I applied online. The process took 2 days. I interviewed at Altair Business Consulting (Grand Rapids, MI) in Oct 2015
Interview
E-mails and calls were implemented for an interview. Begin interview with HR and the manager there, and went back the next day for another. It was a typical interview for a consulting firm. No real bumps or awful questions, unique questions which will help you determine if you are a fit or not. Love the attitude of staff and office. It is certainly a nice challenging atmosphere, but unsure yet if it something I will do forever. I do network marketing at home, and love it. But working for others, a new ballgame. I am determined and coachable, have a wonderful personality, and that helps here with this market.
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 2 days. I interviewed at Altair Business Consulting (Grand Rapids, MI) in Nov 2015
Interview
I was called about an opportunity for a Customer Service/HR Manager at Altair BC.
After the initial phone screen I went in for an interview at the Altair office in Grand Rapids, Michigan. They had me fill out a quick application as well as a personality questionnaire.
The interview itself was fairly straightforward - the HR Administrator described the company and then asked what I was looking for and what were 3 strengths and a weakness.
What threw up red flags for me were the following:
- At no point (even after I asked for one) was I provided a job description.
- The job that was described was a sales/marketing position, not the CS/HR Manager role I was told about on the phone.
- They seem to stress professionalism. I was instructed to wear business professional attire (should have been a given) and that was one aspect the interviewer hit on a few times. However in the waiting room they have some kind of Pop Pandora blaring, the interviewing obviously had very little interviewing experience (side note - this isn't a bad thing because everyone needs to get that experience but there should have been someone else in the room with her). She couldn't answer basic questions about the job - what an average day looks like, what the pay structure looks like, etc.
- I was being sold the company more than they were interviewing me. The perks, the fast promotions, the free tickets and trips.
- Later that evening I received a call back offering me a second interview. At that time I was able to get a few questions answered and was told "We want to see you make six figures in the first year" and that the first several weeks/months are 100% commission." After doing a bit more research, it sounds a lot like a multi level marketing type of structure where the more people you're "training" and the more they train, the more money you make.
I was offered a second interview but declined. After I declined, the person who called pushed a little further (not in a rude way though) and spoke to how many promotions she had received and how quickly people can move up.
All in all, it wasn't a terrible experience and this might be a really good opportunity for someone right out of school or someone who is having a hard time finding work. I happen to be at a point in my career that starting again at the bottom isn't what I'm looking for and I'm looking for long term security but I'm not sure if Altair will still be around in 5 years - based on what I saw, they need to grow into their values a bit.