Interview Experience Review
The recruiter – actually, the team lead – reached out to me via LinkedIn. He sent me a message and then suggested a time for a phone call. The call lasted around 25 minutes, and for the most part, the recruiter didn’t ask many questions but rather “sold” the company and the position, occasionally checking in to ask how it sounded to me, whether I was interested, and whether I had any questions.
After the call, he asked me to send over my resume. Just a few hours later, I received an invitation for an in-person interview at the office, and he mentioned that the next step would be an on-site meeting with the team.
The interview lasted 1 hour and 15 minutes with the team lead and another team member. They asked questions like:
Briefly present yourself, your education, and your professional background.
Why do you want to work specifically in recruitment and not, for example, in sales?
Give examples where you initiated something at work and others followed your lead.
What professional challenges have you faced, and what were they?
Can you describe your best communication experience with a candidate?
Have you had any client-facing situations where the client behaved inappropriately, and how did you respond?
Throughout the conversation, they would take parts of what I shared and dig deeper – asking for clarification, why I chose a certain approach, or asking for specific examples.
The next day, I was invited for a “half-day” at the office to meet the team. The session was scheduled for 2.5 hours.
It started with a general meeting where I was asked to present myself to the entire team. This seemed intended not only to assess who I am professionally but also to get a sense of me as a person. They also discussed some of the processes related to their open roles.
Then I had a one-on-one meeting with a team member who asked how I felt about the team meeting, what I understood from it, what I observed, and whether it resembled any of my previous experiences. She also asked more about my background and showed me the software they use.
After that, I had another one-on-one with a different team member. He initiated a mock cold call with a potential candidate. Afterward, he gave feedback on how he believed the conversation should have gone and what I did wrong. He spoke very quickly and had a somewhat pushy tone, as if trying to catch me in a lie. The experience was quite stressful. He wasn’t friendly, and I didn’t get the sense that he genuinely wanted to get to know me – it felt more like he wanted to assert dominance and prove he was better at communication. I’d advise anyone going through this to not be afraid to set boundaries and speak up if you disagree with his approach – and to explain why. It felt like a moment of power play.
Next, I had a calmer one-on-one meeting with a third team member, which felt more like a casual conversation. During this chat, I learned that there are specific KPIs you need to hit in order to receive an end-of-year reward – usually a trip to a tropical destination. If you don’t meet them, you don’t go.
The final meeting was with the boss – the sales manager – who summed everything up. He emphasized that this is fundamentally a sales role and asked me how I felt about the entire experience and whether I had any questions.
Overall impression:
This is very much a sales job. The people were quite pushy and strict, the pace was fast, and I felt pressure from the moment I walked in. Everyone stared into your eyes, trying to catch the smallest sign of uncertainty, while at the same time withholding the full truth – classic sales behavior. At first, I was told there were no cold calls, but later it turned out that cold calling is the core of the job. Initially, they said the KPI was 25 calls per week, then it turned out to be 50. They mentioned high competition with other staffing agencies, high turnover, and that people who don’t meet KPIs are let go. When I asked about overtime, they vaguely said that in the beginning you’ll need to “work hard to build the candidate pipeline,” which strongly implied that overtime is the norm. Everyone talks about “working hard.”
After the 2.5-hour session, I felt exhausted – it was like a continuous interview with no breaks, though it did give me a good picture of the company. In the end, I felt deceived: the job had initially been sold to me like a sweet candy, but as we got closer to the reality, it turned out very different from what had been promised. You realize you can’t fully trust what’s said during the first calls – again, typical for sales environments.
I wouldn’t recommend this kind of high-stress job for anyone concerned about their mental well-being. But for those whose main motivation is money and who are ready to work long and hard – this might be a fit.