessed with a great deal of common knowledge. You’ll gain points for thoroughness. Okay, now that you’re a whiz at answering this type of question, test your prowess on the question that follows.
84.
How many skis are rented each year?percent of that, or 37,500,000. Of those, let’s figure that 28,175,000 of them own skis, leaving the number who rent at: 9,325,000. Then, let’s add the number of tourists who ski, say, 1 million. So the grand total of renters would be: 10,325,000.
Now, let’s assume that the renters who live here take 3 trips a year, while the skiing tourists visit the U.S. once a year. The number of rentals for residents per season would be 3 times 9,325,000, or 27,975,000. While the number of rentals for tourists would be 1,000,000. Let’s add those two numbers together to arrive at the total number of rentals each year, which is: 28,975,000.
Never attempt to tackle a brain tickler without a pen and paper, unless you do math in your head easily. Even then, it’s a good idea to write down your calculations as you go, so that you can double check them easily. Be sure to bring a pad and pen with you just in case.
85.
There’s an ad on the back of a phone kiosk on Third Avenue and 47th Street. Can you tell me how many people are exposed to it every day?A.
Well, let’s see…8 million people live in New York City, and let’s suppose that half a million of them work in Midtown. Midtown covers a fairly large geographic area, and people who work on the Avenue of the Americas rarely walk all the way over to Third Avenue, even at lunch. So I am going to think of this in terms of subsets.The first subset is the group of people who work within a five-block radius of Third Avenue and 47th Street. Let’s say that’s approximately 100,000 people.
The second subset is the group of people who take cabs by that location, plus the cab drivers themselves. There are 10,000 cabs in New York. Let’s imagine that 1,000 of them will drive by the location twice a day, carrying two passengers each. Then again, only the passengers sitting by the windows facing the kiosk would probably notice the ad, so that’s 2,000 taxi passengers who would see it, plus all 1,000 cab drivers. We’re at 103,000 people so far.
If the ad were lit, of course, there might be an additional 1,000 passengers who would see the ad at night, bringing our total up to 104,000 people.
I believe that ads are more difficult to spot if one happens to be sitting on a bus. So let’s add a fraction of the people who take the Third Avenue bus every day to our number—50 more people a day (bus passengers and bus drivers) would see the ad.
Another subset of people would be those living, but not working, within a five-block radius of the ad. I’m going to guess that’s an additional 50,000 people. We’re at 104,550.
Lastly, we should take tourists into account. Perhaps 1,000 tourists might stroll by that location on their way to another Midtown destination. Grand total: 105,550 people would see the ad every day, Monday through Friday.
since there isn’t all that much to do in Midtown during the weekends. I think we can safely assume that the 50,000 people who live in the area would see the ad, plus perhaps 200 tourists, 10 people taking the Third Avenue bus, and 800 people taking cabs. So on the weekends, the total would drop to 51,010 people.