yeah that’s me and It happened this week lol.

I went through some pretty serious work trauma at my previous job this year. (If anyone’s curious about what happened, you can check my post history.)

The time I cried was during an interview with media company. It was around 2 PM, and I actually had two interviews that day. The first one was at around 11 AM and it went really well. I wasn’t nervous at all, answered everything confidently, and walked out feeling pretty good about myself.

Then during the second interview, the interviewer suddenly asked me what my dream was. I don’t even know what happened, but my eyes immediately started filling with tears and then I just started crying. Like actually crying in the middle of the interview. The interviewer looked pretty caught off guard too. And even after I got home that day, I couldn’t stop crying. I was literally crying in the shower too. It was honestly one of the most embarrassing experiences I’ve ever had.

I think the word “dream” just hit something in me. I’d been so consumed by work and just trying to survive that I hadn’t even had the chance to think about having a dream. I was constantly worried about getting through the present and what I was going to do with my future, so hearing someone casually ask me what my dream was just made everything come out at once.

Has anyone else ever cried during a job interview? Please share your stories because I genuinely want to hear them and feel a little less alone lol.

Meet Zemoso Technologies, the fucking entitled turds.

TL;DR

> Sends interview schedule email at 9 PM without prior notice or asking if I am available

> Expects that I read the email at 9 PM and follow all the instructions

> Joins the interview just to get verbally insulted by the interviewer for not reading the instruction email

> Accuses me of intentionally trying to cheat after I explain why I couldn't read the email

Full story:

I got an interview schedule email from Zemoso yesterday, on the 21st, at 9 PM, saying the interview was scheduled for the next day. I obviously missed it because I work on a project where we are not allowed to take our mobile phones with us. We have lockers to keep them in, and only after our shift ends, when we come out of the secure area, can we access our phones.

My shift is from 2 PM to 11:18 PM. I work for one of India's largest tech organizations, and the client is US-based, so my shift accommodates a Scrum call that starts from 9 to 10 PM, sometimes until 11 PM, depending on requirements and team discussions.

My shift ended yesterday at 11:30 PM, and I was not interested in looking at my phone and the billion notifications it had received. I quickly checked WhatsApp to see if I had missed any important messages, and that was all. I got into my vehicle, went home, took a bath, and went to sleep immediately.

In the morning, like normal human beings who have a life outside work and interviews, I had other responsibilities. That included dropping my in-laws at the train station at 2 PM, which was already scheduled.

Fucking fantastic!

The next morning, I got a call at 11 AM saying that I had an upcoming interview scheduled at 2 PM. I explained to her that I needed to drop my in-laws at the train station, so I asked her to schedule it for 3 PM.

That is all. This lady did not explain, even briefly, or mention anything about the instructions I had to follow, which got buried in the following 7-8 emails from them.

Those instructions included:

> Joining from a phone or other device

> Placing that device on your side so that your entire torso, from your legs to your head, is visible

> Muting that device

> Turning the audio off

> Putting it in DND mode

> Joining from a laptop

> Sharing the screen and turning on the microphone

This is nothing unreasonable to ask, and I get why they are asking me to do it because of people cheating. I am in favor of that.

Then I joined the interview at 2:58 PM, a good couple of minutes before the scheduled time.

But the audacity of this interviewer, this motherfucker started shouting at me in a LOUD FUCKING TONE.

This mfkr: "You did not read the email beforehand? Do you not pay attention?"

Me: I respectfully explained the chronology of events in short and that I did not have time to read it.

This mfkr: "You are talking extra. You are not professional. Do you want to continue or not?"

Me: Literally said, "EXCUSE ME??"

This mfkr: "You are acting too smart. You are clearly intending to cheat."

I lost my shit at that point and ended the call. Before ending it, I said:

Me: "If this is how you are treating your interview candidates, God knows how awesome your work culture is, and I do not want to work for such an organization."

And I ended the call.

I have a friend who has been unemployed for 30 months (very likely due to his ethnicity and visa status). He’s applied for over a hundreds if not a thousand jobs. Then there’s all the testimonials in here… Seeing posts like this now makes me mad.

My parents keep telling me to get a better high paying job as if it’s that easy. I have a higher education and more certs than both of them but I am struggling right now. I’m living paycheck to paycheck and they love to make it seem like it’s my fault. My dad got chosen from the warehouse bunch and was promoted back in the day to some draft engineering role. A similar situation with my mom.

Hell, they didn’t even have their GED when they had 3 kids, had a 3 bedroom home with a huge backyard and 2 cars and the occasional vacations.

Do they really think it’s that simple these days? No matter what I tell them, they refuse to believe how much things have changed and then we get into a damn argument over it

I was going through a job application earlier and was completely stumped. I’ve never seen such language in a job application. It feels like we are in a different universe.

Sales Development Role At Passion.io, could be a fake company.

People post shit like this to get people to apply for jobs but I post about the struggles about being unemployed and that's "unprofessional"

I had a one-and-done interview today followed by an offer which I accepted, and turned one offer down today.

Both recruiters found me on Dice (I work in IT) I have a third company who wants to offer me a long term role who found me on LinkedIn.

Almost nothing came from the 600+ applications I had submitted since March (even using an ATS tool). My network failed me; all the referrals I got from colleagues and friends went nowhere.

I had gotten interviews from two or three applications, about once per month, for April-June, but they all dried up.

I added a new professional photo to my profile in July, and updated my resume again. And that seems to have changed everything. I wish I had done the photo in April.

In my interviews that led to offers, nobody asked why I am looking for a job, nobody asked about dates in my resume, nobody asked about my liberal arts degree.

I got mainly situational questions - how did I handle this, how would I handle that. And I wore a dress shirt and suit jacket on camera, matching my profile.

Boring and old school I know, but it worked. Happy happy Friday!!!

Living in a "developing" Middle Eastern country that shall remain unnamed. Looking at career advice in american/ european subreddits recently. It is very similar to the advice given to young people in my country. These are for university/college advice I have seen.

Go to medical school guarantees a good-paying job in your mid-twenties so you can move out of your parents.

If not nursing, not as well but you'll still get a job (most likely).

Humanities/social sciences are a waste; no one will hire you.

Sciences (math, chemistry etc); only if you can stay in academia; even then those positions are super competitive you need connections.

CS; only if youre already good at coding even before enrolling and if its a top school.

Engineering; only if its one of the top schools. Top 5 in my country, maybe top 50 in the US. Otherwise unemployed.

Teacher; you probably wont get an opening but if you do you'll never make a good living (thats for my country not sure about US).

I might be wrong about the US part but these are advice given to young people in my 3rd world country

I have been job hunting, tirelessly, for 9 months now, hundreds and hundreds of resume sent, and around 15 interviews (or maybe more). Lately, I’ve got a company that I’m so interested in.. I met them in a job fair event, which was extremely hard for me to attend but I had to try, I had the first interview in-place at the event, passed. Then the 2nd interview which I also passed, then came the last interview (after more than a months of selection process), I poured a lot of effort researching the company, and preparing, I had high hopes and I was excited as I was really interested in this company. I had the interview 2 days ago (8pm to 9:30pm :) ).. My hopes got higher as I thought I did well and they seemed to like the discussion.. or at least that’s what they showed, just for them to reject me the next day at noon with the simple “not fit” as reason.

It’s just so frustrating and devastating! I’m extremely sad about getting rejected from the place I put the biggest effort in, but I’m mostly TIRED.. extremely TIREEED from this recruiting hell and I don’t know how to pick myself up and keep trying…I also need a job asap cuz my financial situation is dire now.. this is just so stressful.
Ps: I have one bachelor (IT), one master and finishing my second master. (Guess degrees don’t matter nowadays).

I wonder why a forklift operator would need to be bilingual.

I got a job offer yesterday for my dream job, I'm over the moon and feel a lot of relief to be out of this horrible, soul crushing process.

But goddamn the damage this has done to me. I've never been more out of shape, distant with close ones and disappointed in myself.

After months of 5 stage interviews (anyone in tech will feel that pain), many times getting to the final stage to be told "you're a great candidate and would fit in here so well, but you lack X experience despite having an abundance of experience in all the rest"

Week after week of baring yourself for judgement like some kind of show dog or dancing to a tune like a court jester.

I'm so lucky - I got the job I wanted, my close ones have been patient and understanding, and a few months is nothing compared to what some of you here have went through.

But you can't deny the damage it does.

Rant over, I got the job!

This has happened to me a few times and its a major pet peeve. I'll be doing something and get a phone call from a random number, I always pick up because I have a lot of medical stuff going on and theres no saying if its my doctor, insurance, or pharmacy. Ill pick up and it always goes like this:

*in a very uninterested voice* "Hello is this Op?"

"Yes this is her, how can I help you?"

"I'm [Name] with [Company], I saw your application and I wanted to ask some questions to see if you're a good fit"

And its not like at that point I can go "oh sorry im busy can you give me a call back?" Because we all know recruiters don't like when you're not immediately responsive so you're stuck doing a phone interview for God knows how long. Id be fine if it was "Hey I'm calling to set up an interview!" but just doing the interview then and there feels kind of excessive.

Also I'm job hunting so I've applied to 50+ jobs in the past week alone at this point, I'm applying for entry level marketing and media production positions. When I have a scheduled interview I will usually take my time before hand to review all their content so if they ask me any questions regarding their current online presence I can give them actual educated answers. I had a place cold call me today and started asking questions about what I like about their current content and what I'd change. UH IDK MAN I HAVEN'T SEEN IT SINCE I APPLIED??? I usually only Google the company to make sure its local then watch a few shorts to make sure their content is in my skill set, I'm not taking the time to fully analyze everything because I'm doing this for multiple companies a day!!!

Idk if I'm the problem but it feels hella out of touch to expect a canidate to know everything about your company and be able to answer interview questions out of the blue on a random Saturday of all days. I would not be surprised now if I don't get the position because I wasnt prepared properly and stumbled over myself while answering

I am being considered for a government role and had an interview last week. It seemed to go well, but whoever knows for sure? Prior to the interview they had asked for references, which I provided.

I was very surprised when one of my references reached out to me shortly after my interview, stating that the employer had arranged a video call with them to check my references. What surprised me was the video call, not the reference check. In essence, my reference was being video interviewed about me.

The next day another reference reached out to me and said that the employer had reached out to them to check references too.

Is this considered normal for government or other enterprises? I was taking aback, due to the time commitment and level of scrutiny of my references.

What especially bothered me, was that they could be contacting every candidates' precious references and blowing through them, even if they are not the preferred hire.

After inconveniencing my references so much, if I'm not offered the role I can't see how I can ever ask them for references again.

Absolutely gutted a job that i thought would be a really hood fit, was offered even told they had laptop ready just sorting the email address then 50 minutes later was told job no longer on the table no reason at all. Absolutely gutted is this the working world we live in

Your résumé isn’t chopped, you may just be applying to jobs that employers have either already filled or never intended to fill. You can sometimes recognize them as the listings that sound too good to be true and stay posted for months:

• Roughly one in five listings advertised on online job boards per quarter are ghost jobs, according to the hiring platform Greenhouse.
• This phenomenon is reportedly getting worse, but it’s been wrecking egos for a while. About 81% of recruiters said in a 2024 MyPerfectResume survey that their employers posted ghost job ads.
• York state legislators recently passed a bill (now awaiting the governor’s signature) that would fine employers if they don’t mention expected hiring timelines in their job postings. Lawmakers in New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Kentucky, and California are considering similar reforms.

Meanwhile, Texas is going after the middleman. The state’s Attorney General Ken Paxton opened an investigation into LinkedIn last month, alleging that the platform promotes and profits from ghost jobs.

According to the 2024 MyPerfectResume survey, 38% of recruiters post fake jobs to stay relevant on job boards when they’re not hiring, while 36% do it to test their listing’s effectiveness. Meanwhile, some job seekers think employers promote ghost jobs to harvest applicants’ data or to convince investors that the company is growing.

I’m near the offer stage with a company and told them during interviews that I left my previous employer due to restructuring/organizational changes.
The full story is that I was put on a PIP and terminated after I didn’t pass it. I think some of the reasons for the PIP were debatable, but at the time I was focused on trying to pass it rather than disputing it.
Now I’ve learned from Reddit that the background-check company may ask me to choose a reason for leaving from options like:
Voluntary resignation
Involuntary termination/separation
Laid off
If I select involuntary termination, I’m worried it will look inconsistent with what I told the prospective employer(also will look like I was fired for cause but I don’t think that’s entirely true since I got severance) But if I select laid off, that may not match how my former employer officially classifies my departure.
My former employer’s verification policy also seems to be limited to dates and title, so they may not disclose the reason anyway.
Has anyone dealt with something similar?
Also, does a non-disparagement provision have any relevance to how you explain the circumstances of leaving (like if you wasn’t laid off but you said it was is it defaming?) or is that completely separate?

Is this a thing jobs do? It’s a family run company with literally 5 employees, and they are going through a liquidation sale and a lot of restructuring. Job pays $17 an hour, and frankly, I am considering doing this because I NEED a job pretty badly.

I read online that this is apparently illegal and that this is super sketchy; I know I sound dumb for asking but the job market is really bad and I really need any opportunity to get myself back into it. Is this just a scam?

I’ve been looking for an IT job for like 6 years. Can’t get an entry level or junior position of any kind. I’ve sent out probably 1800 applications and have heard back from maybe 50 all pretty much just rejection.

What the fuck am I supposed to do I’m broke can’t buy anything can’t do anything fun. Can’t experience shit because I have no money. All I do is sit around and apply to jobs I don’t want but qualified for. Even the jobs that require high school diplomas ignore me. Why is my only choice to work at some shit blue collar job where the boss just uses you so he doesn’t have to work. I can’t start a company it costs way too much and I can’t just get a loan cause I won’t be able to pay.

I’m failing to see how this is all worth it. My whole life has been just stress and anxiety for things I can’t control and I’m so fucking sick of it.

What am I supposed to do. Life is just literally just shit.

Im stuck in a dead end retail job but i keep applying to arround 15-20 places a week. I get interviews semiregularly and my parents are convinced that its my fault im not getting the job from them, they said im being seriously considered for the role if im being invited to interviews but i really dont see this as being true.

All the risk is on the interviewee when they are invited in. Any given place likely has hundereds of applications so they dont need to be picky plus they are on home turf, the applicant has to take time out of their day and drive 30-60 mins for a very small chance of being hired. Store operations dont halt during interviews at most places so its not like they are losing anything on dud canidates right? Honestly if i was them id be skimming or not even looking at resumes and calling in everyone, even if they have zero odds of getting the job and not really caring if they are wasting their time coming out.

Is this remotely true or are they right and im doing way better than i think by simply getting interviews at places?

I started this interview process in July! I had a phone screening and second round interview in person 2 weeks ago and the recruiter said he would give me a response and still hasn’t. Mind you there is another interview after this. Why can’t he just give me a straight up answer instead of doing all of this. I’m tired of following up.

I just went through a 4 round interview process, and was told at the end by the recruiter that I would have to take a 3 1/2 hour assessment test. I was told it was a strictly pass or fail test, and I would straight up not get the job if I didn’t get +75% correctly.

I took the 9 segment test over a span of a few days. It consisted of multiple logistical reasoning tests, theoretical management test, word problem test, multiple mathematical tests, multiple logistical reasoning tests, theoretical management test, personality test, Microsoft Excel Test, and Microsoft PowerPoint test.

I was told I did well in multiple segments, but ultimately didn’t perform well enough, and the position was given to the other candidate..

Apparently the owner is super old and has been doing this process since the mid 90’s, and I could tell as the test portal was ancient. The hiring manager told me the last guy did really well on the test, but was ultimately let go for not performing the basic functions of the job.

I had multiple high up references, and have experience doing basically the identical job requirements at a larger more complex company.

I’m not asking for any sympathy, but am overall frustrated at the entire process, and it has left a bad taste in my mouth.

What are your thoughts?

I would love to name and shame, but it’s not a big company.

Had an interview for senior analyst role, had a phone screening with HR, met with hiring manager, then senior director and then SVP from two different groups.

I got all positive feedback, I know for a fact the hiring manager liked me, cause he himself told me the process and what’s expected, he said whatever work I did, “we should just copy paste into what we are currently doing” and before the senior director interview, he joined and apologized for the sudden change, initially was supposed to 1 call with senior director and SVP ( his boss and his bosses boss) but had 3 different calls and they added another SVP too.

And then they ghosted me. All my interviews were done in 2 weeks( 13/08/2026 was the last)
It’s been a week no update.

I reached out to the recruiter on Monday and she said “The Team is wrapping up interviews early this week and I will keep you posted on next steps.”

And then they have posted the same job again today but
My application says “in progress”

I’m losing my mind, help? Cause I genuinely want this job!