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Mistakes Made by Interviewers
There are an abundance of articles with tips and techniques about interviewing for a job. They are commonly written from the perspective of the person being interviewed, such as questions to expect during an interview, how to respond and answer, appropriate questions to ask, and examples of mistakes and how to avoid making them. This article is from a completely different perspective, which is not discussed that often.
This article provides some examples of mistakes that interviewers can make. This is a first hand account, and all of these mistakes occurred while I was interviewing for a job, and the summaries were not embellished in any way. For obvious reasons, I have not disclosed the names of any of companies, but all of them are in the information technology (IT) industry. In order to give some context, I do provide some generalized details as to the size of each company and how prominent each might be. Mistakes can and do happen, and this article has no intent of being deprecatory in any way to the interviewers or companies. The purpose is to simply emphasize that when an interviewer does make a mistake, the person being interviewed needs to be prepared to adapt and respond.
The "What Interview?" Interview
The Setup: This interview was with a very small IT company that I had never heard of previously. Contact was made with me by a third party recruiter, and I had an initial interview with the recruiter that lasted about half an hour.
What Transpired: The recruiter forwarded my information to the hiring manager at the company, along with some days and times that I was available for an interview. The hiring manager then sent me a calendar invite, which I promptly accepted. Additionally, I sent a short e-mail confirming the time and date of the interview, expressed how I was looking forward to it, and I also did the same thing the day before the interview. At the scheduled day and time of the interview, I promptly joined the remote meeting tool. After waiting about 10-15 minutes, my assumption was that he was running late or was addressing a business priority. Though it is not normal to be provided with the mobile number of a hiring manager or interviewer, it came across with the calendar invite. I decided to politely text him and suggested that we could reschedule at a more convenient time for him. Several minutes later he called me, and ask a few rapid fire questions, such as "Who are you?" and "What Interview?" After answering his questions, he said that he would call me back.
The Aftermath: About half an hour later, he called me again, and we had the interview. The job role and responsibilities were really not a fit for what I was seeking, so the dialogue ended with that interview. I'm not exactly sure what happened, but one possibility was that an administrative assistant may have scheduled the interview, and the hiring manager was lax about calendar managment. Regardless, I had sent two separate e-mails that confirmed the day and time of the interview. This is what I always refer to as my "what interview?" interview.
The "Wrong Candidate" Interview
The Setup: This interview was with a large IT company that is not a household name, but is well known to anyone in the IT industry. For this particular job, I was far along in the interview process. I already had at least six interviews, which included an initial interview with a recruiter, and an in person interview with the hiring manager.
What Transpired: This interview was positioned to be one of the last, and was with a senior vice president. I joined the remote meeting tool promptly, and the senior vice president joined a couple of minutes later. Before I could even say "hello," the senior vice president immediately started talking rapid fire. Paraphrased, he said "I hear that that you are with [company name which was not on my resume] and are long term acquainted with [name unknown to me]. We would love to have you here, and we'll see how fast we can get you aboard." After a deliberate long pause from me, I then introduced myself. The senior vice president didn't acknowledge anything that he had just said.
The Aftermath: After what the senior vice president disclosed, I immediately knew that I was a backup candidate, and that he blundered tremendously. Obviously,, most hiring companies will keep at least one backup candidate during the hiring process. This is done in case the leading candidate declines the offer, does not pass a background check, etc. I enthusiastically and professionally completed the interview, as I had some hope and anticipation that there might be another opening in the near future. This is what I always recall as my "wrong candidate" interview.
The "Wrong Job" Interview
The Setup: This interview was with a very large IT company that is a common household name, and does occasionally does advertise on television. For this particular job, I had already interviewed with the recruiter, the hiring manager, and one other manager.
What Transpired: This was my fourth interview with the company, and this time it was with the director of the business unit. We both joined the remote meeting tool promptly, and began a very cordial interview. After several minutes, I began to sense something was out of order, as his questions did not align with anything from my prior three interviews, nor the job description. As a result, I asked a couple of clarifying questions.
The Aftermath: After briefly discussing the job posting and the prior three interviews, the director bluntly told me that his team had posted the wrong job. He was not open to telling me what the job was supposed to be, nor did he really want to have any further discussion. After that, I was completely "ghosted." Neither the recruiter or hiring manager would respond back to any e-mail inquires, nor return any voicemails. One possible interpretation that could be drawn was that they were embarrassed about what transpired. This is what I refer to as my "wrong job" interview.
The "Glass Walls" Interview
The Setup: This interview was with a very large IT company that is a common household name, and does occasionally advertise on television. For this particular job, I had already interviewed with the recruiter, and had four other remote interviews.
What Transpired: This interview was in person, and was a series of interviews with four different people back to back for thirty minutes each. After arriving early, I was escorted to a small meeting room, and it was an area that had about a dozen small meeting rooms. All of the meeting rooms had glass walls from floor to ceiling, so you could see through from one room to the next. A few minutes later, another person was escorted in to the meeting room across the hallway from me. She had a visitor badge, and my first thought was that she was another candidate, and questioned to myself why would they put two candidates in such close proximity to each other. About ten minutes later, another person was escorted to the meeting room directly next to mine in the direction that I was facing.
The Aftermath: The person that they placed in the meeting room directly next to mine was one of my coworkers. It was someone that I spoke to every other day., immensely respected as a colleague, and we were seated no more than ten feet apart with a glass wall between us. Obviously, it was awkward to say the least! We were both a bit surprised and sheepishly smiled and waved at each other. After the interview, we chatted in the parking lot for quite a while, and also talked later in the day. He did wind up getting the job, and rightfully so, as he was more qualified for that role. There were four candidates in total that they simultaneously brought in for this series of interviews. It was simply astonishing that the interviewers did not recognize that two of the four were employed by the same company, and then placed us in glass walled meeting rooms directly next to each other. This is what I always call my "glass walls" interview.
The "Mountain Pile of Laundry" Interview
The Setup: This interview was with a very large IT company, which is not necessarily recognized as a household name, but does occasionally advertise on television. My first interview was with the recruiter, and this was an interview with the hiring manager.
What Transpired: This interview was remote, and we both joined the remote meeting tool promptly. After a couple of minutes of cordial exchanges, the hiring manager started with some questions about Airbnb, where he wanted me to analyze their business model and technology in a very specific manner. After a couple of questions, I explained that I'm barely familiar with Airbnb, and have never used their service. I suggested pivoting to another company for which I had a better degree of knowledge, and provided a few examples. The hiring manager had a script, and there was no budging him from that script. He continued with further questions on Airbnb from his script, such as asking my thoughts about the usability of their app. I had to repeat myself that I had never used their service, and as a result, I have never even seen their app. He was relentless, and continued with further questions.
The Aftermath: The hiring manager refused to listen to anything I shared, asked, or suggested, and would not deviate from his script about Airbnb. There was another facet to this interview, which was during the COVID pandemic. The hiring manager took the interview from a bedroom, and forgot to turn on the feature for a virtual background or to blur his background. Quite visible behind him, the closet doors were wide open and filled with boxes, and there was massive mountain pile of laundry on the bed. It should be noted that this company had a hybrid work model for many years before COVID, so working remotely was far from being a new concept for this company. This is what I refer to as my "mountain pile of laundry" interview, as well as my "tell me about Airbnb" interview.
Summary
This article helps demonstrate that mistakes can and do happen by interviewers during a job interview, and there was no intent of being deprecatory in any way to any of the interviewers or companies. Hopefully, this demonstrates that anyone who is being interviewed should give some thought in advance about how to adapt and respond if an interviewer does make a mistake. Should you have any comments or questions, please feel free to contact me.