Here's another thing to note: At least a few people here have probably heard the words "culture fit" uttered when a decision is being made to bring a new employee onboard. That's basically just a socially acceptable way of validating discrimination in hiring (with ageism being a typical example).
This is easy to say until you have actually tried to create a clear culture. It is even more clear when you have suffered from a bad culture you are trying to reform.
For example, I bought a company, the culture was highly competitive, focused on greed and self enrichment...and what do you know, we caught employees engaged in shady behavior. When we disciplined or fired some, they claimed discrimination, and while I have personal experience with discrimination and fully acknowledge it exists, their allegations had no merit, and their actions required the consequences.
The longer a lead people the more I value and strive to create a good culture.
Culture fit is more an assessment of how similar the candidate’s current workplace is to yours, than anything about the candidate personally. It’s “unfair” in that it penalizes the candidate for doing what is appropriate in their current environment, without knowing how well they might be able to assimilate and be effective under your norms.
I don't really think many people tie things back to the candidate's current workplace. It just means "Did they seem like a toxic asshole?" at its best and "Did they seem like your sort of person?" when it's worse.
In “tell me about a time...” questions, the interviewer has some idea of how he would expect his coworker or report to handle such a situation. That idea is culture. The candidate’s response doesn’t have to be “toxic asshole” to be very different, and therefore a culture fit concern.
I have seen candidates rejected for telling stories where they were too cooperative with coworkers they knew to be wrong. Some interviewers in technical rounds will second guess the candidate on correct decisions to see if they stand their ground.
Socially acceptable? Just a reminder: while one can legally discriminate against multitude of traits, any of HN crowd who interviews candidates probably should consider that age discrimination is simply illegal against 40+ aged people in US (ADEA - federal level). Don't break the law and don't help to whitewash it.
