To be honest, I'm still unclear about what the actual job I was interviewing for was. They (the recruiter) told me they couldn't afford me for the job I applied for but they mentioned I could be a good fit for another role they hadn't posted yet...and still haven't posted on the site to this day, a whole 2 weeks later. The initial call went fine. It took about a week from my application to the time the in-house recruiter reached out to set up a call. He called me at the scheduled time and the call went okay. Basic questions about my work history and what I'm looking for. Compensation came up and I was told that the role I applied for didn't pay near the range I wanted but I could be a good fit for another role that did potentially pay that much. I let the recruiter know my experience in that vertical was limited but I was open to a discussion with the hiring manager to see if it could potentially be a good fit. Recruiter got back to me the same day and say the pay for the role would be within my range and immediately began to set up the next call. He sent through some "Interview Etiquette" information which was....odd. I've been in the industry for 10+ years and I'm a professional; I found the email incredibly tone-deaf and, to be honest, insulting. Good for those just out of college, but if you've ever held a professional job before, it’s a huge waste of time and energy to send this to people. Also, if you’re needing to provide people with instructions on how to conduct yourself during an interview (including such pearls of wisdom as "don't interrupt the interviewer" and "make eye contact") perhaps you shouldn't be hiring these people. I don't know. I found it insulting but I guess tips can't hurt. For me, it was odd though, and very off-putting – red flag for sure. When it came time for the second interview, the person I met with on the team I would be working on was amazing! She was super friendly and very nice; gave a great overview of the company and team. Very genuine and kind. I enjoyed a good conversation with her about the role. A few poignant questions here and there, but generally speaking just a really good conversation about the role, my work history, and what I'm looking for. No complaints. She mentioned they would have me do a project. Not too crazy, but at this point in my career with substantial work history and plenty of professional references, I felt this was odd, but chalked it up to me mentioning I didn't have much experience in this particular vertical. I then needed to deal with the recruiter again, who was less than helpful. I was provided the project which I’m assuming was intentionally vague to really suss out what I was capable of. Fair. But when I reached back out with questions on the prompt, I was met with the most ridiculous response I’ve ever received which sounded more like a Dad giving a pep-talk to his son during a little league championship than an actual response to very real questions I had about the prompt. I had less than 48 hours to put this together so I needed additional clarity on where to focus my time since not only did I have to put this project together, but then present it, live, in front of a panel. The response was chock-full of motivational verbiage that didn’t answer a single specific question I asked. Okay. At this point that was like red flag 4 or 5. The fact the recruiter initially emailed me at like 11PM and would conduct business over the weekend were also some red flags for me. Just seems like the company might have people working all the time. Second person I interviewed with was candid about working more than 40 hour weeks on the regular. Which again, is fine, but this coupled with the horrible recruiter experience, I decided to pass on this potential opportunity. I was lucky enough to have another offer for a more senior role and I decided to take that. This experience is not unique to me. I know someone else who went through this exact same process as me, with the exact same recruiter, and she actually DID the project and presented it and then was ghosted by the team. My advice here is simply for the team to revamp its recruitment process. It honestly left a sour taste in my mouth and the only thing keeping me from immediately turning down the project was the second interview I had with the lady on the team I would be working with. She was great… but ultimately the recruiter was just not great, the process was very labor-intensive, and really honestly didn’t feel worth it.
