As much as businesses use it to screen candidates, a job interview can tell applicants a lot about their potential employer too. It's a two-party game. However, most of us aren't as good at it as professional recruiters — they do it for a living and get to practice a whole lot more. So in order to successfully "compete" with them, we have to do our homework.
A recent Reddit thread, created by user u/BackgroundChapter970, can be a good place to start. It asked everyone on the platform "What is a red flag from an employer that people might not immediately recognize as a red flag?" Now, there are over 2,000 comments, many of which detail the warning signs jobseekers need to pay attention to.
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Selling "work culture".. dude I just want to get paid, work reasonable hours and work with competent respectful colleagues. I don't care about Halloween parties and happy hour.
When you hear "We're like a family here", run and don't look back. The only "family" trait that'll come from that job is the dysfunction, gaslighting, and lack of accountability.
Offering to pay you a lot less than market rate because you will "Learn so much" or "Will be working with a great team". My bank does not take IQ points as a mortgage payment.
Want to find the red flag fast? During your interview, when the employer asks if you have any questions, ask this: Can you tell me about a recent time one of your employees really excelled?
A good employer won't have any trouble celebrating their team. A c**p employer will struggle hard to answer.
...And it's a perfectly reasonable question.
And beware of what their idea of "excelling" may be. "Well, George is our model employee because he's always willing to work way past 5 - and never whines and expects to be paid for it."
When an employee quits or gets fired from the job and the company doesn't hire anyone new to replace them.
It can be hard to tell as a red flag at first, but the temporary workload they added to your own over that was left over after the person left, slowly becomes your new permanent workload, without any changes to your pay or benefits to compensate for the additional tasks. The further out it goes without the position being filled, the larger and more obvious the red flag becomes.
Happened in the company I worked for. Spread over two sites, one president, two vice presidents, one on each site, other layers below that. Two vice presidents were told their jobs were being amalgamated, one person to do the job of two people, they could apply or leave and take a redundancy payment. Both left - no surprise, they both knew the new position would be a nightmare. New person took the job. I've heard, from staff still there, that's she is regularly seen in tears from the stress and overwork. President just passes all the work to her and does eff all.
When you don’t get a review until you ask for a raise. Then, all of a sudden, you work is being questioned and you’re being berated.
Yeah, happened to me and my team. Found out new hires are making a dollar not than me, the team lead, and two dollars more than the rest of the team. So I formally requested a pay raise for my team and myself. Not even a week later my manager is calling up questioning the hours we're working and saying his bosses are on him about it and that we have to stop. Now I've got half the team threatening to walk and still no pay raise.
They tell you they're anti union, or a union-free environment. I don't care how you feel about unions, but the employees should be telling you there's no reason to unionize, not the bosses.
You check out glassdoor and there are a bunch of overwhelmingly positive reviews from "anonymous current employees" that under cons list "no cons that I can think of!"
Even the best place to work in the world has SOME cons.
When a company tells you you're required to be 10-15 minutes early for your shift. In previous jobs that I've quit, any time I remind a supervisor its illegal to require that, they clam up. If they are not paying for that 15 minutes, you are not required to show up then. At least thats the case in Ontario anyway.
I might show up early but that doesn't mean I'm starting working sooner than scheduled.
Walking in and getting hired on the spot without a single question, especially as a young woman. It has happened to me a few times and it’s always when it’s a male interviewer.
And if they hire based on looks. I once went to a group interview and 3 of us showed up (all young women). The guy actually did ask a few questions. One woman had a business degree and she was a little bit overweight. Me and the other woman, who were both thin, didn’t have any higher education or any prior experience. At the end of the interview, he told me and the other thin girl that we were hired, and told the one with the business degree that he wouldn’t need her on the team. I said “no thank you”, walked out and never went back.
When management talks poorly about the other employees, it might make you feel included/special at first but guaranteed they’re going to be talking about you next.
It's a "fast-paced environment" excellent for "self-starters".
Shuraz replied:
Translation: A f**kton of work, with no documentation, no training, no support and surly co-workers, for about 1/3 of what you SHOULD be paid to do 1/3 the work.
Self-starter - no credit for anything done right; all the blame if anything goes wrong.
High turnover rate. Ask them how often the position is left open/filled. Oftentimes, if retention rates are only 1 year... run.
If you're interviewing in person and on-site... look at the cars in the parking lot. Look at the "nice ride" to "sh**box" ratio. If there's a bunch of sh**box, the place offers substandard wages.
Or some people hate the process of buying new car, like their current car, don't care of it being nice ride, because they treat it as a mean of transport or thousand other reasons.
When everyone seems to "wear many hats" and have many unrelated duties.
It just means they're trying to squeeze every drop of effort out of everyone instead of properly hiring for those positions.
If a job has a lot of different roles and one of those roles is "sales", you'll only be doing sales.
If they focus on how you handle conflict resolution during the interview process.
I got asked what I would do about a "hypothetical" hostile workmate who was being awful to others. Got the job, turned out it was NOT hypothetical.
When they say stuff like "we're definitely not a 9-to-5 place, we stay until the work is done," they mean there will be lots of overtime, possibly due to poor planning or overcommitment by leadership.
It could still be a good job, but negotiate for equity, not just a salary.
I had such a job interview many years ago. The interviewer went like "Work begins at 8 A.M. and it ends when we get the job done - usually around 9-10 P.M., and in some cases we stayed overnight." WTF?? They offered me the job and tried to convince me: "You are exactly what we need." No, I'm not. :))
Here’s one I wish I hadn’t ignored.
I was hired as support staff at a preschool meaning I’d be in and out of every room through the day. I was being led around the school by one of the bosses. Certain classrooms she was chatting and joking but others she just said “this is TheBrontosaurus she’s the new aid.” Then move on.
Obviously you’re going to get along better with certain coworkers than others. But I quickly learned that the management played strong favorites with the staff. It had nothing to do with ability but usually mostly physical appearance. Thin/pretty teachers were treated far better.
Thin and pretty get treated better most everywhere, not just jobs, by most people. Sad, but true. It's all about tearing someone down, whether consciously or not, to make themselves feel better.
Everybody is under the age of 35 who works there.
This means the job sucks.
Depends on the industry. Some are so new most of the people qualified are younger. If it's factory, fast food, or anything that has been around 50+ years thier right younger people will put up with a lot more bs and can usually find another job if they need to and it means there are no long term employees so unless it's a newer business they are burning out young people in 5 years for "better then average" pay or have major problems driving off employees.
If they ask if you've turned in your two weeks to your current employer during the interview process. Had two short jobs fresh out of college that did this and realized too late that they were waiting for me to be desperate before hiring me, because the pay was actually much lower than advertised and the hours were much longer.
The phrasing of this one is the red flag, IMO; "Are you currently employed" means they're potentially wondering when you can start, while "Have you turned in your notice at your current employer" means they're wanting someone desperate.
Slowly normalizing working outside of regular hours.
This type of gaslighting. Is the worst. ‘Hustle culture’ glorifies this and shames employees that respect their own boundaries. Thanks gen Z for shining the light
Regular mandatory overtime - in other words you're salary but after 60 hours per week you're not making a whole lot over minimum wage.
When they have nothing for you to actually do when you first start out. Prepare yourself for the worst management of your life that are all ideas with no actual planning involved.
This can vary. in my current job, they started us 2-3 weeks before the work was due to start so we could learn the company, the systems, the processes etc. in fact everything was prepared for our start knowing the work would be along in due course :-)
"This generation is difficult to manage." I applied for a management role at a bakery and they said this sentence and similar complaints about young staff members throughout the interview. It sounded to me like they just didn't respect the needs of their younger staff members. I just asked for an absurd amount of money to give the next guy haggling power and I left.
When low-level employees are asked to step in an fill the roles of high-level employees when they are on vacation/leave. At first this may seem like a great opportunity, where you get to prove you can do the big-kid work and sit at the adult's table, but unless that comes with a temporary raise or a bonus, you're just being asked to do $$$ work for $ money.
My work does this a lot. The lowest tier worker will sometimes learn work of the second lowest tier worker and so on. Higher tier can learn how to lead, leads can learn to supervise, etc. The difference is we DO pay a good 10% higher than the employees current pay to do higher wage work - and sometimes it means the person filling in technically makes more than the person they filled in for because it is a percentage
When during the interview they make you take a personality test.
If they claim to be a good place to work, especially if they have a purported third-party award for it, watch out.
If they claim to be a good place for women to work, specifically, be twice as careful.
It appears that many if not all of those "best place to work" awards are pay-to-play and purchased by the worst places to work.
A new potential employer should be waiting for only you to arrive for your interview- if you are kept waiting in the same room as a bunch of other candidates leave. These people are rude and on a power trip. They get off on making people compete against each other and the workplace will be hostile and cutthroat.
Yep agree with Frando and Bryan. The interviews could be spread out but with some people early or late. Could be multiple positions, especially in Sales. It could be with different departments but everyone is sat at reception.
Things like game machines, foosball, air hockey, beer, and/or hip hang-out spots at the job. They want and will expect you to spend every waking minute there.
My job has this. It just means they're a cool place on your break. A bad experience doesn't make for a red flag.
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When there is no proper or comprehensive documentation or training for your job, or no documentation at all especially if they are a big corporation & employ thousands. A recent job I had used unintelligible & incoherent documentation that had been pieced-together by the manager & various people who'd held the position, making the job extremely difficult if not impossible. Another red flag was that key people in the department had quit or were retiring, which meant there was no one to ask questions or help decipher the incoherent documentation.
When they hold the job interview for an IT tech weenie at McDonalds.
I'm 14 and just got my first job at a rly nice apple orchard place. But so many things on this list are in the hiring process so idk ... my first shift is on Sunday (4 days away) so I'll update then 😄
Good luck with your first job. Hiring processes for entry level jobs are more basic, so you will probably have no problems. If any problems do occur, trust yourself ask for help.
Load More Replies... When there is no proper or comprehensive documentation or training for your job, or no documentation at all especially if they are a big corporation & employ thousands. A recent job I had used unintelligible & incoherent documentation that had been pieced-together by the manager & various people who'd held the position, making the job extremely difficult if not impossible. Another red flag was that key people in the department had quit or were retiring, which meant there was no one to ask questions or help decipher the incoherent documentation.
When they hold the job interview for an IT tech weenie at McDonalds.
I'm 14 and just got my first job at a rly nice apple orchard place. But so many things on this list are in the hiring process so idk ... my first shift is on Sunday (4 days away) so I'll update then 😄
Good luck with your first job. Hiring processes for entry level jobs are more basic, so you will probably have no problems. If any problems do occur, trust yourself ask for help.
Load More Replies...