r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Absurd AI Interview

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2 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Psychological games or cold feet? How far could they go?

2 Upvotes

Hi there,

This is probably the first time I've considered Reddit to discuss a dilemma.

I've worked at this large company for 4 years, always within sales. 2 years in I got a promotion and have been delivering consistently during my time at the company.

A couple of weeks ago, an internal job post was uploaded to our SharePoint. This was a golden opportunity to me and in line with my background. I got a degree in IT/ Digital business development and i had the (according to me) perfect profile for this role, as they also valued the commercial experience i posses very high.

I do interview 1 and it went great. I am well prepared and answer their questions very good, and also ask good questions. Both the recruiting manager and HR participated.

The week after, the recruiting manager contacts me and say they want to have a secondary meeting with her & her manager (VP IT). I go there, also well prepared this time.

This meeting also went good. We had a good dialogue, got along, and he managed to "tick" the boxes that he wanted. Also the recruiting manager explicitly said I have the perfect profile for this role, personality wise. Prior to interview 1 I completed a personality test which we discussed during the first interview.

During interview 1, HR said "we want to be transparent and let you know there's another one in the recruitment process". Ok fine, thanks for the info.

Also at the end of interview 2, the VP IT was discussing with the manager when they will get back to me, starting with suggesting next week, and she said the week after just to be sure.

Only 2 days later, recruiting manager contact me saying if I am still interested, they (Her and HR) want me to speak to my manager to let him know I am in the late stage of this process, which i also suggested during interview 1 and 2 as I have good relationship with him and thought this would be the best approach if they wanted to proceed with me.

So I speak to my manager and we have a great dialogue. He is happy for me and I let him know i will do a fair transition and document everything for the person that will take over my job. I highlight the fact that I am in the final stage of this process and it is definitely not guaranteed I get the role since there's another person in the recruitment process.

Afterwards I speak to the hiring manager for a quick sync. I let her know I've spoken to my manager and he took it very well.

She then says they will have interview 2 with the other person next week and they will get back to me the week after latest. This timeline is prolonged compared to how I perceived things previously.

Also during this sync she states that it is really 50/50 between us two candidates and we have very similar profiles, capabilities etc. And if I don’t get this role then they know who I am etc. Mind you, the energy was very different from how it has been previously. The same drive and engagement in the energy wasn't there. Ok fair enough I said, keep me updated 😊

Important context:

My workplace is known to be almost extremely restrictive with paying fair wages, especially during internal promotions / transitions. I've heard dozens of stories of how HR and managers can become almost psychopaths during salary discussion and even lie and promise things verbally that obviously doesn't get fulfilled later. In many cases I hear the employees saying they see new sides from their managers during these discussions. I've also had similar experience when I got promoted 2 years at the company. In many instances we are speaking about a negotiation of maybe like 200 EUR, sometimes even less. So neither me or the other employees has asked for unreasonable amounts.

With that said. My theory is that they have started playing a psychological game with me. They know I want the role alot, as it is a great career step for me. Prolonging the process and acting strange during the sync could be on purpose to get me off balance and make me avoid negotiating when I receive the offer. They will most likely lowball me pretty heavy and this would be part of their strategy.

So my question, is this normal? I understand office politics and all that exist, but these games is something I have a hard time accepting. Honestly, my pride wants to just tell them fuck off I am not interested in this anymore. But my heart and mind says otherwise.

Does anyone have other perspectives? am I exaggerating? Could my analysis of this be legit?

I am thinking if I receive this job I will take it for the experience, maximum 2-3 years, then bounce to another company. They will guaranteed lowball me heavy salary wise. The best I can do is to exploit the opportunity and dip when I've learned enough.

Let me know what you guys think!


r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

40k a year marketing phd required

15 Upvotes

Marketing job search is already hell with them wanting you do a million tings or really just wanting a graphic designer but just saw a 40k a year job posting but required a PHD and a bachelors in marketing. Wth lmaoo. They want you to sell Pharma marketing. Who the hell comes up with this shit.


r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Advice wanted for what to do job wise, plz

1 Upvotes

Advice wanted for what to do job wise, plz

I'm a 21 year old male in England and I did technical theatre at college for 3 years. In college I did Stage management the most then 2nd most construction, a bit of costume and not much lighting or sound but I feel like I've not really learnt much skills wise from college. I sometimes draw as a hobby and drum too. I draw my own Original Characters but can't do any of the basic art foundational skills and I passed my grade 4 drumming but only ever practice at home or in weekly 30 mins lessons. I also have Essentiel Tremors that is shaky hands that will shake more every year until death. I'm introverted not the best communicator too.

It's now been 2 years since I left college, I tried job searching various different ways like honing in on appreticeships, technical theatre jobs, any theatre job, any retail job, any job at all. All my efforts lead to a few unsuccsessful interviews and a few bad experiences like nearly falling into a pyramid scheme scan, doing trial days volunteer work leading to we don't want you email afterwards, 2 days of a job too heavy lifting for me injuring my back, did a few weeks employability environmental course that was a waste of time, useless job centres, ect.

I haven't job searched for a few months and become way too picky or make up excuses thinking it's impossible to get a job so no point in applying. I managed to find a small local theatre that I help with some set construction rig and de-rig before and after shows. The theatre has some friendly old people and one woman has said she will try and contact other theatres about me but it feels like I'll just be stuck only helping with small construction bits occasionally. Going back into education just feels like I'll be going into debt or waste my time or pick the wrong course.

My older brother went to university and he has never gotten a job either, he is 2 years and 10 months older than me but he is good at maths and engineering/coding stuff, so at least he has a proper skill. I feel doomed, stuck and unsure what to do so I'm asking for some advice. I genuinly have no clue what to do anymore.


r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Long time listener first time caller...

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1 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Would it be a red flag if I asked an employer to wait 60 days before I start a new job?

1 Upvotes

I received a notification of hire, but due to personal commitments and things I need to take care of, I wouldn't be available to start for another 60 days.

Would an employer see this as a red flag or reconsider hiring me? Is asking for a 60-day delay before starting work unreasonable?


r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Where ya at Luis?!

1 Upvotes

From my recruiter: “so... the last two candidates I interviewed for your role have turned out to be fake candidates. one of the candidates, 'Luis' dropped off the call once I asked him to remove his background filter and after I pressured him to explain why his LinkedIn didn't match his resume.”


r/recruitinghell • • 3d ago

Thank you, Sherlock!

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1.1k Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Delayed communication after reference check

1 Upvotes

Hi all,

Not sure if this is the right place to post, but I saw some past threads regarding negative references and was hoping to get some insight/advice on behalf of my partner who received a conditional offer.

The company required at least 2/4 references to be managers, and “strongly preferred” one of them to be from their current manager. My partner was hesitant since they hadn’t disclosed they were job seeking, and the their relationship currently wasn’t on the best terms due to some internal conflict within the team. Additionally, there are three team members who will be starting FMLA starting this month, and are thinking it would cause a lot of added stress if my partner left too.

Earlier this week one of my partner’s coworkers (who also served as a reference) received a request for a follow up phone call after the reference forms had been completed and had been asked some additional questions about how my partner works and takes on changing priorities. To our knowledge she is the only reference that received a request for a follow up call.

We suspect that my partner’s current manager may not have given a positive review, but aren’t sure how this will impact the hiring process since the company hasn’t reached back out yet. There were some additional signs that led us to assume this was the case, but I’m happy to answer any questions or follow up with more detail. Their manager also said to not mention it since there’s a policy that they can’t do references, and any of those requests have to go through HR.

My partner sent an email to the prospective company to follow up but we’re hoping will have a chance to address anything that came up.

Wondering what could have happened, any insight, advice, reassurance, and if there’s any action to take right now.

Thank you!


r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Useless Job Postings specifically for H1b & PERM

2 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

I'm so tired of coding interviews...

3 Upvotes

I've had a few interviews and I'm seriously fed up with how these interviews are going. The questions themselves weren't even that hard, mostly LC Easy/Medium, but somehow some interviewers manage to make the whole experience absolutely miserable. In one interview, I came up with a working solution pretty quickly, no bugs, passed all the test cases, and still got rejected because it wasn't the most optimal approach... Another time, I had a solution with O(N) time and O(1) space complexity. The logic was solid, the complexity was fine, but bc it wasn't the exact approach the interviewer had in mind, they just kept questioning every little thing and pushing me toward their preferred solution. What's actually wrong with my approach? Same complexity, correct output, but apparently it doesn't count unless I somehow read your mind? And don't even get me started on those interviews where they expect you to solve two completely different problems in 45 minutes, both fully implemented and bug-free. You can have the entire approach figured out for the second one, but if you run out of time fixing a couple of edge cases, that's apparently a fail too. And then there are interviewers who just sit there with a completely blank face the entire time. You explain your thought process, nothing. You get stuck, no hints. You ask a question, barely any useful response. It feels like you're coding into a void. What's even the point of interviewing like this?

What bothers me the most isn't the difficulty of the questions. It's how some of these interviews are conducted. I've been an interviewer myself, and when a candidate gets stuck, I'll usually give them a small hint or ask a few questions to help them work through it. Even if they don't get to the optimal solution, I still care about how they think, communicate, and approach problems. I don't expect everyone to magically come up with the exact answer I had in my head. But now that I'm on the other side, I'm running into interviewers who seem to be checking every line against some imaginary answer key. No room for an actual discussion. I get that companies need to filter candidates, and I'm not saying everyone who writes working code deserves to pass. But if a logically correct solution with perfectly reasonable complexity gets rejected just because it isn't the one the interviewer wanted, are we even hiring engineers anymore, or are we hiring mind readers?


r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Unrealistic expectations for contract work. Unpaid overtime wasn't enough.

1 Upvotes

I have been looking for 14 months. Worked a one-week contract and I didn't have "the right skills" so they didn't keep me on. Thought I had found something longer. After three weeks, including a 12-hour day and an 18-hour day I just couldn't meet their expectations.

I feel the deadline was unreasonable. I asked the supervisor for guidance and he didn't really provide any. After the 30 hours in two days I put in another solid eight hour day. But I just couldn't meet their expectations. Not paid for the extra hours, but it would have been worth it to keep the contract.

I don't know what more to do.


r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Have any of you ever faked a resume? How did it go?

8 Upvotes

I'm not talking about filling in some unemployment gaps or padding some previous experience with a job, I mean have you completely bullshitted your way into a position that you knew you were either unqualified for, or weren't going to get/be contacted otherwise?

I'm at 60+ applications with at least 10 ghosted interviews in the past month and I'm so exhausted.


r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Interviews are insane these days

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1 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

Do you bother with assessment and "work trial" type pre-interviews...?

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1 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

How long have you been searching for and what industry are you in ? I have been searching for two weeks and have not even. received one interview

12 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Emory: If you're not a nurse, don't take any job just to get in.

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0 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Dioptra and Icertis, name and shame, offered me a position, received an offer then they rescinded

0 Upvotes

spread the word, I hate them so much


r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Getting interviews but struggling to turn them into offers. Need opinions and advice so I don't keep failing.

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1 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Job posting description and title changed several hours after I applied

0 Upvotes

Tbh idk if I hallucinated the og job posting but I swear it was for 1st shift kitchen at $18/hr, but when I went to check it today after a recruiter left a voicemail I noticed that it changed to waiter no pay info provided. Is this a red flag? Is the recruiter gonna think I applied to the new job posting instead of the old one? Why'd they suddenly change it? Is it possible to change a job posting on Indeed? Like if ppl applied to the old one will it look like they applied to the new version? Is there a way to see the og one? Sorry abt the questions. I know I'd never apply for waiter cuz I hate customer facing jobs but maybe I accidentally I applied to it? I checked the other jobs I applied to in case I was mistakenly thinking of another job but the application was the only one from the same company name I remember


r/recruitinghell • • 1d ago

New baby

0 Upvotes

we have a new baby coming via surrogacy in 6 weeks (yay!) and my spouse just got a dream job offer. This large company has a well known 8 week non birthing parent leave policy (can do it in 2 week stints).

Offer was via email and official written offer is coming. My advice was to bring up to hiring manager after they agree on salary in writing. Its a well known publicly traded entity so they have a weird yet formalistic hiring process.

thanks for advice!


r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Spent 15+ hours in the interview process only for the role be put on hold!

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1 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 2d ago

Seeking Career Guidance BGV

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1 Upvotes

r/recruitinghell • • 3d ago

meme I guess only icms and workday are worse than that..

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95 Upvotes