My resume was shared with Adesso in the last week of November, and after a noticeable delay, the interview was scheduled for 17 December 2025. The role in question was a Shift Lead position, which typically requires strong experience in production support, operational ownership, stakeholder management, and leadership. However, the interview was conducted by a senior associate backend Java developer whose background appeared misaligned with the role being evaluated.
The interviewer had substantially fewer years of professional experience than me and came from a purely engineering role, without exposure to shift leadership, people management, or operations. He was not a lead, manager, or specialist, and did not hold ITIL or Scrum certifications, despite asking several questions related to those frameworks. In contrast, I am formally certified and have hands-on experience applying these practices in real operational environments.
Many of the questions felt theoretical and disconnected from real-world support scenarios. It was apparent that the interviewer was reading questions directly from a screen, with little ability to probe deeper, challenge responses, or relate them to practical situations. Questions on incident management, SLAs, escalations, and operations were asked by someone who did not work in operations and had no visible experience managing production environments.
The interview lacked structure and depth and felt more like a checkbox exercise than a genuine evaluation for a senior leadership role. The overall interaction gave the impression that the actual hiring manager may have delegated the interview at the last moment to an associate developer. Even the casual approach to presentation and conduct reinforced the sense that the interview was not taken seriously.
At multiple points, it felt as though an associate was interviewing someone who would effectively be expected to act as his own lead. This raised serious concerns about role clarity, reporting structures, and the maturity of leadership processes within the organization.
Overall, the experience reflected poorly on the professionalism and rigor of Adesso’s hiring process for senior positions. In hindsight, I am relieved that the process did not move forward, as it helped me avoid an environment where leadership roles appear to be assessed in a casual and poorly aligned manner.