I recently applied for an Associate Writer position at one of Stripes39's venture companies, Education Labs. After I submitted my resume and cover letter, I received a link to a personality test that took about 40 minutes to complete. Once I finished that, I received two writing assignments, both of which focused on topics relevant to higher education and student life. For my time and effort completing the assignments, I was compensated $25. After that, I was granted a phone interview. Unfortunately, during the phone interview, I found out that Education Labs recently sold off all properties related to education and is currently focused entirely on personal finance. This is an area in which I have no interest or experience and something entirely different than what's listed on their website and alluded to in both of the aforementioned writing assignments. The whole experience ended up feeling completely unprofessional and even deceitful. I certainly would not have applied for the position and wasted so much time pursuing this position if personal finance had been mentioned in the job description. I wonder how many others wasted their time getting to step four of the application process only to find out the same information I did.
Advice for Stripes39: if one of your venture companies now has a totally different focus than what's listed on its website, stop wasting applicants' time and just disclose it in the job description. I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who are interested in writing about personal finance. It's just unlikely to be the same kind of people applying for a job at a site that claims to be focused entirely on higher education.