Job Candidate Invoices Company After Being Turned Down Following 7 Rounds Of Interviews And 2 Assessments
We should all be wary of doing free work — just like this person was.
fizkes | Shutterstock These days, with the job market in absolute shambles and the recruiting process nothing short of chaotic, a lot of job hunters are coming away with horror stories of facing multiple rounds of interviews and doing free work on a trial basis. That’s exactly what happened to one candidate who shared their experience on Reddit to try to help others in the same position.
A job candidate decided to invoice a company after they put them through seven rounds of interviews and two assessments.
“I’m in the trenches of the hiring process,” the Redditor revealed in their post. “This was my second time going through seven interviews and not getting the job. The first time around, they had a valid reason and we said our goodbyes. Left on great terms, they referred me to some other places.”
Things weren’t quite as amicable after his latest interviews with a company. “This particular time though, I had seven interviews and two assessments, which is way too much ‘free work’ to ask,” they explained. “One assessment I get given that the roles I’m applying for are quite senior and pay $160-200,000 plus.”
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Everything seemed to be going well with this company. The job seeker said, “I went through the whole process, met the team and when I got to the end, the CEO chatted about checking my references and making an offer. Then out of the blue they turned me down because I’m self-employed currently (I had to be [because] I couldn’t get a job).”
They were confused about why this had made a difference when they had been open about it from the very beginning. “I was very honest about being self-employed and that I run my own agency since the first question in the first interview,” they insisted.
The candidate later shared why his self-employed status impacted his job search.
“Someone from their board had an issue with another self-employed candidate they hired in the past,” they explained.
The candidate further revealed that the company initially ghosted them, and they had to reach back out to get an answer. “I chatted to the CEO,” they explained. “He took responsibility for it. I told him in this situation I’m gonna bill him for my time — he agreed. I sent them [an] invoice and they paid it [the] same day.”
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In another comment, the candidate clarified what happened even further to give details to anyone who found themselves in a similar situation and wanted to do what they did. “[I] pointed out that [the CEO] knew I was self-employed since the first interview, so the [remainder] of the process shouldn’t have even happened. He took responsibility,” they shared.
“That when I said, ‘Look, I usually don’t do this, but in this scenario, I am going to bill you for my time,’” they recalled. “We agreed that the interview shouldn’t be billed for but the time I spent on the assessments, which were extensive, should be.”
Experts agreed that doing free tests or assessments for a company is not the way to go.
Nick Corcodilos, who runs the website Ask the Headhunter, received a question from a reader regarding whether or not paid trial assignments were ever okay when interviewing with a company. His response? “While testing your skills and knowledge shouldn’t be a problem, no employer should assign any substantive work tasks to get job candidates in whom the company has not yet invested any of its own time!”
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In this situation, of course, the company did invest plenty of its own time in this job candidate and probably would have made them an offer if it weren’t for that stubborn board member. Nevertheless, what they did was absolutely a waste of the candidate’s time, and they deserved to be paid for the work they did.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
