I believe what he was trying to say is that there is a large factor of chance involved with interviews.

Therefore it should not be a signal. Not getting a job because of an interview does not mean that you are not a qualified engineer.

It may mean that though. But it's not as if it's a 100m sprint where you can very easily measure results between Olympian and couch potato.

> https://www.amazon.com/The-Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules/d...

Along these lines, I'd recommend The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives http://amzn.to/1NYgSQm

Even very intelligent people seem to have far too many delusions about their own competence or success.

The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives

This changed how I look at my life

http://www.amazon.com/The-Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules/dp...

I see that you've read this.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules/dp...

It's not rare for people to attribute success only to them self and failure to market conditions.

"The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives" http://www.amazon.com/The-Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules/dp... was a great book that showed that not everything is under your control

This reminds me of the book I just started reading that talks about randomness in our lives.

The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives : http://www.amazon.com/The-Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules/dp...

Read "The Drunkard's Walk: How Randomness Rules Our Lives"

http://www.amazon.com/Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules-ebook/...

and everything will become clear.

Mlodinow in "The Drunkard's Walk" makes the very good point that the 'losing streaks' that lead to coach firings (and Hollywood studio boss sackings) are almost entirely explainable by perfectly normal random variation.

http://www.amazon.com/Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules-Lives/...

Not only that, but the subsequent 'improvements' are generally due to regression to the mean.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regression_toward_the_mean

It's depressing that an pompously-titled site like American Thinker can completely fail to consider this...

Your point is well taken that it's easy to treat fortune differently in different situations. Hard workers that don't make it are "just unfortunate." Lazy people that win the lottery are "just fortunate." Hard workers that make it "earned it."

However, I think randomness (i.e. "fortune") generally plays a much larger role in all of our lives than we care to admit. The American obsession with hard work and merit fuels this misconception. Our brains are also somewhat intrinsically hardwired to intuit simple causes and effects, even when none truly exist.

If you're interested in the topic, I highly recommend reading "The Drunkard's Walk" by Leonard Mlodinow. http://www.amazon.com/Drunkards-Walk-Randomness-Rules-Vintag...