bad interviewer behavior

A reader writes:

So, I had a second-round interview this morning with the finance director (the hiring manager’s manager) of a multinational company. I have a pretty dynamic and open personality and I think this came through during the interview, especially since we had a rather free-flowing, back-and-forth type interview and I felt that we had rapport. Anyway, towards the end of the meeting, the director asked me, “How would you rate your interview on a scale of 1 to 10?”

I’ve never been asked this question before, and that threw me a little. I answered that I thought it was for him to rate me instead, and I tried to turn the question back to him. He declined to answer saying no, no, he’s the one asking the question, and when he pressed, I told him I thought my interview was not perfect, but certainly not the worst.

After we’d wrapped up and he was seeing me out, I mentioned that I would be really interested to know his answer. He laughed and said then that I should call him.

What are your thoughts on this? Should I be reading any significance into it, and did I shoot myself in the foot with my answer? In this case, I thought the interview was overall quite good even if I know I could have worded some answers much better. But I was hesitant to say “7″ because I didn’t know how it would be interpreted.

Should I really call/email him to get his interview rating? I do not have any of his contact information and would have to call HR in order to obtain it.

Your interviewer was an ass.

It wouldn’t have been unreasonable for him to ask you for your thoughts on the job and your fit for it at the end of the conversation, based on the new information you’d learned. But asking you to numerically rate the interview itself serves no purpose, other than to illustrate that he has no idea how to interview and is probably a bit of a buffoon.

Don’t contact him to “get his interview rating.” If you want the job, you can certainly follow up with him or the hiring manager to reiterate your interest and ask about the timeline for next steps, but don’t revive this ridiculous rating game.

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A reader writes:

I’m writing to you because I just turned down my first job interview, and I’m not sure how I feel about it. On the one hand, I feel really bad because the job market is tough these days (particularly with an entry-level employee like me) but on the other hand, judging by the way the guy handled scheduling the interview, I did not want to work for him. The phone conversation went down thusly:

HR: “Can you come in at 1 pm today?” (NOTE: This is less than two hours from when the call was made.)

Me: “Uhh, no, that’s not going to work for me. Do you have any other times available, or perhaps a phone interview would be more convenient?”

HR: “Look, you either come in at one or we move on.” At which point I was hung up on. No departing remarks or a “goodbye,” even.

This is where the red flags came up. Look, I appreciate that companies are busy, particularly the Human Resources department when a company is understaffed, but something about the way this conversation was handled rankles me. I feel like no negotiation took place here; I was shut out of the conversation and instructed to “take it or leave it.” If there’s no possible way to reschedule, or to do a phone interview, surely there are more civil ways of saying so? Slapping a prospective hire with an ultimatum just makes you sound like a jerk to me.

With less than two hours to get myself sorted, and the way that I was treated on the phone, I have to ask: does it make sense for someone like me to turn this offer down? Or am I overreacting emotionally, and needlessly tossing out an otherwise perfectly good opportunity?

Yes, of course he’s a jerk. You don’t talk to people that way. And you don’t expect them to drop everything and appear before you in two hours with no notice. (It is true that sometimes employers only have certain interview days available and can’t be flexible, but they’re generally still polite when explaining that it’s take-it-or-leave-it, and those slots usually aren’t the same day they’re calling.)

Whether or not you should consider interviewing with a company that treats people that way really comes down to your financial situation. If you have options, no, you should not sign up to work for an abusive employer. If you don’t have many options, then you need to calculate whether the income you’d receive is worth the treatment.

Some people take jobs working with jerks and aren’t especially bothered. They have thick skins and they let it roll right off them. Other people are much more bothered. If you’re in that last category (and most people are), then you’d only take an interview like this if you were fairly desperate for a job.

(There’s a tendency out there to dismiss any situation like this with “no, of course you shouldn’t want that job” — and it’s a tendency I have too. But the reality is that not everyone’s situation allows them to make their decisions that way.)

Either way, though, you’re certainly not overreacting in concluding this this guy is a huge ass.

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As I’ve written here before, despite what you may have read in the media recently, most employers aren’t asking job candidates to hand over their Facebook passwords. It’s not a trend, it’s extremely rare, and the article that started the whole thing cited a single case at an unnamed company, with the rest of its evidence coming from hiring practices at law enforcement and government agencies, which have always conducted more thorough background checks than other employers. (And those examples weren’t even recent; one of the two agencies cited had already changed its policy last year after people complained.)

But there is plenty you should be outraged about in hiring practices. Over at U.S. News & World Report today, I take on the Facebook-passwords story and suggest some better targets for your outrage. You can read it here.

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A reader writes:

I recently applied to a company who was looking for someone with my exact background. The position is a perfect match, no exaggeration, so I applied. They wrote me back the next day saying they had interviewed good candidates already and were not taking any new applications. OK, no harm, no foul. The following day another person from their senior staff wrote me and referenced some points I made in my initial email to them on work I had performed. They wanted to know if I would be willing to share how I had implemented a big technological innovation. I wrote back sharing some information and saying yes to a call, but made clear I was disappointed they would not want to interview me. They wrote back to confirm the call time, and restated that I was just too late in applying.

This innovation would be key to their business. I want to help to an extent, but my time is money. Have you ever heard of anything like this? How should I manage this call? I have a job and I do not want contract work. I have some ideas on how I plan to take the call, but I keep meandering toward being a little rude. Any insights would be great.

Whoa. You are being taken advantage of, and they’re being so blatant about it that they’re not even bothering to disguise it as an interview (not that that would make it better, but their brazenness here is pretty surprising).

What they are asking you for is consulting work. Consulting work is not free; they should pay you for what they’re asking for.  So if you were open to a side project, you should say something like, “I’d be glad to consult with you on this project.  I charge $__.” (You’d probably still do an initial free call — a short one — because that’s typical to make sure that proceeding together makes sense, but it would be clear to both parties that actual work would come with a price.)

But you don’t want to take on side work, so I’d recommend simply saying (before the call), “After thinking this over a little more, it sounds like you’re looking for a consultant to assist with this work, and I’m not currently taking on consulting work. ”  If you know someone to refer them to who could help, you could do that too, since connecting people is not only polite but also often a useful thing to do in building your own network.

Just to present all sides, there’s also an argument to be made that you should take the call — limiting it to some reasonable amount of time, like half an hour — and be impressive, because impressing people can often pay off in the future, such as if you might apply for another job there at some point.  But I’m so displeased with how these people have handled this situation that I’m not too enthusiastic about that option.

What I wouldn’t do is take the call and be rude, tempting as that might be. You never know when you might run into these people again, or who they might know, and your reputation is too important to risk it simply for the satisfaction of making a point here.

Besides, you can make the point in a completely polite, professional way by using the wording above, and that tends to ultimately be more satisfying anyway.

P.S. Writing this felt good, because I am really irked by the number of requests that I get from for-profit companies (which is quite different from a charity asking it) to do things for them for free. (I’m looking at you, AOL. Most recently, anyway.)

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A reader writes:

I am very frustrated. For the second time in two weeks, I’ve had my phone interview cancelled by the employer, just hours before the interview time. This is after twice staying up to “study” and getting bad sleep due to nerves, and also scheduling child care for my baby during the interview.

The woman emailed asking to postpone again, and frankly, I don’t feel very nice about it. What should I say? I’m not really sure I want to work at a place that has such little respect for other people’s time.

Yeah, it’s really rude and inconsiderate. And unfortunately, it’s not that unusual. Too many employers act as if candidates should be grateful that they’re even considering talking to them, forgetting entirely that they’re not doing candidates a favor by interviewing them; that candidate may turn out to be someone who they’re ultimately really eager to woo. It’s incredibly short-sighted, not to mention just a crappy way to treat people.

As for whether you should take this as a sign that you don’t want to work there:  Is the interviewer the hiring manager or someone else, like a screener in HR?  If it’s the hiring manager, you should absolutely be wary, because you can expect this kind of disregard for your time when you’re working for her, and I can promise you that it’ll be even more frustrating then. But if it’s someone in HR, it’s not as conclusive. I mean, obviously no organization should let anyone function that way so it might be a red flag in that regard, but it might not actually indicate much about what life in a different department would be like.

If you’re still interested in the job itself, I’d reschedule and then stay alert for additional red flags during the rest of the process. And once you’ve set up a new time, I’d say this to her: “I’ll be planning other appointments around our call, so would you please let me know as soon as you can if you end up needing to move it?” It won’t guarantee you courtesy, but it’ll at least prompt her to realize that you’re a person with your own schedule commitments.

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A reader writes:

I saw this article today and it made me wonder about hiring practices.

In a nutshell, it’s talking about that thorny situation of social media and its use in hiring decisions. A lot of the info there is very 2006-era “duh-tastic” but one thing caught my eye: Some companies are apparently requesting usernames and passwords to access applicants’ accounts on social media sites. This seems VERY sketchy to me, and even though my profile is pretty boring, my first reaction would be to say “No,” and remove myself from their consideration. 

What would be your advice to someone who finds themselves in this situation?

Yeah, it’s outrageous. This got some attention last year, when it came out that the Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services was asking job applicants for their social media account usernames and passwords for use in background checks. I agree with the person quoted in the article you linked to that it’s like asking someone to hand over their diary.

Now, it should be noted that this practice is very limited. There have only been a handful of reports of it happening.  It’s still outrageous and unacceptable, but it’s also not widespread.

Part of me thinks that the employers who are doing this are just clueless about social media, heard that it’s good to check out people’s profiles, and don’t realize that you don’t ask for their passwords in order to see what they’ve posted about themselves. Another part of me thinks that they’re well aware of what they’re asking and this is a natural offshoot of increasingly invasive screening practices.

I’d strongly encourage anyone who finds themselves on the receiving end of this request to refuse it. Say, “I don’t give out passwords for security reasons, although I’d be happy to send you the link for viewing my profile.” And stick to it.

Just because they want to strip search you doesn’t mean you have to let them.

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A random assortment of stuff –

1. I loved reading all the comments about people’s secret fantasy careers — and especially seeing how drawn a lot of people are to careers that might look mundane to others. If you haven’t read them yet, do! It’s a fascinating read.

2. Speaking of things I enjoyed recently, I also really enjoyed the recent round of resume reviews that I did. It’s super satisfying to help people fix their resumes up, to the point that I’m contemplating making it a permanent offer. Maybe cover letters too. Stay tuned…

3. This is a great series of job-hunting advice for librarians, with much of it applicable to non-librarians, written by our occasional commenter Modern Hypatia. I especially loved the final piece in the series, on bits and pieces.

4 This is a very entertaining post by another commenter here, kristinyc, about how a rude and condescending recruiter did pretty much everything you can imagine to turn her off to the job that he was ostensibly recruiting her for.

5. This is a good article from the Harvard Business Review about how to deal with having multiple bosses.

6. Last, see if you spot anyone surprising on this page of “celebrity” INFJ’s. (That’s a Myers Briggs type, to those unfamiliar with the lingo.) I am using this as conclusive evidence that I am a celebrity on par with Plato, Thomas Jefferson, Leonard Cohen, and the others listed there, and I intend to begin behaving accordingly.

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A reader writes:

I’ve read your “run, don’t walk” advice when you find yourself in a job interview with someone you would never work with in a million years. But I still look back in anguish at an incident that happened a few years ago.

I had flown to another state for a job interview with the VP of HR for an automotive parts maker. The only fllight I could get was for mid-morning, and the VP couldn’t meet me till after 6 pm at a restaurant. So I flew to Detroit, rented a car, and poked around in a small town for hours (turned out to be her hometown–not where the facility was located) and met her at the restaurant as instructed. She arrived with a rep from the executive recruiting firm (not the recruiter I had talked to on the phone), and they largely ignored me and smirked together as I put forth my earnest answers to the few questions she asked and sat patiently listening while she spent the majority of the time telling me about what a big shot she was. It was so bad that at one point I felt tearful and had to hide it. I felt trapped and couldn’t think how to end it gracefully and waited for her to bring it to an end. The whole experience–flying in, driving to a strange town, being treated disrespectfully, sleeping in a budget hotel, etc.–was traumatizing. I obviously called the recruiter I had originally talked with the next day and told him it was not going to be a fit on either side, but I still wonder how to extricate oneself from a bad interview situation that lasts for hours.

That one was particularly horrifying because I had been flown in, but I recently had an interview I had driven to that was excruciatingly painful, and I knew within an hour that the company was not going to be a good fit for me.  In this situation, I met with the owner of a small business who asked questions like, “You say these are your strengths, so tell me which ones you are really bad at.” I told him I wouldn’t have listed them as my strengths if I weren’t fully capable and experienced in all of them, and I could give him examples of each. He sat there and stared at me and waited and waited. I felt as if I were 10 years old. I was ready to leave then, but I didn’t want to be rude. However, the interview went on and on. I didn’t even get the feeling the owner liked me; he was making up his interview questions as he went along and this was some type of weird entertainment for him.

I am currently well-employed but I would be open to another opportunity should the right one come along. But the thought of getting into another unpleasant situation like one of these makes me gun shy to even agree to an interview. I am not a rude person, but I sometimes think the best thing to do is to just say, “Thank you for your time, but I’m sure you will agree that this is not going to be a good fit,” and end the misery. Thoughts?

I’d divide this into two categories: interviews that are truly excruciating and miserable (which I think are rare) and interviews where you realize partway through that this just isn’t a job you’d take (which are more common).

In the latter case, I recommend staying and seeing it through. Even though you don’t want this job, they might have an opening in the future that you do want, or your interviewer might later move to a company that you’d love to work at, or they might refer you to an acquaintance who’s hiring for a job you’d be interested in. So it pays to build the relationship, and you don’t want to be remembered as “the person who awkwardly short-circuited the interview.” Instead, think of it as networking. (You can follow up with a note later thanking them for their time and letting them know that this isn’t quite the right fit.)

The exception to this is if it’s something like an all-day interview or other significant investment in you. In that case, I’d argue that it’s more polite not to allow them to spend that kind of time on you when you already know you’re not interested, and in that case you should politely bow out with an explanation.

Now, let’s move on to the excruciating interviews. If the interview is really intolerable — the interviewer is abusive or something like that — well, frankly I’d still recommend trying to stick it out for the reasons above. (Try to focus on the good story you’re going to have later. And then you can come here and tell it to us!) But if it’s truly unbearable, then it’s certainly an option to politely say, “You know, I really appreciate your time, but as we’re talking I’m realizing that this isn’t quite the fit that I’m looking for.” Ideally, you’d add, “I’m looking for something more ____” just to make it less abrupt.

Of course, often the people who conduct the sort of interview that would make you want to end it early are exactly the people who are likeliest not to react to that well (because they believe they are in control, not you), so you want to factor that in. These types can be unreasonable enough that you may be burning a bridge with that company —  which you might not care about, but if it’s a small enough industry, it could potentially have further-reaching consequences … so I’d discourage doing it unless you’re willing to risk that trade-off.

Really, I’d say your best bet is to stay and be entertained by the bad behavior, but I realize not everyone finds that as entertaining as I do.

By the way, you can read about this from the other side in this old post (and the comments are especially interesting).

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A reader writes:

I am currently job hunting and have interest from several amazing companies and consider myself very lucky.  I’ve always been a good interviewee, and have never really had a bad interview, just ones that didn’t seem like a good fit.  Well, until a few weeks ago.  I was contacted by a senior person at a company, completely unsolicited.  They asked me to submit my resume for a position they had open, and the company seemed great!  The email was very nice, and very personal.  I submitted my resume, and didn’t hear back right away.  I followed up a couple of weeks later and the senior person never wrote back to me, but the next day someone from HR got in touch to set up a phone interview.  I guess the first red flag was never hearing back from the person who initially contacted me, and the lengthy time between the first contact and the first interview.

Well, the call with HR was ridiculous. They basically demanded to know why I would apply to this company and what could I do for them?  It was clear he did not read my resume or cover letter.  Red flag number 2.  I explained that in fact I was contacted by them for this interview, and he immediately calmed down and the rest of the call went fairly OK  but I was left frustrated.  When I asked him when they were hoping to fill this position, he said “Ha!  Like, 3 months ago.” Red flag number 3.  He also mentioned that they have a SEVEN-part interview process, which is entirely out of the norm for my industry, and I assume most others as well. Red flag number 4.  I sent a thank you note to be courteous and thank him for his time, and to my surprise he wrote back a very nice note and asked if he could set up another phone interview, this time with another team member.  This call went even worse.  I was berated on the phone, asked nonsensical questions and was made to feel like an idiot when I had to ask for clarification.  The whole thing was an eye opener that it is OK to go with your gut and walk away when those red flags start popping up, and I’m glad they only wasted my time on the phone.

The sad part of this is my path will most definitely cross with these team members in the future, and I so wish I could give them an honest critique of their hiring process, which definitely needs some work.  No wonder they haven’t been able to make a hire!  Is it ever appropriate to give such feedback?

Ugh, this is one of those questions that drives me crazy because I would so, so, so want to hear this kind of feedback and in no way would hold it against the candidate (unless I was able to definitively determine that their judgment was completely off-base). But there are plenty of employers out there who would take offense to you letting them know that their interviewers were acting this way, and I have no idea which type you’re dealing with.

Now, that said, I don’t think everything you listed is a red flag. I don’t think it’s a big deal that HR followed up with you rather than the person who originally reached out (ideally, the senior person would have sent you a quick note explaining that would happen, but it’s not really a big deal that he didn’t). The “ha, we wanted to fill this job three months ago” comment isn’t necessarily a red flag either; there are lots of legitimate reasons why that could be the case, and it could be that his attempt at humor didn’t quite translate.

And even demanding questions aren’t necessarily out of line, depending entirely on the way they’re asked. I mean, if he had a contemptuous or hostile tone and bellowed, “what makes you think you could do this job?”, that’s obviously ridiculous. But nicely asking, “tell me what you think might make you a good fit for this role” is reasonable in an interview, even when they approached you first. I don’t know which was the case here, and I’m raising it only because the fact that we disagree on whether a couple of other things are red flags makes me consider the possibility that … well, that you might have read this part of it wrong.  (Sorry!)

But for the purposes of getting you an answer, let’s say that the interviewers were indeed rude. Is it appropriate to let the company know about it?  It pains me to say this, because if I were in charge over there, this is exactly the kind of thing I’d want to hear about. But you have no idea if they’re reasonable people or not (and in fact have some clues to the contrary), and there’s not really any incentive for you to go out on that limb. It’s not your responsibility to fix their hiring processes, and certainly not when it means risk to yourself. So I have to reluctantly, regretfully, mournfully say no.

However, if the person who initially reached out to you happens to get back in touch to follow up, you can absolutely say something like, “You know, I had a couple of odd interviews with John and Julie and got the sense it wouldn’t be a fit.” If she’s smart, she’ll probe around for more information, and if you get the vibe that she really wants to know what happened, you could (totally dispassionately) tell her your concerns. But that’s the limit of what I’d advise.

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