A Senior manager in the HR team head-hunted and contacted me directly with the following tempting package, claiming they would offer a market leading salary and bonus system, excellent training and development, fully expensed iphone and laptop, international travel and flexible working hours.
After several telephone interviews confirming what I could offer and what they could offer me, they requested that I meet with them as soon as possible and sounded very keen, so I took time off from my current position and travelled to do so. They kindly recompensed my travel expenses.
The interview itself lasted six hours but there was no break, with a new team member coming in and interviewing you at every hour and asking the same interview questions as the person had before.
While being interviewed, it became clear that there was indeed no international travel nor were there flexible working hours, you are expected to be office-based from 08:30-17:30. Which discounted the international travel and flexible working hours the Senior member of the HR team had mentioned in the initial written conversation.
They were polite, a pleasure to speak with and the office itself is quite spectacular, and it's clear they can offer you wonderful career progression opportunities. That said, I left the interview wondering and feeling if perhaps the whole thing had simply been a fishing expedition in order to stake out the competition.
In the end, they politely contacted me to explain that they had decided not to add anyone new to their team after all.
