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This page collects workplace experiences, questions and discussions submitted by users. Dates shown are submission dates, not periods of employment. Individual reports do not describe the entire company.
Read the community guidelines(Interview experience)
The HR representative was very polite.
I am a recent graduate with no work experience. I applied for the position “Software Engineer (Welcome New Graduates)” and received an invitation for an interview.
When I first arrived at the floor of the company’s building, I couldn’t find the location, so I called the company. Since it was the company’s phone number, I assume it was answered by a female receptionist or administrative staff member.
Me: Hello, I’m Mr. ___, scheduled for an interview at ____.
Receptionist: So?
So?
Fortunately, I happened to notice the floor directory and found the company, so I didn’t raise my question.
Even if the receptionist found it unpleasant that an interviewee had called, there was no need for that kind of attitude, was there?
After that, Manager A interviewed me. If I joined the company, I would have worked under Manager B, but Manager B was away on a business trip and had not yet returned, so Manager A conducted the interview instead.
As soon as Manager A came in, they said, “You look quite different in person from your photo.”
That was a rather unusual opening. I just smiled and replied, “A girl took that photo for me. She studies photography, so she’s a bit better at taking pictures.”
Perhaps the manager was simply expressing an observation and did not mean anything special or malicious by it, so I was not particularly bothered.
I completed a test, and the manager did not look very satisfied. Their attitude noticeably changed and began to feel rather condescending. Later, they asked about my expected salary. I gave a figure, and the manager replied, “With your background, getting 35K here would already be pretty good.”
I replied, “I suppose I could accept that. I don’t care that much about salary for my first job.”
The manager said, “So you have a second job, then? You should just go to the second one.”
I was completely confused. What I meant was, “For my first job after entering the workforce, I won’t care too much about the salary,” since I considered myself to lack educational and work experience or any particular advantage.
However, the manager seemed to interpret it as, “I have two interviews today, I’m not interested in this position, and I don’t care what the salary is because I won’t be coming anyway.”
By this point, I was already very unhappy with the manager’s attitude, and the interview ended shortly afterward.
A few days later, HR called to invite me to a second interview, so I went.
This time, Manager B interviewed me. They said that since Manager A had already interviewed me, they would not ask many more questions and would go directly into discussing what I would encounter in the job. The general reason they chose me was that Manager B said the people who came in were all quite strange: either they knew absolutely nothing or they buried themselves in solving problems without listening to what others said. They only needed a normal person.
I suspect this was related to the job description saying “Welcome New Graduates,” since applicants may have expected the company to have a comprehensive training system.
Sometimes I would need to communicate in English with colleagues overseas. It was fine if my listening and speaking skills were not strong, since I could communicate by typing through messaging software. The manager also mentioned that I would need to go on business trips to Southeast Asia, but the business-trip requirement was not listed on 104. That was really dishonest.
After the discussions were settled, the company’s department director spoke with me about the salary and offered me around 38K. That was acceptable for a new graduate, but taking the business trips into account, it was actually not that appealing.
Everything was normal during my discussions with Manager B and the department director.
The reasons I gave this company a negative review were the receptionist’s response and Manager A’s attitude. They were so dismissive of me, yet they still ended up selecting me—it was really awkward. On top of that, the business trips were not disclosed in advance.