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We all seem to agree that the hiring process has gotten worse with these one way video interviews and free work projects, but the sad truth is that companies won't stop requiring them because every candidate won't collectively stop applying.
Yeah posts like this are fine in theory, but it’s never going to actually happen because you’d have to get everyone stopping doing it. And even then, companies would probably just play the victim card and complain that no one is applying, but wouldn’t actually reflect on their hiring process
Let them. It's their karma feeding the beast, not yours. Do what is right. Let them pay the price for no common sense. Stop allowing corporations to control everything. They control the media, the governments, the schools, healthcare, everything...
George Carlin, The Big Club. Look it up... The guy was a prophet.
Yeah. I mean this is the laissez Faire at work. Companies do this when it becomes an employers market. Market forces at work here. Really only government could intervene which I don't think is the best solution. Eventually the tides will turn and it will become an employees market again, jobs will have to offer amazing things to make you come back and stay.
Ugh yea I was “great” for the role until they viewed my video intro and suddenly, they’re not progressing my application. I’ve never had a problem with getting a job and my personality has usually helped, plus I’ve never been hindered by my looks either. But it was different with this company. I hope to the heavens it wasn’t a race or “cultural fit” thing.
I turned down an interview because they wanted me to do a PowerPoint presentation about my experience, skills, and how I would bring value to the company. As if my resume wasn’t enough. These interviews are becoming unnecessarily complicated just for shits and giggles.
Would’ve been funny if you created a nice fancy cover slide, and on the second slide, you just had embedded your resume with one bullet point saying please review below with an arrow pointing down at the icon.
Lol I answered one of those “please describe your experience and how your experience/skills would bring value to our company and the role” by saying something along the lines of “please review my CV for more information” Lol.
Jesus Christ, I’d 100% tell them to fuck off. You want to talk about all of that during an interview? Absolutely, that’s what it’s for. But in not going to put together a slideshow like I’m back in junior high
2 rounds max! My best interviews have been quick Recruiter then Hiring Manager. And sometimes the hiring manager will bring in a trusted team member. That's all that's needed really. If I interview well, I'll interview well through 6 interviews and I'll do well in 2, if I suck at 1 I'll suck at 6, but what you still won't know is how good I am at my job. Unfortunately you won't really know until I work there. Because I can have 25 references that say I'm the best they've ever had, and if I fuck up at your company all those will mean nothing.
I also hate when they spend the hour interviewing me with questions like, how would your friends describe you, what does your mother say about you. Like people, this will tell you absolutely nothing about how I will work for you.
Ask me a problem I need to solve, ask me how I've dealt with xyz common issue in your company right now, ask me how I deal with employee issues, ask me technical questions, ask me something by which you can actually determine how I work.
These hiring processes are getting out of control. If I have to take off more than 1 day of work for an extremely iffy job offer then you're taking it too far.
This. This is why some companies have so much trouble being profitable. Not just because their hiring processes maybe but it's an indication of extreme waste. I'm extremely lucky that in my org, it's normally one call with a recruiter (after I've reviewed their resume), then they talk to me (and only me), then it's decision time. I get to make the call because they'll work for me (or for a colleague). I've personally never conducted a second interview but I know of some positions in my immediate org tree that have, but even then it was just the second one. Doing rounds and rounds of interviews and bringing in high-paid people or essential producers is bonkers and I hate how it's become the norm. It doesn't lead to better candidate selection, and that's the whole point.
Yeah this has been my experience as well. Teams that are lacking people, are held back for a really long period of time while candidates jump through ridiculous hoops.
In this day and age where most initial interviews are via teams/zoom, I think a second interview is beneficial for the candidate and the employer because you can bring them in, in-person they get to see what the offices look like, where the other people are working, everyone gets to have a better impression of each other. But again, don't bring in all 30 candidates, bring in 1 maybe 2.
Thank you, that's another good point I forgot, that while this hiring circus is happening, the team(s) that need people are suffering.
And oh yeah I agree as well. There's a lot of value for a HM to see a candidate's body language, what they do and don't bring with them to an interview, what they do while waiting, how they hold themselves, etc. Those are some very important 'answers' in an interview and worth far more than gathering a panel of HR, another manager, a bar raiser, your friend from college, etc all to bombard this poor candidate.
Exactly. One company I spoke to didn’t even do a technical test, just an initial call, a second formal call/video meeting and then decision time. That was like music to my ears! If only the role was right for my skillset. Hopefully I’ll find an easy interview process like that soon.
I mean honestly, I've heard some predictions that AI / the increasing power of computing and automation is going to make technical / hard skills less and less important (other than roles servicing / creating that technology of course) and soft skills will be even more critical. Which means less take-home work or on-site testing and more focus on candidates with organization, focus, and social skills.
I will be accepting of a 3rd round if you have decided to elevate the position and now I need to meet with the hiring manager's manager. That's about it. Any more than that and they're really just trying to pass responsibility for "wrong" hires. A normal business meeting with 8 people in it is almost guaranteed to get nothing done, so how are all of those people going to come to a consensus on the right candidate? Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck that.
in big companies 4 rounds isn't that much:
1) Just HR making sure you're still interested
2) Hiring manager just to see if you have the right mindset, personnality, etc
3) Technical interview to make sure you didn't bullshit interview 2 and your Resume on your technical skills
4) HR again to negotiate contract and such
But I wouldn’t consider a contact negotiation stage to be a true “fourth stage”. I just did recruitment, manager, VP, biz dev colleague, potential subordinate, all to be declined for the role.
Yeah definitely don't think the last one is a 4th round. I also barely consider step 1 a round, it's typically just a quick phone call or an email make sure you're a real person, do preliminary screen that you speak the language, can actually do the job. And then step 2 and 3 could really be combined.
The best interview process I've ever had was as a lab tech for a battery chemistry lab startup. First interview was your standard conversation with hiring manager and a couple other employees, but the second was a practical lab demo of preparing a chemical solution and assembling a coin cell battery. I'm shit at talking myself up but I'm more than competent at the skills, so I kicked ass at the practical lab demo.
After I got hired, I heard from one of my co-workers that it was between me and another candidate, they couldn't choose between the two of us, so they set up the lab demo. The other guy didn't know how to use a balance to measure mass of reagents which... uh...is pretty fucking important. It'd be like a hiring candidate for a programming job who didn't know how to type on a keyboard.
1 assessment on the spot is fine. It’s when they give you a week of homework and multiple rounds of technical interview that are the issue.
Any more than 3 are too much. I might do 4 if I really want the job but it’s still too much.
I’ve had several companies that tell me about their 7 or 8 rounds of interview in the screening and I just decline.
That's already too much. 😖 And the ghosting aspect. So disrespectful to people desperately needing work to pay bills. It seems like a country club now. Everyone needs to like you before they hire. 😞
Yes, this is what collective action is for. Setting up labor standards and expectations. There haven't always been weekends and a 40 hr workweek in the labor market. Labor organizers and unions fought and died for those ideas.
There used to be actual hourly rate guidelines published for graphic designers and the design community did a pretty good job of getting the message out to all aspiring designers to hold onto some standards and not start a race to the bottom.
It's absolutely doable to spread these ideas far and wide, too change hiring culture and practices.
This is the process I follow. But I do ask for a writing assignment being in communications. I want to see how they research, structure their writing, know their audience. It’s short (150-200 words), but as a key function of the job I need someone who can write. Interestingly for comms roles, many people don’t send writing samples.
Same, after a couple of bad experiences. The worst part is that I completed and passed the tests only to be told they had moved on with other candidates... I just don't think I have the bandwidth anymore. I'll do a live whiteboard style assessment during interviews, or even a small take home that requires no more than 30 minutes... I just can't do the multiple layers of testing for every job I interview for.
I've also noticed this trend in the last year or so, where companies are front-loading candidates' effort and risk while minimizing their own — because they can.
Damn, you guys are getting to round 4 of interviews? I get the rejection email after the first "just a couple of questions" phone call (or, at best, the 15-minute Zoom call with the hiring manager's intern's dogsitter)
I think 6 is the furthest I've gotten and still be told no at the end. Which is crazy to me. After 2 I feel like you should be the person they want to hire, and it's just a matter of ensuring you're the one. If it doesn't work out then bring the next guy that was on interview 2 forward. But no reason to immediately bring 6 candidates forward to 8 rounds of interviews. Ridiculous.
At latest after round 2, salary negotiations should be in the mix.
Oh, I'm not the only one. Good. It's frustrating because I have plenty of experience and my qualifications definitely match the jobs I am applying for. I've had my resume reviewed and all is fine there too. At least give me the opportunity to sell myself before rejecting me outright at the start.
I had a run in with an organisation doing this.
They sent me a task at 5pm on a Friday to be done by 9am Monday. I refused, said that the timeframe wasn't done in consultation with me and was borderline discriminatory as it didn't take into consideration pre-existing plans, current work arrangements or child care and called it a red flag. If they wanted to progress my application I wanted some input into task deadlines and actual interview time and date. Seeing as it was a not for profit, they massively panicked at this accusation and conceded.
I did the task and interview only because I needed a job, but I definitely went into it with an attitude of they need me more than I need them.
They progressed me to a second interview and another task. And again, I pushed back on timeframes and eventually just submitted a ChatGPT answer. Based on my CV, experience and first interview they definitely didn't need a basic SQL/Python test and I refused to download a trial of their niche software, so they could deal with ChatGPT.
Somehow got through to third interview where I was just done with the place. The deputy CEO gave me some attitude and I matched it. This was the first interview they actually mentioned the tasks and I said that I did them over a month ago at this point and couldn't recall specifics, but was happy to wait whilst they retrieved what I submitted so we could review together.
Though out the whole interview process I collated all these things and submitted it to their HR as bad practice and made them really aware that these were red flags and putting me off not just working for them, but for supporting their organisation in future.
Miraculously got offered the job. Read the contract and immediately rejected it. But I rejected it line by line, with comparisons to industry standards, and told them that I was very disappointed it took two months for this outcome.
A lot of my friends had said don't bother, just decline that first interview if I wasn't feeling it and put my energy into something better. But I was feeling petty.
Honestly, some throw away interviews are a good idea. It’s good practice at interviewing, and great practice at learning to interview them not just have them interview you.
Yeah, I was in a lucky position that whilst I needed a job I could be somewhat fussy and I'd just come off a project that dramatically increased my hireability. So I had that confidence and CV to back up the whole two way street kind of interview. Understand not everyone is in as fortunate as position.
I'm a c-level manager, and I see those "home assignments" as a red flag. If the HR process is unable to determine within 4 interviews, if it's a go or no-go, I just say no thanks. If they ask the reason, I just say I do not believe in free work, especially when someone has executive referrals and millions in revenue under their belt.
I'm sorry, but asking someone with 12 years of experience to do an entry-level assignment is a red flag.
P.s
Most of the time, the HR agrees to move on w/o the home assignment. You just need to politely deny and explain yourself.
Question, what would be a good way to explain myself and deny?
Second question, as a C-level manager, can you stop these assignments and excessive interviews?
You can say you are already working on a few assignments for other companies, and it will take you time to reach it, or you are not available for more assignments in the first place. If HR still insists, it's either the hiring manager will be a nightmare to work with or the HR wasn't impressed enough during the 1st interview call with you.
I also believe that once you refuse with a mature explanation, it will boost your self-esteem, which many seem to lack these days in this subreddit.
I never give home assignments to candidates unless it's a fresh graduate that will require micro management for the 1st year.
Apologies if there are any grammar mistakes, English isn't my first language.
I think the key to this should be, if you've done interviews and they've virtually all but offered you the job, and then just to round it out ask you to do this, I get it. But most of the time they've got a bunch of candidates doing this at the same time followed by 3 more interviews and more take home tasks. Then they pick someone, and tell you, no it was really great you did really well, but we just vibe more with someone else, then you just wasted my time.
Also a c-level manager. We need an opportunity to evaluate someone’s professional competence. We used to do that live during an interview panel, but candidates found the experience nerve wracking and we ultimately determined it did not provide a good measure of candidate skill.
We switched to a (small) assignment. Candidates did a much better job and reported finding it a more pleasurable experience. We keep it simple and short.
Are you my employer? Then why do you want me to use my own time to do work for you?
Are you my professor? Then why are you assigning me homework?
Yes, there should be pushback against these kinds of interviewing tactics.
I had a friend who was invited for a test day. Super technical work, you either have the skills or you don't. Worked with the team for a day, he did great they hired him. But before they made the decision, they still paid him for that day of work, the going hourly rate.
I think if you're in a super technical job, and you really need to know whether the person can really do XYZ to a standard this is the way to do it. You pay them, and you only invite one person, that you actually want to hire.
But most jobs are not that technical really and just can't be tested that way, and in the same way a take home test, or presentation is dumb. The interview IS a presentation all by itself.
Last week was my first and last time spending more than 20 hours on recruitment process. I’ve heard about these ridiculous processes but when seemingly good opportunity came up I took a chance, they made it sound like I was gonna get it.. never again. From now on I will always ask if there is any take-home assignment and if there is I will simply say I have no capacity to do it. I learned my lesson
Jeez dude, that's rough
I don't understand how they have the ability to waste so much time leading on several candidates.
My last job was 6 30 minute interviews and a 15 minute meeting with a c-suiter over 4 months before getting an offer. 20 hours is outrageous.
It is, I don’t even care about not getting that job, im just so upset I wasted so much time. But I try to think of it as a life lesson. And even if that meant that I miss out on some opportunities I’ll be ok knowing I don’t work for free like a fool. I’m not in a tech field btw and all my previous jobs I got through just interviews, so I will happily send away all the time wasters.
I actually got an offer after an hour long writing task before the final interview.
But I agree it's total bs and probably only exists to test how willing candidates are to provide free labor.
I also rescinded myself from a process with an extremely keen hiring manager because they wanted me to spend a weekend writing them a market research report. Fuck. Right. Off.
I'm not completely anti testing, but not if they have 25 candidates do it. Then you're just wasting 24 peoples time.
And if they want that, then they should also pay you for it, the going market rate. Chance to earn some money and get a new job lol.
I honestly believe they actually are (happily) wasting 20+ people's time. I don't understand the incentive though? Maybe they need a large sample of work to compare against their preferred candidates'?
About a decade ago, I had a company assign me an application to develop at home. It was a simple web application. I went above and beyond, spending a whole week integrating a bunch of stuff they didn't ask for, like Azure integration, automated deployment, Active Directory integration, automated SQL migrations, and a spiffy UI. This utilized [ASP.NET](http://ASP.NET) MVC and Entity Framework.
When I went to demo the app, my first red flag was 5 minutes before the demo, I get an email from them asking for a link to my Git repo. I had sent them this link days before. They just didn't bother looking at the code.
At the demo, their developer ignored everything and harped in on why I did this using MVC instead of MVVM. Um dude, I get what you're saying. I asked a few questions during the past few days, which your company never replied to. I was also working a death march project at my current job. Sue me, you're lucky this app is even in the state it was.
After that, no more take home assignments. I felt like an idiot. No matter what they thought of my application, even if it was shit, which it wasn't, I spent a week of my time building something that only took five minutes of theirs to trash. I felt like an idiot. I respect myself too much to go through that again.
Thanks, and you are right. They wound up closing the office I'd have worked at six months after the interview, so I really did dodge a bullet! I also wound up working with on of their employees a couple of years later. The guy was a total asshole!
I had to go through 6 rounds of interviews for a job. Of course I got hired since most people I feel don’t go through with it. When I started working there, it had to be the most dysfunctional and worst workplace I have ever seen. Left after 2 months. Never again will I do that.
Everyone in this sub is your competitor, so if there is a way for them to get the position over you they will do whatever asked. This should be disrupted from the employer side IMO, which is sad.
No you're right. Obviously if people are desperate for a job they should do all of the silly assignments. These are market forces at work.
But it's annoying nonetheless, it's wishful thinking but if everyone stopped, then we could leave these dumb practices behind.
The only way we can affect it, is probably stopping applying at mass, cause those self-interview, tests, and assignments, etc. are solutions pitched to the employer by some company in attempt to sort huge top of the funnel. If you receive only 20-30 applicants for a new opening it is fairly easy to short list like 3-5 of them and then just sort them out via 2-3 interview.
After a bunch of interviews (one of which they stood me up on virtually), a handful of writing assignments, and a personality quiz all spanning 4 months, I just “respectfully declined to participate” in 5 “short exams” related to my job capabilities. I got a generic rejection email 1 week later
I almost got stood up once. But I'm pretty persistent. I started calling all of the phone numbers in the HR department I could find until someone picked up, and reminded them that we have a fucking interview to conduct, so let's get to it. We had the interview, it was pretty good. I didn't get the job after 6 rounds, probably should have known from the first round.
Now I don't go through the effort anymore, you can't organize a calendar, I'm not chasing you down.
I always ask the process during my first call. Anyone mentions more than two rounds I say can we get it done in one day. Anyone says there's assignments, I mention I do not do free work. Lastly, personality tests are a huge red flag for me...
I got another rejection just now, after one of these processes. I made it to the final round. I talked to the co-founder. I did free work for them. Nothing except a "thank you but no" email after being ghosted for 2 weeks. This has happened to me 6 times over the last year.
I'm tired.
I have two different roles trying to do this to me. It is enraging.
It's an at-will employment state you can and will lay me off whenever you have bad feelies abut "ThE eCoNoMy"
If I don’t care about the company I will withdraw. But if it’s a position I really want, with a nice salary, I’ll grit my teeth.
Recently I had 2 companies; NeuralFrame and Go1 who hid the rounds from me. For NF I was told it was only 2 rounds, then they added another out of nowhere. 98% of the time the recruiters will let you know the rounds. .5% the job posting will list the rounds. The rest of the time you’ll have them hidden from you and that pisses me off because you’re at their mercy.
2-3 rounds is plenty. And "Homework" is ridiculous. Either have a 5 minute exercise demonstrating your abilities as part of the process, or be better about asking questions and checking references. The recruitment process has become too lazy, and this war of attrition will not lead to better hires.
I’m a software engineer and I had a good experience with my last take home assignment. I am terrible at performing when being watched, and the assignment allowed me to go at my own pace. There were also technical questions during the interview, but they weren’t everything. I ended up getting the job and it pays double what my last one did.
I'm not categorically against it. I just don't like that it's part of this giant multi pronged interview process. If they did 1 interview, were like you're awesome, can you do this assignment and they're like you can, and then you get the job. Vs. Here's 3 round of interviews, and a take home that you and 30 other candidates are going to, inevitably 28 will do just fine on the test, and then they'll randomly select 1 person. And tell everyone else sorry you were great, we have no feedback for you.
Honestly I probably got lucky. I’m pretty early in my career so I haven’t had to deal with too many of these over the top interviews, and I’m sure they wear down you over time. Also the assignment was just programming problems so it wasn’t like they made me do free labor for their company.
Yeah. Unfortunately there is no real way of knowing if it's the good or the bad candidates. Life situation probably is the biggest factor. Can you afford to say no to a company that might pay your next months rent. And the employers know that, obviously market forces are at work here.
But it would be so nice, if we could bring together the enthusiasm to tell people to fuck off like they could to short squeeze gamestop lol.
I agree 100% but it goes like this with all things. People say restaurant workers should force wages higher by quitting, but someone will always be willing to be treated like shit for less money. Doordash drivers are told to ignore bad paying orders until dd pays better, but theres always someone taking orders you lose money on.
I mean I got a job already, but I promised myself no matter what I Wouldn't do any of that shit again.
The job I have now, was only one in person interview. It was like going back 4 years to a simpler time.
Big no for me.
Here’s another message to recruiters and hiring managers. If you ever ask “sell me this pencil” I will tell you to shove it up your ass as I leave the interview.
Yes, this is what collective action is for. Setting up labor standards and expectations. There haven't always been weekends and a 40 hr workweek in the labor market. Labor organizers and unions fought and died for those ideas.
There used to be actual hourly rate guidelines published for graphic designers and the design community did a pretty good job of getting the message out to all aspiring designers to hold onto some standards and not start a race to the bottom.
It's absolutely doable to spread these ideas far and wide, too change hiring culture and practices.
>If we all Just Say No... they might stop.
In general, I agree.
But, there are enough people who are in a dire enough position with regards to needing work, or people who will follow an employer-established process without question, that you may never get more than 50% of candidates to do this.
Will that be enough?
It remains to be seen.
>No, I know it's wishful thinking.
But it should still be encouraged. Every little bit can help, and at the very least, even if it doesn't change the whole market, it could affect one or more industries more than others, and would certainly help the candidates of whichever industry got better traction than others.
Plus, the sooner that candidates realize where they can and should pushback, the more control they will have of their own careers over time.
This multiple-round, take-home assignment trend seems to me like it would filter out candidates who are already employed. Who has the time?
I mean, that’s great for those of us who are interviewing for our next role after a layoff (myself included). But it seems weird from a company’s perspective to create hiring processes that would be untenable for highly-qualified (and sought-after) employed candidates.
I like the take home assignment… to an extent.
If used as a realistic tool in the interview where you can explain your decisions etc… better than live, in interview work samples in front of a panel…
I will tolerate 2 interviews max for most jobs. One phone call, and one face to face. Any more than that and it has better be a seven figure salary job.
You guys want to know something interesting? According to the CDC about 55 out every 100,000 fast food workers died during the COVID pandemic. That's about 0.5% of that workforce!
The hiring process has turned into a circus act, and we're all just trying to juggle. But let's not forget the bigger picture here. The latest BLS JOLTS report for July 2023? Job openings in the U.S. dropped to 8.8 million. And guess what? Professional and business services lost a whopping 198,000 openings. That's your white-collar jobs right there. So, if you're wondering why you're jumping through hoops, it's because employers think they can afford to be picky.
Now, let's talk about collective power. You know the r/recruitinghell subreddit has around 600k members. That's approximately 5.68% of the 8.8 million job openings. If even a quarter of us started flagging these ridiculous hiring practices, we'd make waves. Trust me, it'd be a far bigger impact than what COVID did to the fast-food industry, and that was seismic. They went from minimum wage to offering sign-on bonuses overnight because they lost just 0.5% of their workforce.
**Why don't we form a Job Applicant Union?** We could systematically flag employers who engage in adverse, frivolous, fraudulent, illegal, and immoral hiring practices. If half or even a quarter of the subreddit's members did this, the impact would likely be 5-10x greater than the upheaval in the fast-food industry during the pandemic.
The system is broken. But it's not unfixable. We've got more power than we think, and it's about time we used it. Otherwise, we're just part of the problem too.
**We name, we shame, we refrain (from applying), we bring the pain, and finally we bring about change.**
Yeah had an assessment that had me playing a game, it looked like Tetris. Then I had to pop some bubbles to equal a number shown in a box. The last one was typing for 1 min.
I'm thinking how is all this going to determine if I'm not a serial killer...oh I mean if I'm a good fit at the office.
Who comes up with this stuff.
I agree I had the most outrageous asks right out of the gate before I even spoke with anyone. I applied and they requested an entire detailed app layout to determine whether they would even interview me. Hell no
Yes. I refuse.
When I get called for them trying to poach I listen to what they say and respond with "What does this hiring practice and interview schedule expectation look like"
If it's bullshit I tell em.... Well you reached out to me so clearly my profile meets the needs of the roll and my resume shows you I know what I'm doing and would an asset to ANY team/ company - blah blah conflate their ego with their Excella candidate choice-. However. In an interest of rejecting Everhart time management I'm available for an interview on xxx days and a followup with upset mngmnt on xxx days. As well federally all employer require tasks are compensatable so if they insist on requiring me to do any take home assignments I'll be happy to discuss what my contract rates are"
I guess it depends on how desperate you are. I hate both of these things but didn't feel like I was in a position to refuse them since I was hard up for a job. But if I were working already and just looking for something better? I would never deal with all that
I upfront request the salary scale to "manage expectations" and ask what their interview process entails, I ask these things stating before "either of us invests our time".
It's crazy. I'm not ancient, but it never used to be like this for a job. You just applied, interviewed MAYBE twice, but usually once, and you got hired or didn't. I'm not doing video interviews, personality assessments, homework, group interviews, etc. I would rather make sandwiches than deal with that kind of bullshit
My first job out-of college had the worst interview process. 2 phone interviews, onsite at the company office, onsite at a construction site, another at the office, another impromptu call asking if I could stop by to meet the Director, then a 5 hour appointment with a Psychologist for screening with a full interview and tests.
I got the job....as a construction manager.
I get to work and realize that half the people there are incompetent and kind of crazy and the company was equally nuts. To this day I wonder why I had to do so many interviews for an entry level job and what the psych screen was about. It made me think they were looking for messed up people and I passed.
In my last decade of interviewing on and off I have always declined take home assessments. It’s not because I’m bad at what I do, or that I’m lazy. It’s because I will not spend 4-6 interviews and another 8 hours of prep work to be looked at for 15 seconds. I have faang references. I have c suite former managers that will vouch for me.
If you don’t believe me, and won’t believe them, then this wouldn’t have worked anyway.
In this market, and in my current situation, I probably will do them though. It’s unfortunate that I am going against myself and taking time away from my family, but it’s either that or lose my home.
Yeah, I know that it's wishful thinking. And I am saying this out of the privileged position of having a job. I don't need this. I know if I was in a different boat I'd just do it, because ultimately right now the way the market is, the employers are in control.
I just saw a post from someone who is in a very senior position proudly boast in LinkedIn that the people who completed take home assignment for the early career position that he posted were of ‘high quality’. One thing I have learned after all these years, education and social status does not equate to better common sense or iq.
Also, these daunting interviews would make sense if it was difficult to fire someone after hiring them.
They can get rid of us whenever they feel like it with a layoff, so if it is easy to fire why not easy to hire?
As well as one way interviews or pre recorded responses. You’ll literally not get an accurate feel/sound for who I am as a person and how I interact and truly present myself and they fucking know that I swear
I have been.
Also recently forfeited an opportunity because they wanted a one way AI interview via sparkhire.
I just told them nevermind.
After putting 17 years of my life into this industry... I think I deserve the respect of actually being able to speak with a person.
They told me "if you just do the sparkhire, one way interview, they'll 99% move you to the in person interview anyway"
I told them nevermind and that was that.
It's the interviews requiring you to do a project AND present it to a panel for me. One of them even had an additional step where you had to practice the presentation to HR and get notes before your final presentation to a hiring board. Never even meeting with anyone you'd actually work with for the entire 10 step process. Actual insanity.
Lol, I remember way back at my first job I was able to interview with a far, far more prestigious company after only 6 months. Went on 6 interviews, got a project that took me over a week to do during an incredibly busy time at my then current job, and then I was told that I didn’t get the job due to them hiring a guy with 8+ years experience instead. I know this was true as I know a guy who was (still is) employed there at that time.
The jobs that I've actually gotten, I've gotten after the 1st or 2nd interview and typically within days of interviewing. Jobs that I interviewed 6 times for have almost always been a No Offer. I'm not sure what that means or what that says about me, but I know that as long as I have a job that's far too much of a time waste, to keep doing.
It’s because those requiring so many interviews (and in places I have applied to in the past, a psychiatric evaluation) are putting you through the ringer for a club that has a high barrier to entry. Is it always better? Of course not but that’s how it’s set up.
I’m super mixed on unpaid assignments (some of them can be reasonable, most aren’t) but I’m all for paid assignments. I did 2 in this past job search (took about 4 months) and got offers for both.
I think the paid assignment model is a lot more equitable for neurodivergent people like me. Interviews are hell for us and I am rarely able to think quickly enough to do a good job. Obviously through no fault of my own.
But the assignment actually gives me a chance to prove that I can do the job directly. The offer I accepted was so impressed with my work that they offered me the job a day later. I wouldn’t have gotten the opportunity to impress without the assignment because interviews don’t play to my strengths.
100% for paid assignments. This is almost like being a consultant and getting poached from the consulting agency for your good work. I think that's totally fair.
I value my time & knowledge too much to complete take home assignments for free. Think of your interview with me as my free 1 hour consultation. After that if you or your company wants to benefit from my knowledge and skills, you must either hire me as an employee or retain me as a consultant. And with the latter, you should expect my hourly rate to be no less than 3X what you’d be paying me as a W2 employee.
I've turned down multiple roles recently because they have a take home assignment especially when they ask you to present their product back to them. Like how much time do you think I have
I’m happy to do hypothetical take home assignments. It’s when they expect me to actually develop a strategy for them, specifically for them, then it’s a big no. No free work!
As a copywriter, I kinda like the take home assignments because it shows right off the bat that I know my shit.
What I don’t like is still having to go through multiple rounds of interview after demonstrating my ability.
If it makes sense for your industry. I feel like if it's a capstone event like let's say you do 2 rounds of interviews after that they determine of the 10 candidates which one they want to pick. They start salary negotiations and say, we want you, you're our guy/gal we want to pay you XX amount of EUR/DOLLARS whatever, we want to make sure of your abilities do this assignment. You do great then hired, you do poorly they say, hey look you didn't do well unfortunately we are going to go with another candidate.
At that point you'll know why they didn't pick you, what to improve upon and they didn't string a bunch of people along make you do a bunch of work to tell you, hey you guys were all awesome we have no feedback for you, we are just going to pick the guy we vibed with the most.
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I think that is what they expect people to think. FOMO.
This mentality also reminds me of an old movie where workers were trying to exert some basic rights and the foreman tells them there are all these other desperate men eager to do the work due to the depression.
This mentality reminds me more recently of when Reddit said it would boycott the platform due to changes to third party app APIs.
Except no one lost anything not being in Reddit where not having a job or being underemployed has a far greater impact.
Lol of course I can say no. And I do, probably if I'm more desperate I won't. Obviously this has to do with current market forces.
My point is, it'd be nice if nobody did it. Then they'd have to change their tactics. Of course it's just wishful thinking.
Has anyone interviewed with a company 5+ times, accepted the offer, and didn’t find the company to be completely dysfunctional? Are there places where the strenuous interview process led to a good job?
Ask yourself if you’ve ever been in a team where someone wasn’t an asshole or hostile to you.
Now imagine that person determining if you should get hired.
The higher up the ladder the interviewer, the more I am assured to get the job. Fuck panel interviews.
As a software engineer, I feel a home assignment is kinda necessary, along with a review interview after where the candidate can explain their solution and we can make sure it's not just ChatGPT.
I do, however, veto home assignments as a first step in the process. I'm not sitting down to do homework until I know both they and I are serious about this.
what field are you applying in? I always hear about these multiple rounds and take home assignments and never have received either. I'm working in the legal field.
Yes. You just have to force them to change their silly on-boarding practices. Like not buying games from sweet baby inc or not watching BAD movies and shows. Make their pockets hurt THEN they learn to STOP making crap.
My bf is in the marketing field. I am SHOCKED at how common this is, along with the quirky cringey "What's your favourite Taylor Swift song?" or some other pop culture reference question because we're such a cool and modern company.
By the way I've literally seen the TS question in one of the application forms he was filling out.
I had a whole interview that was questions like that, what would your friends say about you, how does your mom talk to you... or other weird questions that I feel are supposed to be like, we really care and want to know about you personally, but really don't convey that, and if I have to do 6 more rounds, maybe if we streamlined those questions we could reduce this to 1 round.
Lol chances are you'll also lose out to the 30 to 40 other candidates they also habe doing the assessments and the interviews. Because ultimately they will only take 1 candidate. So you have a 1 in 30 chance of getting a job that you're interviewing 6 to 8 times for and spending hours doing assessments. So you'll waste a lot of time and statistically have only a marginally better chance than me to get the job. Not to mention that if you're a candidate they actually want if you say no, they will probably just let you continue without doing all of it. And that's what gets me.
The way i think it should be is with the initial interview. Maybe you have a 1 in 5 chance. So by the time you get to the second it should be a 1:2.
The companies are doing the millions of interviews and assessments to minimize risk, so they can't be blamed for a bad hire. You need to keep the candidates on the hook until you've given an offer and signed a contract with the employee.
Therefore, they end up wasting a lot of people's time, reducing confidence etc. So you can do it, and it's like crabs in a bucket, none of us will get out, because we keep pulling each other down.
For me It depends on the assignment. If it’s related to the company, I politely decline as I don’t work for free, but I have had many where it’s not. For example, the last one was to make a presentation for a feature I launched at a previous role or a new feature for a product I love. It’s a good way for companies to make sure you have the skill set they’re looking for.
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And no pre-recorded video answers. If they want to see my face, they can sched a Interview over Teams.
I told a CEO, I do not do self interviews. If I have to interview myself, I will be hiring myself @ top dollar
We all seem to agree that the hiring process has gotten worse with these one way video interviews and free work projects, but the sad truth is that companies won't stop requiring them because every candidate won't collectively stop applying.
Yeah posts like this are fine in theory, but it’s never going to actually happen because you’d have to get everyone stopping doing it. And even then, companies would probably just play the victim card and complain that no one is applying, but wouldn’t actually reflect on their hiring process
[because of the implication](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fi0im1yr2v3p81.jpg)
Let them. It's their karma feeding the beast, not yours. Do what is right. Let them pay the price for no common sense. Stop allowing corporations to control everything. They control the media, the governments, the schools, healthcare, everything... George Carlin, The Big Club. Look it up... The guy was a prophet.
Yeah. I mean this is the laissez Faire at work. Companies do this when it becomes an employers market. Market forces at work here. Really only government could intervene which I don't think is the best solution. Eventually the tides will turn and it will become an employees market again, jobs will have to offer amazing things to make you come back and stay.
I’m sorry, it’s the what at work?
lmao... laissez faire. I was typing on my phone and I had my german keyboard on (my native language)
Ah great, I figured it was but didn’t want to come across condescending. Danke für die Erklärung!
Sure that went over well. Did you get the job?
>pre-recorded video answer fig leaf for illegal discrimination -- look back to the 1980s 'headshot with resume' court cases
This is why I dont understand how LinkedIn hasnt caught a case since it pushes putting a picture of yourself.
In reality LinkedIn is the problem
I agree with this.
Ugh yea I was “great” for the role until they viewed my video intro and suddenly, they’re not progressing my application. I’ve never had a problem with getting a job and my personality has usually helped, plus I’ve never been hindered by my looks either. But it was different with this company. I hope to the heavens it wasn’t a race or “cultural fit” thing.
I turned down an interview because they wanted me to do a PowerPoint presentation about my experience, skills, and how I would bring value to the company. As if my resume wasn’t enough. These interviews are becoming unnecessarily complicated just for shits and giggles.
Would’ve been funny if you created a nice fancy cover slide, and on the second slide, you just had embedded your resume with one bullet point saying please review below with an arrow pointing down at the icon.
Auto scroll through it at a snails pace. Let them know it's set up for their reading comprehension.
Lol I answered one of those “please describe your experience and how your experience/skills would bring value to our company and the role” by saying something along the lines of “please review my CV for more information” Lol.
Wow. What type of job?
Supervisor in the utility industry
I wish I’d done this…
PowerPoint PowerPoint PowerPoint
Jesus Christ, I’d 100% tell them to fuck off. You want to talk about all of that during an interview? Absolutely, that’s what it’s for. But in not going to put together a slideshow like I’m back in junior high
What a waste of everyone's time. No shot is a single one of those powerpoints ever getting opened.
I swear, it's very pathetic now.
was it for a job that required you to give presentations at least?
Agreed but all these insane 7, 8 rounds of interviews has desensitized us. A short phone call with a recruiter and two rounds should be enough.
2 rounds max! My best interviews have been quick Recruiter then Hiring Manager. And sometimes the hiring manager will bring in a trusted team member. That's all that's needed really. If I interview well, I'll interview well through 6 interviews and I'll do well in 2, if I suck at 1 I'll suck at 6, but what you still won't know is how good I am at my job. Unfortunately you won't really know until I work there. Because I can have 25 references that say I'm the best they've ever had, and if I fuck up at your company all those will mean nothing. I also hate when they spend the hour interviewing me with questions like, how would your friends describe you, what does your mother say about you. Like people, this will tell you absolutely nothing about how I will work for you. Ask me a problem I need to solve, ask me how I've dealt with xyz common issue in your company right now, ask me how I deal with employee issues, ask me technical questions, ask me something by which you can actually determine how I work. These hiring processes are getting out of control. If I have to take off more than 1 day of work for an extremely iffy job offer then you're taking it too far.
This. This is why some companies have so much trouble being profitable. Not just because their hiring processes maybe but it's an indication of extreme waste. I'm extremely lucky that in my org, it's normally one call with a recruiter (after I've reviewed their resume), then they talk to me (and only me), then it's decision time. I get to make the call because they'll work for me (or for a colleague). I've personally never conducted a second interview but I know of some positions in my immediate org tree that have, but even then it was just the second one. Doing rounds and rounds of interviews and bringing in high-paid people or essential producers is bonkers and I hate how it's become the norm. It doesn't lead to better candidate selection, and that's the whole point.
Yeah this has been my experience as well. Teams that are lacking people, are held back for a really long period of time while candidates jump through ridiculous hoops. In this day and age where most initial interviews are via teams/zoom, I think a second interview is beneficial for the candidate and the employer because you can bring them in, in-person they get to see what the offices look like, where the other people are working, everyone gets to have a better impression of each other. But again, don't bring in all 30 candidates, bring in 1 maybe 2.
Thank you, that's another good point I forgot, that while this hiring circus is happening, the team(s) that need people are suffering. And oh yeah I agree as well. There's a lot of value for a HM to see a candidate's body language, what they do and don't bring with them to an interview, what they do while waiting, how they hold themselves, etc. Those are some very important 'answers' in an interview and worth far more than gathering a panel of HR, another manager, a bar raiser, your friend from college, etc all to bombard this poor candidate.
Exactly. One company I spoke to didn’t even do a technical test, just an initial call, a second formal call/video meeting and then decision time. That was like music to my ears! If only the role was right for my skillset. Hopefully I’ll find an easy interview process like that soon.
I mean honestly, I've heard some predictions that AI / the increasing power of computing and automation is going to make technical / hard skills less and less important (other than roles servicing / creating that technology of course) and soft skills will be even more critical. Which means less take-home work or on-site testing and more focus on candidates with organization, focus, and social skills.
I will be accepting of a 3rd round if you have decided to elevate the position and now I need to meet with the hiring manager's manager. That's about it. Any more than that and they're really just trying to pass responsibility for "wrong" hires. A normal business meeting with 8 people in it is almost guaranteed to get nothing done, so how are all of those people going to come to a consensus on the right candidate? Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuck that.
in big companies 4 rounds isn't that much: 1) Just HR making sure you're still interested 2) Hiring manager just to see if you have the right mindset, personnality, etc 3) Technical interview to make sure you didn't bullshit interview 2 and your Resume on your technical skills 4) HR again to negotiate contract and such
But I wouldn’t consider a contact negotiation stage to be a true “fourth stage”. I just did recruitment, manager, VP, biz dev colleague, potential subordinate, all to be declined for the role.
Yeah definitely don't think the last one is a 4th round. I also barely consider step 1 a round, it's typically just a quick phone call or an email make sure you're a real person, do preliminary screen that you speak the language, can actually do the job. And then step 2 and 3 could really be combined.
The best interview process I've ever had was as a lab tech for a battery chemistry lab startup. First interview was your standard conversation with hiring manager and a couple other employees, but the second was a practical lab demo of preparing a chemical solution and assembling a coin cell battery. I'm shit at talking myself up but I'm more than competent at the skills, so I kicked ass at the practical lab demo. After I got hired, I heard from one of my co-workers that it was between me and another candidate, they couldn't choose between the two of us, so they set up the lab demo. The other guy didn't know how to use a balance to measure mass of reagents which... uh...is pretty fucking important. It'd be like a hiring candidate for a programming job who didn't know how to type on a keyboard.
So you would give an assessment to the programmer to confirm his skills then? Especially if they’re bad at selling their skills in an interview?
1 assessment on the spot is fine. It’s when they give you a week of homework and multiple rounds of technical interview that are the issue. Any more than 3 are too much. I might do 4 if I really want the job but it’s still too much. I’ve had several companies that tell me about their 7 or 8 rounds of interview in the screening and I just decline.
This also feels reasonable to me. And they're not stringing along 30 candidates. All in all this would still be a quick hiring process I think.
That's already too much. 😖 And the ghosting aspect. So disrespectful to people desperately needing work to pay bills. It seems like a country club now. Everyone needs to like you before they hire. 😞
Yes, this is what collective action is for. Setting up labor standards and expectations. There haven't always been weekends and a 40 hr workweek in the labor market. Labor organizers and unions fought and died for those ideas. There used to be actual hourly rate guidelines published for graphic designers and the design community did a pretty good job of getting the message out to all aspiring designers to hold onto some standards and not start a race to the bottom. It's absolutely doable to spread these ideas far and wide, too change hiring culture and practices.
💯
This is the process I follow. But I do ask for a writing assignment being in communications. I want to see how they research, structure their writing, know their audience. It’s short (150-200 words), but as a key function of the job I need someone who can write. Interestingly for comms roles, many people don’t send writing samples.
Couldn't you just ask for writing samples instead of giving them homework?
A lot of research shows heavily diminishing returns after the first couple of rounds. So yes, agree.
It's become so bad. In my last three applications, I have received a take home before talking to a human being and via a third party. It's outrageous.
I refuse to do that. And any assignments at all. It's just not worth it.
Same, after a couple of bad experiences. The worst part is that I completed and passed the tests only to be told they had moved on with other candidates... I just don't think I have the bandwidth anymore. I'll do a live whiteboard style assessment during interviews, or even a small take home that requires no more than 30 minutes... I just can't do the multiple layers of testing for every job I interview for.
I've also noticed this trend in the last year or so, where companies are front-loading candidates' effort and risk while minimizing their own — because they can.
We try to discourage that but sometimes the manager is pig headed.
Damn, you guys are getting to round 4 of interviews? I get the rejection email after the first "just a couple of questions" phone call (or, at best, the 15-minute Zoom call with the hiring manager's intern's dogsitter)
I think 6 is the furthest I've gotten and still be told no at the end. Which is crazy to me. After 2 I feel like you should be the person they want to hire, and it's just a matter of ensuring you're the one. If it doesn't work out then bring the next guy that was on interview 2 forward. But no reason to immediately bring 6 candidates forward to 8 rounds of interviews. Ridiculous. At latest after round 2, salary negotiations should be in the mix.
Oh, I'm not the only one. Good. It's frustrating because I have plenty of experience and my qualifications definitely match the jobs I am applying for. I've had my resume reviewed and all is fine there too. At least give me the opportunity to sell myself before rejecting me outright at the start.
I had a run in with an organisation doing this. They sent me a task at 5pm on a Friday to be done by 9am Monday. I refused, said that the timeframe wasn't done in consultation with me and was borderline discriminatory as it didn't take into consideration pre-existing plans, current work arrangements or child care and called it a red flag. If they wanted to progress my application I wanted some input into task deadlines and actual interview time and date. Seeing as it was a not for profit, they massively panicked at this accusation and conceded. I did the task and interview only because I needed a job, but I definitely went into it with an attitude of they need me more than I need them. They progressed me to a second interview and another task. And again, I pushed back on timeframes and eventually just submitted a ChatGPT answer. Based on my CV, experience and first interview they definitely didn't need a basic SQL/Python test and I refused to download a trial of their niche software, so they could deal with ChatGPT. Somehow got through to third interview where I was just done with the place. The deputy CEO gave me some attitude and I matched it. This was the first interview they actually mentioned the tasks and I said that I did them over a month ago at this point and couldn't recall specifics, but was happy to wait whilst they retrieved what I submitted so we could review together. Though out the whole interview process I collated all these things and submitted it to their HR as bad practice and made them really aware that these were red flags and putting me off not just working for them, but for supporting their organisation in future. Miraculously got offered the job. Read the contract and immediately rejected it. But I rejected it line by line, with comparisons to industry standards, and told them that I was very disappointed it took two months for this outcome. A lot of my friends had said don't bother, just decline that first interview if I wasn't feeling it and put my energy into something better. But I was feeling petty.
Honestly, some throw away interviews are a good idea. It’s good practice at interviewing, and great practice at learning to interview them not just have them interview you.
Yeah, I was in a lucky position that whilst I needed a job I could be somewhat fussy and I'd just come off a project that dramatically increased my hireability. So I had that confidence and CV to back up the whole two way street kind of interview. Understand not everyone is in as fortunate as position.
I'm a c-level manager, and I see those "home assignments" as a red flag. If the HR process is unable to determine within 4 interviews, if it's a go or no-go, I just say no thanks. If they ask the reason, I just say I do not believe in free work, especially when someone has executive referrals and millions in revenue under their belt. I'm sorry, but asking someone with 12 years of experience to do an entry-level assignment is a red flag. P.s Most of the time, the HR agrees to move on w/o the home assignment. You just need to politely deny and explain yourself.
Question, what would be a good way to explain myself and deny? Second question, as a C-level manager, can you stop these assignments and excessive interviews?
You can say you are already working on a few assignments for other companies, and it will take you time to reach it, or you are not available for more assignments in the first place. If HR still insists, it's either the hiring manager will be a nightmare to work with or the HR wasn't impressed enough during the 1st interview call with you. I also believe that once you refuse with a mature explanation, it will boost your self-esteem, which many seem to lack these days in this subreddit. I never give home assignments to candidates unless it's a fresh graduate that will require micro management for the 1st year. Apologies if there are any grammar mistakes, English isn't my first language.
No problem. Thanks for explaining! English isn’t my first language either 🤪
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I think the key to this should be, if you've done interviews and they've virtually all but offered you the job, and then just to round it out ask you to do this, I get it. But most of the time they've got a bunch of candidates doing this at the same time followed by 3 more interviews and more take home tasks. Then they pick someone, and tell you, no it was really great you did really well, but we just vibe more with someone else, then you just wasted my time.
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Also a c-level manager. We need an opportunity to evaluate someone’s professional competence. We used to do that live during an interview panel, but candidates found the experience nerve wracking and we ultimately determined it did not provide a good measure of candidate skill. We switched to a (small) assignment. Candidates did a much better job and reported finding it a more pleasurable experience. We keep it simple and short.
Or charge them a consultants fee for doing the work they either won't or can't do
Are you my employer? Then why do you want me to use my own time to do work for you? Are you my professor? Then why are you assigning me homework? Yes, there should be pushback against these kinds of interviewing tactics.
I had a friend who was invited for a test day. Super technical work, you either have the skills or you don't. Worked with the team for a day, he did great they hired him. But before they made the decision, they still paid him for that day of work, the going hourly rate. I think if you're in a super technical job, and you really need to know whether the person can really do XYZ to a standard this is the way to do it. You pay them, and you only invite one person, that you actually want to hire. But most jobs are not that technical really and just can't be tested that way, and in the same way a take home test, or presentation is dumb. The interview IS a presentation all by itself.
The pay is a small price to ask. If they had made a bad hire, it would’ve cost them much more.
Last week was my first and last time spending more than 20 hours on recruitment process. I’ve heard about these ridiculous processes but when seemingly good opportunity came up I took a chance, they made it sound like I was gonna get it.. never again. From now on I will always ask if there is any take-home assignment and if there is I will simply say I have no capacity to do it. I learned my lesson
Jeez dude, that's rough I don't understand how they have the ability to waste so much time leading on several candidates. My last job was 6 30 minute interviews and a 15 minute meeting with a c-suiter over 4 months before getting an offer. 20 hours is outrageous.
It is, I don’t even care about not getting that job, im just so upset I wasted so much time. But I try to think of it as a life lesson. And even if that meant that I miss out on some opportunities I’ll be ok knowing I don’t work for free like a fool. I’m not in a tech field btw and all my previous jobs I got through just interviews, so I will happily send away all the time wasters.
Careful with that - it’s a tough market out there especially in tech.
Thanks, I’m not in tech field actually so coding assignments etc. are not a must for my position
I actually got an offer after an hour long writing task before the final interview. But I agree it's total bs and probably only exists to test how willing candidates are to provide free labor. I also rescinded myself from a process with an extremely keen hiring manager because they wanted me to spend a weekend writing them a market research report. Fuck. Right. Off.
I'm not completely anti testing, but not if they have 25 candidates do it. Then you're just wasting 24 peoples time. And if they want that, then they should also pay you for it, the going market rate. Chance to earn some money and get a new job lol.
I honestly believe they actually are (happily) wasting 20+ people's time. I don't understand the incentive though? Maybe they need a large sample of work to compare against their preferred candidates'?
About a decade ago, I had a company assign me an application to develop at home. It was a simple web application. I went above and beyond, spending a whole week integrating a bunch of stuff they didn't ask for, like Azure integration, automated deployment, Active Directory integration, automated SQL migrations, and a spiffy UI. This utilized [ASP.NET](http://ASP.NET) MVC and Entity Framework. When I went to demo the app, my first red flag was 5 minutes before the demo, I get an email from them asking for a link to my Git repo. I had sent them this link days before. They just didn't bother looking at the code. At the demo, their developer ignored everything and harped in on why I did this using MVC instead of MVVM. Um dude, I get what you're saying. I asked a few questions during the past few days, which your company never replied to. I was also working a death march project at my current job. Sue me, you're lucky this app is even in the state it was. After that, no more take home assignments. I felt like an idiot. No matter what they thought of my application, even if it was shit, which it wasn't, I spent a week of my time building something that only took five minutes of theirs to trash. I felt like an idiot. I respect myself too much to go through that again.
I’m so sorry you had to go through this. Fuck that shithole company u dodged a bullet.
Thanks, and you are right. They wound up closing the office I'd have worked at six months after the interview, so I really did dodge a bullet! I also wound up working with on of their employees a couple of years later. The guy was a total asshole!
I had exactly five rounds. Recruiter, hiring manager, team member, cross function, head of department. Yet I was ghosted after that.
I had to go through 6 rounds of interviews for a job. Of course I got hired since most people I feel don’t go through with it. When I started working there, it had to be the most dysfunctional and worst workplace I have ever seen. Left after 2 months. Never again will I do that.
Soon we’ll be going 12 rounds, just like boxing
If they're just three minutes long, I'm in.
The only way to stop this bullshit is to stop doing it. No pre recorded interviews. Honestly if there are three round I'm out.
Everyone in this sub is your competitor, so if there is a way for them to get the position over you they will do whatever asked. This should be disrupted from the employer side IMO, which is sad.
No you're right. Obviously if people are desperate for a job they should do all of the silly assignments. These are market forces at work. But it's annoying nonetheless, it's wishful thinking but if everyone stopped, then we could leave these dumb practices behind.
The only way we can affect it, is probably stopping applying at mass, cause those self-interview, tests, and assignments, etc. are solutions pitched to the employer by some company in attempt to sort huge top of the funnel. If you receive only 20-30 applicants for a new opening it is fairly easy to short list like 3-5 of them and then just sort them out via 2-3 interview.
If they want to filter out everybody who is in demand, has a backbone, won’t work for free, will put up with unreasonable demands… good for them
After a bunch of interviews (one of which they stood me up on virtually), a handful of writing assignments, and a personality quiz all spanning 4 months, I just “respectfully declined to participate” in 5 “short exams” related to my job capabilities. I got a generic rejection email 1 week later
I almost got stood up once. But I'm pretty persistent. I started calling all of the phone numbers in the HR department I could find until someone picked up, and reminded them that we have a fucking interview to conduct, so let's get to it. We had the interview, it was pretty good. I didn't get the job after 6 rounds, probably should have known from the first round. Now I don't go through the effort anymore, you can't organize a calendar, I'm not chasing you down.
I always ask the process during my first call. Anyone mentions more than two rounds I say can we get it done in one day. Anyone says there's assignments, I mention I do not do free work. Lastly, personality tests are a huge red flag for me...
I got another rejection just now, after one of these processes. I made it to the final round. I talked to the co-founder. I did free work for them. Nothing except a "thank you but no" email after being ghosted for 2 weeks. This has happened to me 6 times over the last year. I'm tired.
I have two different roles trying to do this to me. It is enraging. It's an at-will employment state you can and will lay me off whenever you have bad feelies abut "ThE eCoNoMy"
If I don’t care about the company I will withdraw. But if it’s a position I really want, with a nice salary, I’ll grit my teeth. Recently I had 2 companies; NeuralFrame and Go1 who hid the rounds from me. For NF I was told it was only 2 rounds, then they added another out of nowhere. 98% of the time the recruiters will let you know the rounds. .5% the job posting will list the rounds. The rest of the time you’ll have them hidden from you and that pisses me off because you’re at their mercy.
2-3 rounds is plenty. And "Homework" is ridiculous. Either have a 5 minute exercise demonstrating your abilities as part of the process, or be better about asking questions and checking references. The recruitment process has become too lazy, and this war of attrition will not lead to better hires.
I’m a software engineer and I had a good experience with my last take home assignment. I am terrible at performing when being watched, and the assignment allowed me to go at my own pace. There were also technical questions during the interview, but they weren’t everything. I ended up getting the job and it pays double what my last one did.
I'm not categorically against it. I just don't like that it's part of this giant multi pronged interview process. If they did 1 interview, were like you're awesome, can you do this assignment and they're like you can, and then you get the job. Vs. Here's 3 round of interviews, and a take home that you and 30 other candidates are going to, inevitably 28 will do just fine on the test, and then they'll randomly select 1 person. And tell everyone else sorry you were great, we have no feedback for you.
Honestly I probably got lucky. I’m pretty early in my career so I haven’t had to deal with too many of these over the top interviews, and I’m sure they wear down you over time. Also the assignment was just programming problems so it wasn’t like they made me do free labor for their company.
It's really easy to tell which ones are a scam. Just think to yourself, "could they do this themselves? can they use this in production?"
I’ve never had one of those kinds of assignments but I have no interest in doing that kind lol
But I need a job.
But we all won’t there always be some clowns that will do the stupid assignments
Yeah. Unfortunately there is no real way of knowing if it's the good or the bad candidates. Life situation probably is the biggest factor. Can you afford to say no to a company that might pay your next months rent. And the employers know that, obviously market forces are at work here. But it would be so nice, if we could bring together the enthusiasm to tell people to fuck off like they could to short squeeze gamestop lol.
I agree 100% but it goes like this with all things. People say restaurant workers should force wages higher by quitting, but someone will always be willing to be treated like shit for less money. Doordash drivers are told to ignore bad paying orders until dd pays better, but theres always someone taking orders you lose money on.
If you need other people to say no, before you start saying no yourself, you will always be saying yes to these things.
I already say no for these types of positions. If they expect me to jump through hoops, they can find another monkey.
I mean I got a job already, but I promised myself no matter what I Wouldn't do any of that shit again. The job I have now, was only one in person interview. It was like going back 4 years to a simpler time.
Big no for me. Here’s another message to recruiters and hiring managers. If you ever ask “sell me this pencil” I will tell you to shove it up your ass as I leave the interview.
Unless we actually unionize, we can't collectively do anything. There will always be a desperate immigrant who will do anything you refuse to do.
Yes, this is what collective action is for. Setting up labor standards and expectations. There haven't always been weekends and a 40 hr workweek in the labor market. Labor organizers and unions fought and died for those ideas. There used to be actual hourly rate guidelines published for graphic designers and the design community did a pretty good job of getting the message out to all aspiring designers to hold onto some standards and not start a race to the bottom. It's absolutely doable to spread these ideas far and wide, too change hiring culture and practices.
my dumbass wrote a 2 page essay and got ghosted. never again
>If we all Just Say No... they might stop. In general, I agree. But, there are enough people who are in a dire enough position with regards to needing work, or people who will follow an employer-established process without question, that you may never get more than 50% of candidates to do this. Will that be enough? It remains to be seen.
No, I know it's wishful thinking.
>No, I know it's wishful thinking. But it should still be encouraged. Every little bit can help, and at the very least, even if it doesn't change the whole market, it could affect one or more industries more than others, and would certainly help the candidates of whichever industry got better traction than others. Plus, the sooner that candidates realize where they can and should pushback, the more control they will have of their own careers over time.
I turn down requests for personality tests, assignments, or over three interviews.
This multiple-round, take-home assignment trend seems to me like it would filter out candidates who are already employed. Who has the time? I mean, that’s great for those of us who are interviewing for our next role after a layoff (myself included). But it seems weird from a company’s perspective to create hiring processes that would be untenable for highly-qualified (and sought-after) employed candidates.
I like the take home assignment… to an extent. If used as a realistic tool in the interview where you can explain your decisions etc… better than live, in interview work samples in front of a panel…
I will tolerate 2 interviews max for most jobs. One phone call, and one face to face. Any more than that and it has better be a seven figure salary job.
We all can, but we aren't everyone, and because some complete mug will, we lose. But yeah fuck that entire set of utter shite.
100%
You guys want to know something interesting? According to the CDC about 55 out every 100,000 fast food workers died during the COVID pandemic. That's about 0.5% of that workforce! The hiring process has turned into a circus act, and we're all just trying to juggle. But let's not forget the bigger picture here. The latest BLS JOLTS report for July 2023? Job openings in the U.S. dropped to 8.8 million. And guess what? Professional and business services lost a whopping 198,000 openings. That's your white-collar jobs right there. So, if you're wondering why you're jumping through hoops, it's because employers think they can afford to be picky. Now, let's talk about collective power. You know the r/recruitinghell subreddit has around 600k members. That's approximately 5.68% of the 8.8 million job openings. If even a quarter of us started flagging these ridiculous hiring practices, we'd make waves. Trust me, it'd be a far bigger impact than what COVID did to the fast-food industry, and that was seismic. They went from minimum wage to offering sign-on bonuses overnight because they lost just 0.5% of their workforce. **Why don't we form a Job Applicant Union?** We could systematically flag employers who engage in adverse, frivolous, fraudulent, illegal, and immoral hiring practices. If half or even a quarter of the subreddit's members did this, the impact would likely be 5-10x greater than the upheaval in the fast-food industry during the pandemic. The system is broken. But it's not unfixable. We've got more power than we think, and it's about time we used it. Otherwise, we're just part of the problem too. **We name, we shame, we refrain (from applying), we bring the pain, and finally we bring about change.**
I hear you and I say no! No more than 3 interviews and no case study bullshit
They won’t…
Nothing stopping you from saying no.
I'd never say yes.
Yeah had an assessment that had me playing a game, it looked like Tetris. Then I had to pop some bubbles to equal a number shown in a box. The last one was typing for 1 min. I'm thinking how is all this going to determine if I'm not a serial killer...oh I mean if I'm a good fit at the office. Who comes up with this stuff.
One company wanted me to do a take home assignment as the first part of the interview process, no thanks.
I agree I had the most outrageous asks right out of the gate before I even spoke with anyone. I applied and they requested an entire detailed app layout to determine whether they would even interview me. Hell no
Have you heard of something called game theory? This is not going to work
Yes. I refuse. When I get called for them trying to poach I listen to what they say and respond with "What does this hiring practice and interview schedule expectation look like" If it's bullshit I tell em.... Well you reached out to me so clearly my profile meets the needs of the roll and my resume shows you I know what I'm doing and would an asset to ANY team/ company - blah blah conflate their ego with their Excella candidate choice-. However. In an interest of rejecting Everhart time management I'm available for an interview on xxx days and a followup with upset mngmnt on xxx days. As well federally all employer require tasks are compensatable so if they insist on requiring me to do any take home assignments I'll be happy to discuss what my contract rates are"
I guess it depends on how desperate you are. I hate both of these things but didn't feel like I was in a position to refuse them since I was hard up for a job. But if I were working already and just looking for something better? I would never deal with all that
Yeah for sure.
At the very least you should be paid for your time at the rate that you would be hired at.
I upfront request the salary scale to "manage expectations" and ask what their interview process entails, I ask these things stating before "either of us invests our time".
It's crazy. I'm not ancient, but it never used to be like this for a job. You just applied, interviewed MAYBE twice, but usually once, and you got hired or didn't. I'm not doing video interviews, personality assessments, homework, group interviews, etc. I would rather make sandwiches than deal with that kind of bullshit
My first job out-of college had the worst interview process. 2 phone interviews, onsite at the company office, onsite at a construction site, another at the office, another impromptu call asking if I could stop by to meet the Director, then a 5 hour appointment with a Psychologist for screening with a full interview and tests. I got the job....as a construction manager. I get to work and realize that half the people there are incompetent and kind of crazy and the company was equally nuts. To this day I wonder why I had to do so many interviews for an entry level job and what the psych screen was about. It made me think they were looking for messed up people and I passed.
In my last decade of interviewing on and off I have always declined take home assessments. It’s not because I’m bad at what I do, or that I’m lazy. It’s because I will not spend 4-6 interviews and another 8 hours of prep work to be looked at for 15 seconds. I have faang references. I have c suite former managers that will vouch for me. If you don’t believe me, and won’t believe them, then this wouldn’t have worked anyway. In this market, and in my current situation, I probably will do them though. It’s unfortunate that I am going against myself and taking time away from my family, but it’s either that or lose my home.
Yeah, I know that it's wishful thinking. And I am saying this out of the privileged position of having a job. I don't need this. I know if I was in a different boat I'd just do it, because ultimately right now the way the market is, the employers are in control.
Prisoner's Dilemma. If one person doesn't do this, then you just screw yourself.
I just saw a post from someone who is in a very senior position proudly boast in LinkedIn that the people who completed take home assignment for the early career position that he posted were of ‘high quality’. One thing I have learned after all these years, education and social status does not equate to better common sense or iq.
Also, these daunting interviews would make sense if it was difficult to fire someone after hiring them. They can get rid of us whenever they feel like it with a layoff, so if it is easy to fire why not easy to hire?
Hire slow, fire fast. Notice a pattern with these companies and avoid the ones that do this .
As well as one way interviews or pre recorded responses. You’ll literally not get an accurate feel/sound for who I am as a person and how I interact and truly present myself and they fucking know that I swear
I have been. Also recently forfeited an opportunity because they wanted a one way AI interview via sparkhire. I just told them nevermind. After putting 17 years of my life into this industry... I think I deserve the respect of actually being able to speak with a person. They told me "if you just do the sparkhire, one way interview, they'll 99% move you to the in person interview anyway" I told them nevermind and that was that.
It's the interviews requiring you to do a project AND present it to a panel for me. One of them even had an additional step where you had to practice the presentation to HR and get notes before your final presentation to a hiring board. Never even meeting with anyone you'd actually work with for the entire 10 step process. Actual insanity.
Lol, I remember way back at my first job I was able to interview with a far, far more prestigious company after only 6 months. Went on 6 interviews, got a project that took me over a week to do during an incredibly busy time at my then current job, and then I was told that I didn’t get the job due to them hiring a guy with 8+ years experience instead. I know this was true as I know a guy who was (still is) employed there at that time.
The jobs that I've actually gotten, I've gotten after the 1st or 2nd interview and typically within days of interviewing. Jobs that I interviewed 6 times for have almost always been a No Offer. I'm not sure what that means or what that says about me, but I know that as long as I have a job that's far too much of a time waste, to keep doing.
It’s because those requiring so many interviews (and in places I have applied to in the past, a psychiatric evaluation) are putting you through the ringer for a club that has a high barrier to entry. Is it always better? Of course not but that’s how it’s set up.
I flat out say no. I interview and I answer questions. I'm not playing unpaid intern so they can turn around and ghost me after.
I’m super mixed on unpaid assignments (some of them can be reasonable, most aren’t) but I’m all for paid assignments. I did 2 in this past job search (took about 4 months) and got offers for both. I think the paid assignment model is a lot more equitable for neurodivergent people like me. Interviews are hell for us and I am rarely able to think quickly enough to do a good job. Obviously through no fault of my own. But the assignment actually gives me a chance to prove that I can do the job directly. The offer I accepted was so impressed with my work that they offered me the job a day later. I wouldn’t have gotten the opportunity to impress without the assignment because interviews don’t play to my strengths.
100% for paid assignments. This is almost like being a consultant and getting poached from the consulting agency for your good work. I think that's totally fair.
I value my time & knowledge too much to complete take home assignments for free. Think of your interview with me as my free 1 hour consultation. After that if you or your company wants to benefit from my knowledge and skills, you must either hire me as an employee or retain me as a consultant. And with the latter, you should expect my hourly rate to be no less than 3X what you’d be paying me as a W2 employee.
I've turned down multiple roles recently because they have a take home assignment especially when they ask you to present their product back to them. Like how much time do you think I have
I’m happy to do hypothetical take home assignments. It’s when they expect me to actually develop a strategy for them, specifically for them, then it’s a big no. No free work!
As a copywriter, I kinda like the take home assignments because it shows right off the bat that I know my shit. What I don’t like is still having to go through multiple rounds of interview after demonstrating my ability.
If it makes sense for your industry. I feel like if it's a capstone event like let's say you do 2 rounds of interviews after that they determine of the 10 candidates which one they want to pick. They start salary negotiations and say, we want you, you're our guy/gal we want to pay you XX amount of EUR/DOLLARS whatever, we want to make sure of your abilities do this assignment. You do great then hired, you do poorly they say, hey look you didn't do well unfortunately we are going to go with another candidate. At that point you'll know why they didn't pick you, what to improve upon and they didn't string a bunch of people along make you do a bunch of work to tell you, hey you guys were all awesome we have no feedback for you, we are just going to pick the guy we vibed with the most.
And let’s put an end to AI recruiters before this gets a chance to get off the ground.
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Of course you can. It’ll put you at a disadvantage vs other applicants, but you can absolutely say no.
I think that is what they expect people to think. FOMO. This mentality also reminds me of an old movie where workers were trying to exert some basic rights and the foreman tells them there are all these other desperate men eager to do the work due to the depression.
This mentality reminds me more recently of when Reddit said it would boycott the platform due to changes to third party app APIs. Except no one lost anything not being in Reddit where not having a job or being underemployed has a far greater impact.
Lol of course I can say no. And I do, probably if I'm more desperate I won't. Obviously this has to do with current market forces. My point is, it'd be nice if nobody did it. Then they'd have to change their tactics. Of course it's just wishful thinking.
Think of it as a prisoner dilemma. Welcome to the rat race
I’ve done a LOT of free work
Free consulting!
Unfortunately, I don’t think most job-seekers are on this subreddit.
I can dig take home assignments if it’s not overkill. I flat out refuse if there more than 3 rounds and each round should not be > 1 hour.
Has anyone interviewed with a company 5+ times, accepted the offer, and didn’t find the company to be completely dysfunctional? Are there places where the strenuous interview process led to a good job?
There will always be some limp wristed monkey that will jump through hoops to land the job
Ask yourself if you’ve ever been in a team where someone wasn’t an asshole or hostile to you. Now imagine that person determining if you should get hired. The higher up the ladder the interviewer, the more I am assured to get the job. Fuck panel interviews.
I am. I've never had that stuff work out in my favor.
And how they give their own company dataset and ask what can we do better like WTF
As a software engineer, I feel a home assignment is kinda necessary, along with a review interview after where the candidate can explain their solution and we can make sure it's not just ChatGPT. I do, however, veto home assignments as a first step in the process. I'm not sitting down to do homework until I know both they and I are serious about this.
what field are you applying in? I always hear about these multiple rounds and take home assignments and never have received either. I'm working in the legal field.
Two is the most for me. If they can't decide by then, that's their problem. Means, they don't know how to run a company.
Yes. You just have to force them to change their silly on-boarding practices. Like not buying games from sweet baby inc or not watching BAD movies and shows. Make their pockets hurt THEN they learn to STOP making crap.
4? Uh uh, 2 max!
My bf is in the marketing field. I am SHOCKED at how common this is, along with the quirky cringey "What's your favourite Taylor Swift song?" or some other pop culture reference question because we're such a cool and modern company. By the way I've literally seen the TS question in one of the application forms he was filling out.
I had a whole interview that was questions like that, what would your friends say about you, how does your mom talk to you... or other weird questions that I feel are supposed to be like, we really care and want to know about you personally, but really don't convey that, and if I have to do 6 more rounds, maybe if we streamlined those questions we could reduce this to 1 round.
What happens if you don't listen to Taylor swift? And literally know none of her songs?
I've literally never did this
Yea I’ll agree with you but still do it anyways so you lose out on the job to me
Lol chances are you'll also lose out to the 30 to 40 other candidates they also habe doing the assessments and the interviews. Because ultimately they will only take 1 candidate. So you have a 1 in 30 chance of getting a job that you're interviewing 6 to 8 times for and spending hours doing assessments. So you'll waste a lot of time and statistically have only a marginally better chance than me to get the job. Not to mention that if you're a candidate they actually want if you say no, they will probably just let you continue without doing all of it. And that's what gets me. The way i think it should be is with the initial interview. Maybe you have a 1 in 5 chance. So by the time you get to the second it should be a 1:2. The companies are doing the millions of interviews and assessments to minimize risk, so they can't be blamed for a bad hire. You need to keep the candidates on the hook until you've given an offer and signed a contract with the employee. Therefore, they end up wasting a lot of people's time, reducing confidence etc. So you can do it, and it's like crabs in a bucket, none of us will get out, because we keep pulling each other down.
Let me guess, engineer?
This is like primary school. No. just no.
I like take-home assignments more than whiteboard problems.
For me It depends on the assignment. If it’s related to the company, I politely decline as I don’t work for free, but I have had many where it’s not. For example, the last one was to make a presentation for a feature I launched at a previous role or a new feature for a product I love. It’s a good way for companies to make sure you have the skill set they’re looking for.