Comment by supriyo-biswas
10 hours ago
I've had an interview like this in the past. At the time, I chalked it up to a power trip and the indignant behavior that comes along with it, as it is especially embedded in the culture of the country that I'm based out of.
Having said that, talking to a relative, I found out that this style of "interviewing" is often done when they already have someone for the position, but need to show (for compliance reasons, or otherwise) that they tried finding candidates, and only their preferred one qualified.
I had a really weird power-trip interview once, and it was the CEO who was joined by a contractor who was ostensibly the technical lead for the project. There was nobody in engineering who worked full-time on the job, everybody was contracted. I was also going in as a contractor so I was aware that the interview would be a bit lighter on process as a result.
The questioning very quickly veered away from technical stuff and into stuff like, "where do you stand spiritually?" and other questions probing into whatever bizarre cosmic insights I could pull out of my ass at the time. He was the really intense kind of boss who wants to make sure you know of it with the hard back/shoulder slaps and micromanagement, and I could see his office from the boardroom which basically had an array of monitors all wired up to CCTV so he could watch (and hear) people from the comfort of his desk.
If any of that wasn't a red flag, getting hired literally 5 minutes after leaving the office was probably the biggest. I lasted about 6 months and even trying to leave was an ordeal.
> I lasted about 6 months and even trying to leave was an ordeal.
Like finding your next gig or just not showing up ever again? Because I've worked at a place where someone came in, went to lunch, and they never saw them ever again.
I've heard stories like this and always wonder, at what point do you file a missing person's report?
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My buddy did that.
I got a gig as a contractor for a well known company. They were hiring and he told his recruiter to get him in. After several conversations trying to tell him not to come in and telling him what a clown show it was, he still managed to get hired.
Same thing. Came in, continually had to ask me how to do stuff, and I kept telling him, "See man, I told you this place is a clown show!". He did the same thing. Left his laptop, "Going to lunch, be back in an hour."
Never came back.
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> Having said that, talking to a relative, I found out that this style of "interviewing" is often done when they already have someone for the position, but need to show (for compliance reasons, or otherwise) that they tried finding candidates, and only their preferred one qualified.
Or they only want candidates from a specific country to apply which is seemingly the case. I've heard from very talented and capable developers that they're getting auto-rejected once the interview reaches someone from a very specific country, no matter how good they did prior. I've also been personally told by people I know wouldn't BS me, that had my name sounded like I was from a particular country HR would have contacted me for an interview, but because I'm none of the countries some companies seem to only hire from, I get ignored. There's a problem with tech hiring and nobody wants to talk about it because most people are unaware.
>There's a problem with tech hiring and nobody wants to talk about it because most people are unaware.
And those who are aware and bring it up often get accused of racism when they do, making it difficult to spread awareness of this awful practice.
The funny thing is I am considered a minority, but apparently not the “right kind” of minority. I think outside of being accused of racism I suspect some people anticipate HR level retaliation as well.
> I chalked it up to a power trip and the indignant behavior that comes along with it, as it is especially embedded in the culture of the country that I'm based out of.
That's a very globally-conscious way to refer to the USA!
My mind raced to the letter I instead
Immediate parent is correct.
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Is it Iceland? Ivory Coast? Ireland? Indonesia?
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> I chalked it up to a power trip and the indignant behavior that comes along with it, as it is especially embedded in the culture of the country that I'm based out of.
You previously said:
"One of the things people in the US like to do is to take some thing that's being negatively talked about and spin that into a thing that only people in the US do"
Well, it sure sounds like a thing people from your European country like to do as well.
What's hilarious is that I'm pretty sure you got his country wrong too.