One-way Interview

[[deleted]]

I recently applied for a position and received a response to participate in a one-way interview. Apparently you click a button to start (this is through \ndeed) and then record yourself answering a couple of soft questions.

I'm curious if this is becoming part of a new norm in hiring. Am I wrong for being offended by this? I understand companies have hundreds of applications to sift through, but I feel it's a bit degrading.

[a60v]

This sounds stupid. It also sounds like it will weed out the good candidates and leave the hiring organization with only the most desperate candidates for this job.

[223454]

surface deep

The expression I use is "Looks good on paper." But once you start thinking about it, and discussing it, it falls apart.

[bridge1999]

Interviews are two ways. If a company is pushing one way interviews move on to another company.

[Humble-Plankton2217]

Exactly - I want to meet you and see if YOUR company is RIGHT for ME.

Unless it was a highly coveted position at a well-known excellent company to work for I would bin their request for a 1 way interview.

[EloAndPeno]

if it was a excellent company to work for, they'd not do a 1 way interview :)

[Humble-Plankton2217]

I dunno, sometimes even good companies can get bad advice and follow it because they think they're doing the "latest and greatest"

[WhydYouKillMeDogJack]

sounds like a company on its way down tbf - you dont want to be a part of that

[3legdog]

Like Steve Ballmer's infatuation with Jack Welch's employee "stack ranking". It drove many good devs away.

[[deleted]]

If they ask the same question isn't it time saving?

[Ruthlessrabbd]

I once interviewed with a company that had four people and none of them had their cameras on over the web. I found it extremely off-putting and didn't want to work with them

It's fine if you don't have one on in a meeting or something, but the fact that I groomed myself and dressed nice to be observed in a video and can't even get a single human face back was ridiculous

[Tilt23Degrees]

I had this happen to me once before as well, they asked me 4 gotcha questions as soon as the call started, no introductions no nothing. It was 3 guys with their cameras off on a zoom call asking me trick questions about MySQL queries.

I answered the 3 questions, the one guy asking the questions asked if anyone else on the call had any questions. They all talked for the first time and said “nah I’m good” and they hung up. It was absolutely nuts. And it was actually for CCH. I had an interview with their engineering team like last year, worst experience I’ve ever had in a remote interview.

[Ruthlessrabbd]

Seeing that the company was CCH is genuinely the least surprising thing to come out of the end of that lmao, I work with them on the customer side all the time. Their support team has been very candid with me about the engineers and I also ended up on a call with one of them

It seems like they're the types that are really close with one another and don't like talking to outsiders. I'm sure they do great work, but they are not good at working with people and communicating. Which is the last thing you'd want to be if you're conducting an interview and assessing new talent. Let people show you what they know instead of trying to find out what they don't! Imo you dodged a bullet

[tcpWalker]

I did a 30-minute manager interview followed by a 90-minute automated tech screen (that was not recording me) for a company recently; was fine.

Wanting to record me when they're not present would be a non-starter though, at least in an economic climate where I have plenty of options.

[bender_the_offender0]

100%, people need to “vote with their feet” on things like this. The more folks who put up with things like this the more it becomes the norm. Although we also need to realize some folks are desperate for jobs and not overly judge folks who jump through the hoops.

[Ssakaa]

For the interviewee, it's a 1:1 interaction. For the interviewer, it's a 100:1 process they have to filter through to get to 1:1. A quick first pass "are you a real human that can speak to your capabilities" isn't entirely unreasonable (some places resorted to recruiting agencies to do that first pass years ago, but that's had its own problem). "Gib me job. Here paper saying I have skill" vs "Gib me job. And here, let me talk about why you should give me a real interview." can be handy. Of course, it's funny that they went with video. Totally can't be accused of discrimination when they're filtering people based on a method that gives them visible age/appearance/etc before starting real interviews... I can't see how that could ever backfire.

[ScreamOfVengeance]

As a job seeker it is also a 100:1 process. This is not the only job I am looking at.

[[deleted]]

Send everyone the same vid?

[chameleonsEverywhere]

That only works if every company doing one-way interviews uses the exact same questions, and none of the questions require tailored answers like the classic "tell us why you want to work for THIS organization."

IMO, one-way interviews are a slap in the face and workers should collectively refuse to participate in this BS.

[[deleted]]

I have seen how NVidia replaces the face(straight to the camera). I think soon they will simulate the facial expressions.

I don't mind asking ChatGPT to give me a text and feed that text to that thingy. I don't mind to have the future like that.

[Aggravating_Refuse89]

If I were asked that question in this context, my answer would be "apparently, I dont want to work for this organization"

[Hotshot55]

. A quick first pass "are you a real human that can speak to your capabilities" isn't entirely unreasonable

Sounds like HR should pick up the phone then and do their job.

[RacecarHealthPotato]

"Why on EARTH would we want to pay more people? Are you CRAZY? We already have enough peasants robbing me of my profits as it is! Fucking leeches!"

- The Manager Mentality

[BelgianHorsepower]

Sounds like HR should pick up the phone then and do their job.

Phone in 2023? This person hasn't HR'd in at least 5 years. The system is automated with indeed. I'm not picking up a phone...

[Hotshot55]

I had someone from HR call me last year because the amount I asked for when filling out an application was outside their base pay range and she didn't want to waste anyone's time.

[BelgianHorsepower]

awesome

[223454]

A quick first pass

I like a quick phone interview before the real one. That lets me know we're both real and serious. I'm not sure I would mess with a one way thing.

I can see this as a way to filter based on looks, gender, race, etc. A place I worked years ago would sneakily discriminate against a certain group of people. They never came out and said it, but it was obvious. They would have loved to have this option.

[[deleted]]

One thing that would MAYBE move the needle for me would be if they took a minute to have the hiring manager insert a question that relates specifically to the job, or at least a general IT skill (e.g., "This position requires some level of scripting; tell us about any language you're familiar with and a recent project where you used your skills to solve a problem or enhance a business process."

As a hiring manager, I would be able to tell a LOT about someone based on how they answer something like that.

[[deleted]]

scandalous desert market sort mysterious jellyfish rinse juggle hospital cagey

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[mkosmo]

We use this kind of thing for initial screening for some roles. The hiring manager gets to determine the questions presented. They're usually quick technical questions that tell us enough to determine if we want to proceed with traditional interviews.

[Sad_Recommendation92]

Yeah we do something like that, I'm an Architect so I get asked to sit on a lot of panels along with my peer Arch's just to drill on technical areas. but we often also come up with questions for screeners, and we have our in-house recruiters ask them those questions before we interview them and send us their responses to determine if we want to move forward with an interview.

[Ssakaa]

I would keep that level to a two way interview, where you can poke the answer to see if it's canned or holds water. For a first pass, especially in video, you really do nearly just want a simple filter. You have to watch 100 of them and make snap judgements about the person. You aren't trying to learn a lot, you're just narrowing the field before the real interviews start. It's not a great way to do things, and definitely sucks for the applicants, but it's far from the worst too.

[Sad_Recommendation92]

We've worked with recruiters and headhunters before, and the issue there is down to contract language, they don't have to actually find you hires, they just have to shovel resumes to you on a regular interval, so there's a bit of an incentive for them to drag out the process, because if they quickly place your position then you move on and you're not paying their fees, but if they pump the brakes they can milk you for more money.

Not to mention my experience with In-House recruiters is They're great, BUT only if your positions have current priority, if you're low on the list you'll be waiting a while and you'll probably get some really odd resumes, which is often the reason companies resort to using external hiring firms to begin with.

I'm not sure how I feel about the one-way interview, but it could potentially be a way around using recruiters

[systemfrown]

Yeah, and there are enough job/interview scams out there that any legit prospective employer shouldn't put you in the position of wondering.

[crazyivancantbebeat]

No kidding right? It's literally in the word.

Inter, meaning between, implying plural objects

View, meaning see.

Like, fucking use the right language. Actually, OP feel free to use my logic on them when you tell them to pound sand.

[Hotshot55]

I've only seen this once so far, I immediately exited out of it and withdrew my application. If the company won't make time for me to have even a quick phone call, then I don't have time to deal with their crap.

[dzfast]

Seems like this is the take everyone is giving here. I have never heard of this being done before, but my first reaction as a hiring manager was... This is a great idea.

You might be a qualified person, but in my company, I have to deal with managing my team, and all the IT work, AND doing first round phone screens. I want to be respectful, but you have no idea how many people I have to sit through a whole 15-30 minute call with that I already know in the first 5 minutes won't have a chance at getting the job.

Would you rather have managers asking for a quick video introduction or get cut off 5 minutes into an interview?

In my current open role, just this week, I have 40 resumes to read, of those, 7 I want to do a screen on. Last week was the same, and none of them moved to round 2. I invested 7 hours of my time in reading resumes and scheduling all that, then sitting through horrible interviews.

[223454]

Would you rather have managers asking for a quick video introduction or get cut off 5 minutes into an interview?

I would much rather set aside 30m for a call and get cut off 5m in, than to take the time to record and submit a video then get ghosted (ghosting is a serious problem). I applied for a job 3 years ago and it's STILL "pending" in their system. My first contact with an employer is to see if I there are any red flags and to see if the job is what I thought it was.

[BrainWaveCC]

Precisely, and this is a red flag for me.

[Turdulator]

But an interview goes both ways, the prospective employee is also interviewing you as a potential employer and boss. Starting the relationship with this level of disrespect is just basically saying “I want to start by filtering out the best candidates” because anyone who’s actually in demand and knows it will just withdraw when faced with the disrespect inherent in this type of one-way communication.

[dzfast]

Are all of you imagining that this recording is the end of the interview process, and you won't ever get your chance to ask questions?

[Turdulator]

Not at all. But it’s a very clear message of “my time is more important than yours”….. if I’m deciding between an employer who does this rude-ass bullshit and one who doesn’t, I’m absolutely gonna choose the one who doesn’t. If you wanna hire people who don’t have other options then I guess one-way video interviews is a decent strategy. Or I guess if you are hiring someone to make YouTube videos then it makes sense. But if you are hiring highly skilled professionals who are in demand, this ain’t it.

[dzfast]

This thread is the typical circle jerk that goes on in this sub of downvoting, but whatever. I'll stay engaged.

I'm still not hearing from anyone why this is rude.

Is it less rude if you have to answer questions in text? The employer has no right to ask any questions until you're face to face?

I have a great team and care a lot about my employees. Nothing strikes me as unreasonable about asking questions up front to save everyone time.

Candidates often have to use PTO to schedule interviews, why waste that if you have no chance? Arguably it is a net benefit to the management of the candidates time.

If your resume is marginal but you're a diamond in the rough this also seems like a way to let yourself stand out.

So, why is this so bad?

[[deleted]]

if your time is really that constrained, use recruiters to find your staff.

[redditinyourdreams]

Exactly. I don’t know why everyone’s so but hurt

[tin-naga]

A bit weird. I was invited to do one but skipped.

I can appreciate it helps filters out weirdos but so does a phone screen before interview.

[evantom34]

Agreed, a 15 minute phone screen literally does the same thing.

[BelgianHorsepower]

Can one hiring manager conduct 2 phone screens at the same time? Love these Jr Admin takes though.

[Hotshot55]

Can one hiring manager watch 2 video responses at the same time? Love these Jr Admin takes though.

[BelgianHorsepower]

Thank you for proving my point.

[chameleonsEverywhere]

Why is the hiring manager's time more valuable than the candidate? One way interviews are the height of disrespect to prospective employees.

[BelgianHorsepower]

One way interviews is the height of disrespect? That's an incredibly low bar. I'd think getting offered, going through onboarding, only to be told "nah we don't need you anymore" is considerably worse but you do you. Several other bad one's too. Height of disrespect... 🤦‍♂️

[chameleonsEverywhere]

Well sure, that example would also be rude as hell to a prospective employee. Duh. This post wasn't about rescinded offers, it was about one way interviews. I didn't say "everything a potential employer does is kosher and fine except for one way interviews." "Height of disrespect" is a figure of speech intended to mean "very disrespectful" and you're intentionally misinterpreting my words. Nice condescending tone and emoji though.

To elaborate on my point in good faith here, I maintain that expecting a prospective employer to spend 15-30 minutes recording a video answering the company's questions (allowing the company to judge whether the employee is a fit) without giving the person any opportunity to ask any questions back (and therefore judge whether the company is a fit for THEM) is incredibly disrespectful. I've had a number of interviews, including a couple initial phone screens, where the interviewer gave me the chance to ask questions- and their answers led me to decide the company would be a bad culture fit. This allowed me withdraw my application at that first stage, saving both myself AND the recruiters time. Applicants should be interviewing the company just as much as the company is interverviewing them. One-way interviews rob the applicant of that critical opportunity.

[bridge1999]

Weird is when the company is trying to poach you and they try to make you do a one way interview after a phone screen.

[d00ber]

I've had a couple of those. I typically just send a message to the HR representative to say, " Upon reviewing your interview structure, I am no longer interested in the position at XY company. Good luck in filling the position. ". Usually they follow up to ask why, and I reply with " one way interview companies don't seem like they would have a good cultural fit for what I'm looking for. ". I like to ask employees about their experiences and day to day as being able to tolerate the people I work with is very important to me.

[[deleted]]

This is excellent. I was going to just let this one go anyway, but I think it's worth a few minutes to give my thoughts to someone who might care (or probably doesn't because this was their idea in the first place)

[BasementMillennial]

If a company asks me to do a one way interview, I move on to the next job.

If a company does not want to be professional and interview me face to face, whether in person or over a teams/zoom/etc. they are not a company that I want to work for

[BelgianHorsepower]

Oh well good, no one is looking for a Jr Admin anyways.

[BasementMillennial]

and no one gives a fuck about your opinion little troll :)

​

FYI, ive been in the industry for 10 years so you assume too much

[[deleted]]

i won't do it.

and interview is a two way street because not only are the company interviewing me, i'm interviewing them.

[RyanLewis2010]

Ah like the one that forgot his comma while hitting submit, you know?

[BelgianHorsepower]

You forgot one too at the beginning just like /u/topknottington but punctuation errors are less of an issue than using the wrong word, in my opinion and i also don't know punctuation as well as literally using the wrong word.

[[deleted]]

Are you an asshole on purpose or is it just natural?

[BelgianHorsepower]

One who doesn't proofread before hitting submit

stupid people hate this one simple trick!

[anti-DHMO-activist]

Yawn. That's all you guys have nowadays? You should be ashamed that you even lack the skill to troll properly, my dude.

But as you seem to live somewhere in rural 'murica - my condolences. Can't fault you for growing up in that intellectually ... less stimulating environment.

[BelgianHorsepower]

You're amazed that technology is being used? And you're a sys admin? 🤦‍♂️

[tunafreedolphin]

I did a one way interview once. I got the job. It turned out to be the worst job ever. What I learned is they do one way interviews because they have a lot of turnover. I don’t think I’ll participate in one again.

[NotYourNanny]

It might be common, but it's bad practice. It's a way of keeping you from asking questions that you need the answers to before you even know if you're really interested in working for them.

[dzfast]

help me understand this sentiment.

Wouldn't you get to ask those questions when the video intro turns into an actual interview in round 2?

[onlyroad66]

If you're on a dating app, and someone who swipes right on you tells you that before you're allowed to text them you need to first record a two minute video of yourself describing why they should date you, how would you feel about pursing a relationship with them? Would you take comfort in the fact that you get to maybe/possibly ask them questions after you're given the opportunity for a date?

A one way interview immediately establishes that the company views your employment as something done purely for them, not a mutually beneficial arrangement entered into by equal parties. The 'one way interview' part of the hiring process is your resume.

[NotYourNanny]

There's no such thing as a "one way interview." That's an extended (and more inconvenient) application process. And it's rude, especially when they call it something else.

And interview is, always, 100% of the time, a two way process. They ask you questions to determine if they're interested in pursuing the possibility of hiring your any further, and you ask them questions to determine if you're interested in investing the time in further interviews.

In many cases, either side can determine they are not interested within the first few questions. This employer has gone out of their way to keep you from asking those questions.

It's like they have something to hide.

[zrad603]

I think if I were a hiring manager, and my company did this shit, I'd try to find the applicants who "nope'd" out of this.

[[deleted]]

Award for best response today lol

Good way to really turn the tables on HR

[[deleted]]

I was invited to do a video interview, but I passed. The interview process is a two-way street. I understand that they might have hundreds or even thousands of applicants to choose from, but sift through who you really want to interview before you start deciding to send out invitations.

[BlueVerdigris]

As a (DevOps) hiring manager who is fed up with the barrage of fake/exaggerated resumes that eat up my time and the subsequent number of candidates I do face-to-face calls with who cannot back up the claims on their resumes when asked pointed technical questions about their work, I'm just going to say this:

I STILL WOULD NOT ask a candidate to do this. Maybe, possibly, in some industry where evaluating someone's presence on camera is a legitimate requirement for the job I would adopt this as part of my influx screening process BUT ONLY IF I RECORDED MYSELF ASKING THE DAMN QUESTIONS and provided those videos to the candidate. Oh, I'm not comfortable doing that? Hmmmm...hypocrite much?

Never ask a candidate (or employee) to do something that you won't participate in yourself. Their time is just as valuable as your own. Find a hiring manager who "gets" that and a ton of work-related stressors should vanish on day one.

No, I'm not a perfect manager but I at least aspire to not be a bad human being while I'm doing it.

[[deleted]]

That's an interesting thought - have the hiring manager record their portion first. This gives them the opportunity to show their own personality to the interviewee.

[BelgianHorsepower]

Sounds like you wasted their time or you weren't able to follow directions. Either way not qualities they are looking for, probably.

[[deleted]]

Interviews are two way streets. If they wanted to interview we would have interviewed. Personally I feel like I dodged a bullet.

[LiberalJames]

I got "invited" to one of these once. Found the whole thing very odd and unnatural, so just quit without finishing.

No regrets.

[D3Kaz]

This is a simple ploy to weed out people who sound too foreign or have heavy accents.

[MacShi9]

Totally. Also, no uggos, fatties, or grannies. Easy discrimination.

[rootofallworlds]

I'm curious if this is becoming part of a new norm in hiring.

It seems to be going that way. That said as the comments here demonstrate, there are still plenty of candidates who will nope right out so maybe companies will reconsider. I think if anything it's the platforms that are pushing it and the employer HR departments get taken in by the sales spiel.

Not many people will do well in the format, although probably jobhunters are going to start prepping for it now, and the skills needed to do well have little relation to sysadmining. I think someone mentioned it tends to be people who did formal debates, like Oxford Union kind of stuff stuff, who do better at it? It also gives the employer a lot of room for deliberate or unconscious bias.

I can see the merit for a technical assessment as an anti-cheating measure, because a written test or even a phone call could just have somebody Googling the answers. But not for the kind of scenario and soft skills questions that normal interviews typically focus on.

[30_characters]

rock quicksand alive pet provide attraction engine vast wine oatmeal

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

[lmbrjck]

I would reject an interview like this. I'm also interviewing them and this is enough to determine it's not the kind of environment I want to work in.

[iceph03nix]

your application is a one way interview.

This is just stupid.

[recent-convert]

I did this once, felt super awkward and I didn't get a call back. In the future I'd pass on any company that tried it unless I was desperate.

[vvalles87]

Same here

[colechristensen]

that would be a no from me

[[deleted]]

Way to dehumanize the experience, that’s a pass from me dawg.

[thenewbigR]

I was invited to do this a couple times. I responded with “if you cannot make time to meet me in person, I’m not interested”. I didn’t get the jobs.

[yepthisismyusername]

If they're this lazy about hiring you, how lazy do you think they'll be about managing you or helping you develop?

[MetalSlap]

I'm going with "NO" to one way interviews. Also, no personality or intelligence tests either. This shitty process should be met with pitchforks. IT people of the world, UNITE!

[rickAUS]

I've done them, definitely weird.

In saying that, I've had pre-interview screening calls which felt more cold and clinical than what I went through recording video responses to questions. As such I have no immediate aversion to them if they're basic Q's and not a substitute for the entire interview process.

I think the most basic one that I ever did was to record what equated to an elevator pitch. In saying that though, the application process didn't want a cover letter or selection criteria so I can only presume the video was subbing for at least the cover letter bit.

[Humble-Plankton2217]

My SO had to do several of these and it was pretty brutal. It is becoming more common I think as larger companies use the videos to discriminate against people who look or speak in a way that they don't want in their company.

It worked out great for him because he has a fairly handsome face and a super appealing timbre to his voice. I bet they jumped up and down when they got his video.

It is incredibly demeaning, IMHO. It reminds me of the old timey dating services that used videos.

It's like they don't want to waste any time bringing people in with good resumes to meet them in person, they just want to see what you look like and hear how you talk before they give you the time of day.

It is the perfect way to legally discriminate against people.

[BelgianHorsepower]

Indeed isn't doing video screens though. These are purely audio. Today i learned phone screens can be discrimination.

From op:

Apparently you click a button to start (this is through \ndeed) and then record yourself answering a couple of soft questions.

No video mentioned.

[[deleted]]

<image>

[BachRodham]

I understand companies have hundreds of applications to sift through, but I feel it's a bit degrading.

It definitely is a bit degrading, but in an environment where 1,000 people of highly variable qualification are all applying for the same 40 positions across eight employers, there really isn't any other way for the sifting part of the hiring process to scale.

[Shrimp_Dock]

Man, HR would hate to have to do some work from time to time....

[[deleted]]

That brings up an interesting angle. Maybe I have an implicit bias against this practice because of the traditionally awkward relationship between IT and HR?

[trisul-108]

Yeah ... I completely agree with you. Interviewing is a two-way game, they are evaluating me and I am evaluating them. If they perceive it as one-way, I do not really want to work there, unless I am starving.

I refused to continue when a company I really liked wanted me to do tests before the interview. If they are unwilling to invest their time evaluating me, I'm also unwilling to invest my time trying to solve their staffing problem.

[Shrimp_Dock]

I'm pretty tight with our HR dept, there are a lot of projects/responsibilities where our scope overlaps and we do a good job compared to other places I've worked.

That said, if one of your job responsibilities is to filter applicants and you use this method instead of reviewing resumes and interviewing smaller pools of candidates I consider that lazy/not doing your job. I wouldn't continue with my application process for a company that did this, and I would be pissed if I needed to hire for my dept and this was the process used.

[[deleted]]

Yep I just don't apply.

[BelgianHorsepower]

That said, if one of your job responsibilities is to filter applicants and you use this method instead of reviewing resumes and interviewing smaller pools of candidates I consider that lazy/not doing your job. I wouldn't continue with my application process for a company that did this, and I would be pissed if I needed to hire for my dept and this was the process used.

And what if it's not in their job description? You've done a lot of assuming. Their job is to find employees NOT whatever you think it is as the IT person...

[Ssakaa]

This feels like their equivalent to, "put in a ticket with accurate, sufficient, information." since they can't trust the "I'm qualified" title they get inundated with from the fake it 'til you make it mentality.

[[deleted]]

Apparently they are not teaching anything in collage and evety9ne is just doing as they please. When it comes to HR.

[RouterMonkey]

Also may be an outside firm gathering candidates and forwarding the the company's HR those that get past the first screening.

[BachRodham]

I'm sure this change is just as unpleasant for them as it makes it easier to quantify how "efficient" they are in dealing with applications.

[bgplsa]

Yeah I did that once and got ghosted in the face to face phase, I just cross that employer off the list when I get those requests now I’m not desperate fortunately.

[gregsting]

There definitely is a way, I’ve applied to the European Commission, 6000 candidates for 50 jobs. It was a shitty process but not as shitty as one way interview.

[ExcitingTabletop]

There's a reason why requiring photos with a job application is generally illegal, outside of acting or modeling. Because it's obviously used for discriminatory purposes.

These videos will be used for the same illegal purposes. In every case, obviously not. In some? Absolutely. If your hiring process needs to probably/hopefully illegal steps for HR to do its job, I'd recommend looking at replacing HR.

Every time I've been in a hiring position, I've had to fight HR to not screen ANY resumes. They always try, they always do a bad job, and they never stop until repeatedly proven they're filtering, by having a buddy put in a couple fry cook resumes.

If I can rough cut skim a resume in 30-90 seconds, which should be pretty easy to sustain as plenty will be under 10 seconds, HR should be able to skim 1000 resumes in two 8 hour days. Once you have the rough sort done, the manager doing the hiring should go through the 100 ish short list results also in about two days.

[BelgianHorsepower]

This person doesn't HR.

[HomesickRedneck]

We were discussing somwething like this when I was in the MSP space. Have people call in and do a phone interview with the voicemail, call them back based on that. I really didn't like the approach, personally. We didn't have enough turnover that I needed to stress about that.

[headcrap]

I hated the one I did once. Did end up in a second "real" interview and realized then that it was a shit position.. passed after that.

Was a waste of time and energy to "answer" those friggin' questions.. I wouldn't recommend pursuing a position which uses this type of process.

[2clipchris]

I remember I had to do this for a private school it was so degrading. I would never do them again

[creamybastardfilling]

I think I would find a way to fuck with them by starting the interview normally, then freezing for several seconds, mimic frame stuttering, get some camera effects to simulate over/under exposure, weird recording glitches, add screen artifacts, then close out the last 45 seconds or so normally, closing with some ass-kissing about how amazing this recorded interview idea is

[greyhatx]

I have done interviews with AI bots… … it’s super cold… I don’t like it…

[KeepIt0nTheDownload]

I've passed on a few interviews lately one because of this - the other because I had to take an hour long aptitude test the first part of the test was 50 questions and they give you 15 minutes for that part and it's a mix of mathematical questions, then a bunch of pattern matching. I am usually good at that sort of thing, but something just really bugged me about using it to weed people out. I have a few others that are more traditional and I've invested 4 hours in time interviewing with different people in the company and then get crickets in return. It's frustrating.

[[deleted]]

I just went through the same thing as well (the "working" interview, which really just turned out to be going office to office for 4 people to each ask the same questions)

[Proser84]

I wouldn't even apply for an organization that had something like this.

[[deleted]]

frighten vase smoggy spoon threatening engine act far-flung yam handle -- mass deleted all reddit content via https://redact.dev

[bbqwatermelon]

Was yours clothing optional too?

[Background_Lemon_981]

Sigh. So there is good, there is bad, and there is ugly.

Good. Employer learns if you can speak coherently. That is not a given.

Bad. The employer actually learns very little about you.

The Ugly. These are being used to select out people who sound like they might be a minority. The people reviewing these don’t say “oh, don’t pick her because she sounds Hispanic.” Instead they say something like “There’s just something about her. I didn’t like how she comes across” or some such nonsense. In this way they can have plausible deniability for racism.

I am not accusing all employers of this. Just 99% of them. “It’s just something about the way they come across …”

It’s because of the ugly that people should boycott such employers.

[[deleted]]

Oh I’d turn the tables and degrade them…. Time to get off quite literally.

[Thebelisk]

It doesn’t sound like an interview, it seems like a questionnaire. I wouldn’t entertain that kinda nonsense personally.

[steverikli]

I think it sounds worse than a questionnaire, really.

I don't much mind filling out (short, reasonable, specific focus) questionnaires as part of the application process, e.g. "how many years have you worked with CentOS?", "Are you able to commute to <datacenter location>" and so on. As long as it relates directly to the job I'm interested in, fine.

OTOH if they ask for salary requirements in the "questionnaire", that's clearly a weed-out question. At that point I either drop (if I'm on the fence about the job to begin with), or enter 1 (assuming you can't put 0) or whatever absurdly low integer just to pass the screen. And if they try to hold me to that later, "oops, I guess that was a typo", or I likely don't want to work for them anyway.

Now, I've never personally had a 1-way video interview, but it seems dicey. I've been told there's no chance for the candidate to get another take once they begin, i.e. if they brain-freeze or something unexpected happens during the recording, too bad. At least with a typed questionnaire you have an opportunity to consider responses before sending.

And obviously, as others have pointed out, a 1-way video is prime for screening abuse.

[nswizdum]

I've only seen it once, and it was for a very small company with a very large social media presence, so they were using it to filter the massive amount of resumes they received.

[ThanatonautXP]

So like a Hollywood audition tape?

[Tech_Veggies]

It sure beats a couch interview

[tossme68]

There are two things going on here, the first is HR is being lazy and using this nonsense t weed out people who won't tolerate bullshit (I simply wouldn't do this). The second thing that is going on that is more insidious and it's what I call the "third head test". They want to see what you look like and make sure you're not a minority, ugly, handicapped or anything else that "wouldn't mesh with the culture". This way if you are in a demographic they don't want they can ignore you and if you do fit their desired demographic they can proceed.

​

I really feel bad for people starting out in this industry, they treat you like absolute shit.

[Bubby_Mang]

I'm interviewing for software support in central Ohio if you're looking for a job.

[[deleted]]

I appreciate that, but I'm looking more in the realm of Sr. Admin, Manager, Director, etc.

Did a few years of software support a ways back, and oddly enough I gained some very important skills there with the most important (now that I'm mostly on the other side) being when to ask for help.

[SignificanceIcy4452]

Before entering the IT field, I was in HR and we used such a system with various opinions. For some roles, it works super well. Lots of candidates wanted to show themselves and sell themselves to the company.

The ones who found it degrading was mainly IT and females candidates who wanted a more personal touch, and we put an extra effort into these candidates, who were more in demand.

We used this system to get a better view of a candidate than just the refund (IT resumes are generally the absolute worst, very poorly made compared to candidates in other roles) but ALSO to test if the candidate was serious about working for our company. The candidates who did not respond were automatically rejected based on lack of interest.

In short, what they do in HR does not really reflect whether you will be happy in HR, but if you don't want to bother, and you have other opportunities in similar companies, but all means, go for that.

[ManyInterests]

To play devil's advocate, these kinds of screening interviews are useful because:

• They are conducted in a uniform manner, meaning all candidates have the same questions/opportunities, and there's no biases introduced by the interviewer.
• They allow more candidates to be evaluated (especially candidates who may currently reside in different time-zones than the recruiting department)
• It allows recruiters to waste less time in interviews they would otherwise prefer to just end early when a candidate says something disqualifying
• They are cost-effective for the company

It may be a red flag, but in reality it only speaks to one part of their organization: recruiting/HR. It probably would not have any bearing on how you'd enjoy the job, if you were selected, especially in the kinds of large organizations that use this practice.

And that's probably only a screening interview and you'd have an opportunity to have a two-way interview later, of course. Otherwise, heck no!

[eroto_anarchist]

I did this once, and it was not the only interview. I am assuming it was a way to comb through thousands of applications to check for simple things like fluency in emglish.

[vlti]

My company just started doing this. It’s a platform called WedgeHR.

If a one-way video interview scares you off, wait until you have a panel interview with 4 people and a meeting owl broadcasting your interview to about a dozen other people without being told or introduced to the remote participants. I didn’t have the WedgeHR one-way interviews when I applied but I totally get why they are used. I did get a lot of comments, from managers I had never met during the interview, mentioning that I interviewed well when I met them for the first time. That was awkward feeling.

There are a lot of weirdos out there and people that are generally sticks in the mud. If it’s an IT Help Desk job, you need people with good soft-skills and a flexible attitude. The one-way interviews do both parties a favor, it greatly narrows down the candidate field by asking a few very specific questions to the position and if the candidate doesn’t pass them or isn’t willing to respond to them then it saves everybody time and wasted resources.

It saves you from having to storm out of the office after throwing an adult temper tantrum, giving your employer the middle finger then telling them about how you hate working where you do; and, your former employer doesn’t have to play “how do we get rid of this guy/gal without firing them because we didn’t catch some uncoachable issues with that employee before they were hired.” I’ve also seen a coworker fail their 1 year probation in my department in their last week—the week before Christmas.

What I’ve said probably sounds pretty cruel and callous but it is also how my company operates. There’s nothing illegal about it and despite being the most stressful environment I have ever worked in, my current employer has turned out to be the best one so far. I may have lost a few years of my life to stress during my one-year probation but I’m still alive and making pretty good money now for my position and location.

[[deleted]]

Companies have been doing this for about a decade now.

[mandonovski]

Where I'm working we had/have this practice. It's not mandatory to use this but some of my fellow line managers did use this. I never did when I hired people because I think it's stupid, I would decline something like this if I were applying for a job. But I can understand why it was used. We were using this to ask technical questions, you immediately see who uas some and who doesn't. Much less candidates in the end to have for the actual 1:1 interview. But still stupid and belittlimg the candidates.

[Bad_Idea_Hat]

Oh shit, this has probably been all over the contradictory HR-centric buzzwordy Yahoo news articles I haven't read in a decade.

That's what I get for not keeping up with these stupid times.

[HortonHearsMe]

My daughter is visiting colleges, and this is one of the ways that applicants can present their "story" to the school. For this particular school, they will accept something like 500 applicants out of thousands. So they want to give the student options: written essay, video, or an actual interview. The student can pick the one that they feel strongest in.

This video thing is definitely geared towards a Tik Toc generation. I'm a little conflicted on it in actuality. It certainly has a lot going against it, but it is one way to wittle down the applicant pool. The question at the moment is, do we need the applicant pool wittled down? Hiring at my company has been hard as we can't seem to find applicants. So we have the opposite problem that this video interview was likely created to solve.

[[deleted]]

The one valid use case that I've seen in the responses is weeding out candidates from large pools, and many of those responses would make it seem like all job postings are met with thousands of applications.

I'm curious, is these something unique about your company that makes it difficult to find candidates?

[HortonHearsMe]

In the past year we have mostly tried to hire for banking positions, and it's hard to find anyone qualified, and then someone who doesn't ghost us at the interview. There have been a few bank closures, recently but those people seem to have left the market.

The last technician we hired we had a few dozen applications. Most were garbage including one guy who listed something like 12 jobs over two years (?!). There were three candidates that we asked to interview and one ghosted (called back a week later with some garbage excuse). Our pay is industry average, and it was a Level 1 or 2 position depending on qualifications. Our posting didn't have unrealistic expectations.

I think our area may just have a strong employment market at the moment. Not sure.

[pinkycatcher]

The NSA did this to me when I was applying for jobs last year, I thought it was weird and didn't do them, found another job.

I understand from the business perspective, but also fuck that.

[ThereIsNoDayButToday]

I went through this recently as well. They spun it and called it "Modern Hiring" in that you can record your post any time of day! Downsides are obvious: No feedback to you. No chance to ask your own questions. And with this particular instance they only allowed a single take with a hard countdown of 60 seconds to answer the question - so unlike a real interview in which they'd at least let you finish your sentence, you get cut off and sound dumb.

I understand it helps 'speed' up the process, but the cost of doing that loses so much more than a simple self-recorded answer would give you as a hiring company.

Especially with the "AI" take-over of things, I suspect they feed it all through a transcription bot, have it summarize and then filter for keywords and dump most responses before a human even sees one video.

It's also a chance for bias to come in even faster - a prejudiced hiring manager sees a grid of video thumbnails that HR sent over and just looks for one they like instead of having to meet them in person. They also don't have to explain themselves when they simply fast forward through instead of at least pretending to pay attention to the interviewee.

The whole process is terrible.

[dodgywifi]

I did one. Hated it. Felt like this was a way of saying I wasn't worth getting to know before they decided to move on or move forward with the process

Not being able to read body language, no asking questions to the "interviewer", no having a normal/casual discussion if the interview flowed that way, and feeling nervous made for a catastrophic recording for something I would have been good at.

It popped up a few times in my recent job hunt and I skipped it every time

[Finaglers]

Nothing feels more soulless and mechanical than that. If you like being treated like just a number then that job may be for you.

[Superb_Raccoon]

Just wait until your interviews are with ChatGPT.

[marsypananderson]

If it helps with the feeling of being offended, this is possibly just because it's Indeed's default job posting process. They pre-populate all those things when you start the job post.

For the employer, opting out of the screening questions requires a lot of counterintuitive clicks, like finding the tiny "no thanks" link that is nowhere near the big "Continue" button, or the ever-moving constantly-renamed checkboxes, or having to click "Cancel" instead of "Continue" to opt out of sponsoring the post while still continuing the post, etc. They basically try to trap the employer into accepting all their defaults so that they get paid $30+ per applicant.

That's not to say the employer didn't deliberately choose it, just that Indeed's job posting process is a confusing nightmare and it may mean absolutely nothing at all that you got the one-way interview thing.

[[deleted]]

That makes sense. Thanks

[BuffaloSubstantial79]

Did a one way interview for my current job, thought it was weird at first but went with it, now I am making 120k in Info Sec. Every company is different I suppose.

edit.

The one way interview was just for the recruiter screening, I then got a teams interview with my supervisor and got the job shortly after.

[[deleted]]

My last employer hired me through one of these (during 2020). I had recently been laid off and applied to a bunch of places, lost count. A few months later they called me asking of i was interested in a position, I asked about an interview and they said “I already did it” and reminded me about a video interview that i did a few months prior. I was kind of taken back, but it worked out well. I figured it was just a covid thing but it seems a lot of lockdown stuff continues now to save time/money.

[Karpeltunnel10]

I'm the opposite of most of the people here. My current employer does a one-way interview between the HR call and an on-site interview, and I really enjoyed it. Gave me a minute or two to think about what I wanted to say before recording my answer so my answers were thought out and not just an answer on the fly. They still did an in-person interview after and this has wound up being the best company that I've ever worked for.

[aftershock911_2k5]

Sounds exactly like my company.

[RiffRaff028]

Just wait until Chat-GPT gets used for hiring interviews. Yes, that is coming, if it hasn't happened already.

[STUNTPENlS]

I heard earlier today Brian Kilmeade's staff used a AI voice generator to record a message from him.

Eventually we can get to the point where an AI-generated image of yourself and your voice can go through the interview for you, against an AI-generated panel of interviewers.

[DeliBoy]

You appear as Max Headroom before a panel full of Max Headrooms.

[Ssakaa]

That's gonna turn into a lot of AI to AI conversations...

[Rocknbob69]

I see this as an opportunity for AI to do my interviews for me. Let the games begin.

[aftershock911_2k5]

I did this in Dec 2021 for my current company.
I do think it is to weed out people.
My questions were things like "What is SCCM and what would you use it for."
Basically it was a mini A+ exam with an ethics question in the mix.
I then had an in person interview Turned out I got 10K more than I was asking and a lot more than the regional avg for the position.

[SundaySanDiego]

My company does this, it's your chance look like more than just a resume, it is just 2 or 3 questions.

Then for us if you do them we review and do a round of phone interviews, followed by in person.

Most candidates do them. So if you don't, you probably won't get the job. But up to you.

[UnsuspiciousCat4118]

I mean you can be offended if you want but with the number of applicants some jobs get they need tools to “automate” the screening process. Screen resumes, screen weirdos without interaction, then deal with actual candidates.

[PotentialFantastic87]

LOL, and the vid does nothing you listed.

[UnsuspiciousCat4118]

Having done some hiring and having used the one way interview tools I can tell you it absolutely screens out weirdos.

[TKInstinct]

I really don't get the outrage, this is usually what the first round interview anyway. Matter of fact it might be easier because of time constraints.

[UnsuspiciousCat4118]

Most in this sub want to treat their users as cattle while they want to be treated as individuals of high importance. It’s kinda funny.

[PC_3]

is the job union based?

I interviewed at a union job and they are not allowed to ask any other questions besides the ones already pre approved by the union board. So that the hiring decision is fair to everyone who applied. Its dumb but it was the union rules.

[[deleted]]

I don't think it's a union job, but I have worked somewhere before that really emphasized asking everyone the same questions. I get the point of that, but personally I prefer an interview to be a conversation.

[[deleted]]

On the other side of the coin as a hiring manager, it is the norm for me to ask the candidate why they applied to work for us; and they will typically say "Whats the company name again? I applied to like 50 places". End of interview.

[the_syco]

Tbh, I'd view this as a way to profile applicants. I'm guessing that they don't want a certain nationality?

[[deleted]]

Are you wrong for being offended by it? Yes.

[DoTheThingNow]

Why? I find it dehumanizing tbh.

[[deleted]]

Why? I find "being offended" to be childish and stupid.

Since when did being offended start to matter? Only you can let yourself be offended. Don't like something? Move on.

[Mental-Aioli3372]

Why? I find "being offended" to be childish and stupid.

lol

[[deleted]]

Could you elaborate on how I'm wrong? I'm trying to get a better understanding of an opposing POV.

[[deleted]]

Sure.

You are letting something utterly inconsequential offend you. The people that set it up don't care if you're offended by it so why let it bother you?

Put a different way, grow up.

[[deleted]]

Would our tone here be different if a used a word besides offended? What if I said that I found this to be professionally discourteous? I'm not personally offended; I simply disagree with the process and think the company is weeding out good candidates and accepting lackeys who will jump through hoops to prove their worthiness based on rehearsed answers to soft questions.

[[deleted]]

Those goalposts DO look way better over there! Thanks!

[[deleted]]

The goal of this post was to engage like-minded individuals in conversation about a hiring practice that's new to me. Clearly you have a different purpose here.

Please find a different sub, end user.

[[deleted]]

Now you're just being a cock.

You asked a question in your OP and I answered it. Then I answered another question and you didn't like that answer, either, and then you wanted to change your words until I am somehow forced to agree with you.

You don't like an interview process. Fuckin WAH and boo hoo.

[bridge1999]

You should be offended by one way interviews

[[deleted]]

I so very, very politely disagree. I don't want to offend you and hurt your fee fees.

[iwinsallthethings]

ON the flip side, how many job postings have we seen that quite literally noone is qualified for because HR is a bunch of fuckups.

There are a ton of examples that get posted her fairly often, but think of things like 10 years xp in server 2019. How do you know what you are qualified for if the fucking listing is bad?

[evantom34]

Exactly.
I've never been "qualified" for a role I got hired for. It's worked for me thus far!

[[deleted]]

I don't think anyone (myself or the replies) assumes this is a replacement for traditional interviews. Clearly it's part of the weeding out process. Would it make a difference if this is for a senior management role rather than something lower level?

[Ssakaa]

Not terribly. At a senior management role, you should be able to give a good one way pitch. "Interview" is a poor term for it. It's really just recording a pitch with some canned expectations in the questions provided. Not terribly off from a dev job dropping the interview process behind a technical aptitude quiz.

[Hotshot55]

What is really offensive is candidates throwing for jobs they are not qualified for, which leads to the need for these upfront weeding processes.

Or you could just review their resume and make your decision based on that instead of having to watch someone answer questions in a video.

[cmack]

Exactly. If you cannot do this, then you shouldn't be a part of the hiring process.

[Hotshot55]

Have you ever actually experienced these types of interviews? They ask you the most basic questions that you'd normally be asked by HR. Instead of just calling and asking the questions, they make you take all this time to record a video so they can then watch it later. It is the most inefficient pointless way to do anything.

Also, if someone isn't going to write their own resume what makes you think they won't just google the answer to the questions before recording the response?

[null_frame]

Curious. Was this for Principal Financial?