How fucking dare that applicant ask what hours they will be working.
And trying to get a feel for the workplace culture‽ Absolutely outrageous!!!
or if they will get insurance through work.
I feel like the answer to some of these questions would/should be answered in either the job application or the job offer. I get not wanting to wait for the job offer, but a company not offering that info is a red flag imo. Personally, I'd ask before signing the official offer, and not at the job interview. I'd also probably go for more general questions.
"What does a typical work day look like?"
"What is the overall compensation package?" Though this one can be a bit taboo
One reason why finding a job is such a hassle. So many employers just want to interview people to hit a quota of "candidates reviewed" without taking any given candidate seriously.
You get a bunch of false positives in the search and waste time going through the motions with people who aren't actually in charge of anything.
Straight out of college I had an eight hour interview process once, for an IT job that paid $25k starting. Round after round of quizes and queries that ate up my whole day.
Then I got picked up by a boutique medical IT firm a few weeks later after two calls and a 30 minute walk in, for nearly twice the salary. When I got the rejection letter from the first people six months later all I could do was laugh.
I had a place tell me I wasn't selected almost exactly a year after I had spoken with them. I set a timer for as long as they had waited to send me that, and replied to it myself a year later.
Probably no one saw it or understood, but it made me chuckle.
My experience in engineering on both sides of the table is similar. As a hiring manager, my goal is to move as fast as possible because talented folks are going to be looking at lots of places and I need present the best option to them very quickly so I don’t lose them. I don’t fuck around with haggling or candidate pools; two, maybe three max interviews depending on the role and we’re rejecting or making the best possible offer we can. I picked this up from companies I have preferred to work at. I think massive enterprises get bogged down in their internal processes and procedures and red tape while forgetting the employee experience begins during the candidate experience. If I have to go through many rounds of interviews I can only assume working there will be miles of bureaucracy before I can do anything more than sneeze.
I am personally fine with the old onsite process where you’d go to the company and have a day or half a day of interviews with not only the team but the stakeholders as well. Post-COVID that turned into a remote onsite and slowly turned into weeks of interviews which I don’t like but is more flexible for serious candidates. When I was running those, each group had specific areas to cover so we got a good sense of the boundaries of your skills. You got to meet many people you’d work with and get a sense of how things run. Always practical, though, never any of that leetcode bullshit. Also always two way. You don’t just stare at a candidate; they need to understand you to make a good decision. And, most importantly, the scale is based on seniority/pay. I’m not going to spend more than an hour or two with a junior interview because it’s a fucking junior interview.
Bingo. I wasted time with a huge, multi-day, multi part interview process with a huge local manufacturing conglomerate. Multiple interview panels over a week, and finally just got rejected because the first two panels I had sat in had no allowance to reject anyone. According to a friend that works there, "it tests how persevering you are".
"We are all like a family here.. so nobody asks questions and just do as they’re told or else they go to the naughty corner!"
Abusive Families are Families too...
Dad is an alcoholic. Mum is psychologically tormenting everyone. Older half brother really wants to fuck.
Just don't go in the room alone with your uncle!
Heard a similar thing too many times
Literally how abrahamic religions work. Do not ask, just do whatever you're told and be happy when awful things happen since god is testing you.
Yup. If your employer uses the, "we're all one big family" then you're in for a real bad time.
Because sooner or later, they're going to make you choose between their fake "family" and your real one.
How tf is asking what hours I'll be working, if not listed in the application, not important? Can't work if I don't know when I'll actually be working.
In fact looking again why are they even having to ask them questions? Most of these seem like things that should be on the listing anyway.
On any jobs interviews i do, i always ask if the applicant has questions because they are interviewing us as much as we are them.
Yup. It's an interview. Not a viewing.
I'm on the job hunt right now and I cannot stress enough how much I do not care what company leadership needs to tell themselves so they can sleep at night. All I need to know are the pay, the benefits, and if the job aligns with my interest
That interviewer should be fired immediately for not being intelligent enough to recognize more important questions when asked them. Whoever let that one into the corporation should be fired as well, also with immediate effect.
Maybe I'm crazy or out of touch, but I've never asked these questions... because all of them but #6 and #7 should have been in the information given out long before I even get to the interview. Two/Five should at least be addressed by someone selling the company to you during the interview.
Six could be worded a bit better, because the interviewer is already going to have to clarify with you what pressure and laid back look like to you, and seven is probably better once the negotiation starts after the offer is begun.
keep in mind, this wording is filtered through the hr fool's retelling.
This is important IMO. This is not the applicant's wording. This is how the HR drone perceived these questions, not direct quotes. We actually have no idea what the applicant asked, but we do know that this person is a clown.
You're right. I didn't think of that, but it does completely shift the lens.
They’re important questions but lots of these are pay and benefit related. Usually I discuss that after getting an offer, and I think that’s what companies expect too.
eh, I'm hiring for my team right now and I have zero problem with these questions.
I tend to bring similar things up myself at the end of the interview if the candidate doesn't ask just because I don't like wasting time down the line.
we shouldn't make people jump through a bunch of hoops to see if they fit the job itself without being willing to consider that they might not want to waste time on a work environment that won't fit for them even if they could do the job.
I get it that pay is negotiable, but i would expect benefits to be based on general policy for all employees.
And in a place like the US, whether you get healthcare or not is a huge deal. If the company cannot tell you that straight away, the HR just wants to waste everyones time.
No problem in anticipating them. But the OP might not be asking them to a person that is allowed to answer them.
Yes but that is very simple to redirect.
Unfortunately I'm not able to answer all of your questions, you would need to refer to our HR specialist for those answers.
Very simple and polite. Going and posting on the Internet that they didn't hire someone because they had 100% legitimate questions make them look like an absolute moron, or simply someone that is looking for a slave that won't complain or inquire into anything. When the reality is, a person knowing those answers is helpful to both the company and the individual in terms of finding a good fit.
I actually tell the employer that I'm interviewing them just as well as they're interviewing me. It's a two-way street. They can't handle that. Well, sorry for them. They're not for me.
Interviewing is a two way street, and the employer definitely failed this interview
That said, coming with a long list of questions of different importance without noticing that the interviewer isn't on the same page is also a bit of a signal so the prospective employee didn't do great either.
A lot of these questions could be condensed into "What are the benefits like?" which is a great question to ask when they ask about salary expecations which often happens early on. If they provide very little in the way of benefits, raise salary expectations.
The other questions are generally around company culture. You don't need to ask all of them to get a good enough picture. If there are several interviews, spread them out. You can also ask them in a more open ended way like "What is the company culture like?", "What do you like most about working here yourself?" or "What makes your best employees so good?".
"Stop shifting the power balance waaaah!"
What a toxic choad.
Unpopular opinion: the candidate shouldn't have asked any of those questions. Those are offer negotiations because you can trade off salary for parking etc.
That first interview is a chance to be strategic and ask about growth in the department or development pathways/programs. I was always told that first you get the ring, then you negotiate the prenup.
It doesn't say this is a first interview.
Good point. On a callback I'd be all about expectations and details. That having been said I'm changing jobs this month and I still don't know if there is a bike cage or showers at the the new place. But it wasn't part of my decision criteria so I'll find out when I start
Some of them maybe, but asking the working hours, the health insurance, and whether the company will wait or buy out the two months might be complete deal-breakers, and saves both sides time by asking up front (and for the first two, should have been offered up front prior to the interview, to prevent wasted time).
It's like being offended if, on a first date, one person asks if the other ever wants to have kids. If you know the long term potential is dependent on something, getting that question out there up front saves both parties, and anybody getting upset over it is scamming (getting them invested before being willing to discuss it). Same as not talking about general (not specific) payscale for the position, medical coverage, hours, or whatever until the second or third interview.
These are questions for after receiving an offer.
The questions you should ask now would be along the lines of management style, corporate culture, and team dynamics. It's the first few dates, not a marriage proposal.
lol no. If a company can't answer what my work hours are gonna be before we even have the first interview, I'm not wasting my time.
I disagree. They're important for me to know if I want to keep pursuing this job opportunity or if I should stop wasting our time. I don't want to do a second or third interview only to find out afterwards about all these factors. I could be out there interviewing for other jobs in the meantime, not in a second interview at this shitty company that doesn't want to tell me how shitty it is until they've offered e the job.
To stay in the dating metaphor:
Would you want the other party to be upfront about serious issues, or prefer to get to know that down the line?
In dating terms these are topics like "do you have children from a previous relationship" or "i plan to move to a different state in a few months".
If you dont respect the other side enough to discuss these things right away, the relationship is destinend to fail.
I can kind of see the logic here. People think they interview the top three candidates and, if so, the interviewees have a high chance of actually getting hired. These would then be appropriate questions in that scenario.
However, if they are interviewing 100 candidates in 4 hours then the appropriate place to find this info for the interviewee is the job posting. The hiring manager doesn't have time to answer 20 questions from 100 candidates and moreover if the information is on the job posting, then they either didn't read it or are basically asking if the interviewer is a liar to their face. Now, if it isn't on the job posting, well that is the person who posted it's fault and they should expect these questions to be asked OVER and OVER.
If it is general questions like 6 or 7 that normally doesn't appear on job posting, the appropriate time to ask those questions (to a busy interviewer) is when a job offer is made to the interviewee.
If the interviewer doesn't have time to answer questions then they shouldn't ask the interviewee if they had any questions.
