Time for will probably be my last “interview review.” It’s taken me two months to collect myself and share this wonderful experience here (seriously, this was so bad it was beyond shocking)…

The job was for a presentation designer. I’ve seen this job repeatedly appear in the job boards numerous times over the past few years. That alone should have been a red flag (why the high turnover?). But I still applied, and was scheduled to come in for an interview.

Where to begin…first, let’s take a look at the reviews on Glassdoor. I try to take these with a grain of salt, as GD runs a scam similar to the BBB where companies can pay a special “fee” to have their reputations cleaned — I experienced this firsthand when I left a negative review of my former employer and that comment was automatically deleted. But it looks like this company isn’t paying for the premiere package (these are just from page one alone)…

First off they fake reviews everytime a new bad one is written. This is an unprofessional work place which leads to high paranoia in the office place. You will be blamed for making a mistake or losing accounts. Management does not actually know the work that’s being produced or anything about it especially time frames…Turnover here is between 50%-75% a year.

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The owners like to brag about driving $110,000 cars to work while you’re barely struggling to live on your own for the first time.

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If your thinking of joining their “creative team” just know that you will not do anything “creative”

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The company has an extremely high turnover, and there are many reasons for this. Senior management prefers to police rather than manage employees. There is a culture of paranoia at the top that prevents them from trusting employees, which leads to policies that make work-life balance a challenge. Compensation is very low for the location and industry, which is why C-4 Analytics is mostly staffed with recent college graduates now. Their benefits package is well under industry standards, and only valuable for single employees. Recognition and promotions are tied to personal whim rather than actual performance. You can be promoted in three months if you’re liked, regardless of your competence, leading to overinflated egos and delusions of ability (see the Peter Principle), while capable employees with more than a year of experience -and that is old by C-4 standards- can be left ignored and undervalued. Standards have dropped rapidly following a long list of veteran employees leaving the company. When that happens, some of them are subjected to interrogation, harassment, and disparagement. Management will go as far as trying to stop other organizations from hiring you. Despite all of the feedback solicited by and provided to management, changes are slow and shallow. The main issues are never addressed, and eventually people seek other opportunities. As shocking as it may be, management thinks the best strategy to solve this is to write or commission reviews on Glassdoor to pretend that the company is better than it actually is. Expect a five-star review to be posted shortly after this one, and it will be easy to figure out which one is the most honest.

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I also peeked at the interview reviews. Here’s one commenting on his interview for a web designer role (fairly relevant to the one I applied for)…

I responded to a posting on craigslist and was invited in for an interview over the phone. Probably the worst interview I’ve ever been in. I talked with their creative director who was nice enough - though he made some bizarre off-handed comments about my work I presented. Then I talked to a developer, he more or less had no questions for me.

The last person to interview me was the owner, Michael Weiss. Immediately sensed this guy was a bad person. He asked me two questions. The first was whether I knew what stylesheets were, and what salary I was looking for. I gave the industry standard for my position, which he burst out laughing at, literally, and asked if I was kidding. Clearly had no idea what he was talking about when it came to web development. Walked out knowing I didn’t want to work there.

Ouch.

This place is located in Saugus. I had never been to this part of the state before, and I was shocked that a place this dumpy existed in MA. This had to be the ugliest place I’ve seen in all of New England — a bleak and barren wasteland.

I got there on time, exited the elevator to their floor, and was greeted by a foosball table…turning to the left towards the door, a ping-pong table. Hoo-boy.

Sure enough, there was nothing but children running around like crazy in this place – seriously, I did not see one person over the age of 30. The HR girl came out and immediately led me to the same guy the above reviewer mentions. I can concur with that reviewer; he was not a nice man. He greeted me from behind his desk, and coldly asked me if I have a copy of my resume (he didn’t even look at me as he said this). I swear, he was expecting me to not be prepared. And I have to admit, for all the faults and criticisms I’ve laid on these HR dimwits, I can say each time I arrived they were at least prepared with my resume right in front of them.

He scrutinized it for a sec, then asked me if I have an online portfolio — my blood pressure began to spike up here, because (1) my url is right there on my resume, and (2) this is something he should have looked at before I arrived. He asked me how good I am at researching on the internet. You mean, “Googling?” Yeah, I’m pretty good at Googling. He began poking around my website and then asked if it has any PPT samples; I explained I can’t post those publicly as they consist of confidential material but I’ve got printouts right here in my printed portfolio which I began to pull out…and he held up his hand and ordered me to stop right there, saying in a disgusted manner, “don’t bother.” Whoa.

And then his cell phone rang — and, yes, he took the call. !!! Oh, but he said “sorry about that” afterwards, so that just makes it all hunky dory…

His next question aligns with the above reviewer’s comment and is where I should have walked out. “What’s your salary requirements?” Really??? That is so fucking inappropriate to ask me such a question at this stage in an interview (again, this goes along with the above reviewer), your HR girl should be the one asking this question (along with making sure you had my resume). We haven’t even talked about the damned job you’re trying to fill, you didn’t really ask me a single question about my design skills…whatever.

Next he says he wants me to meet with the kid who’s vacating the job. I was led to another office and met with the soon-to-be-ex, and his first question (turned out to be his only question) was “what do you like to do for fun?” Oh, for the love of dog…what fucking business is it of yours what I do for fun????? What does this have to do with the JOB I am here to learn about????? But I played along, making silly pointless chit-chat about “Game of Thrones”…he then wraps it up (and I realize again I wasn’t shown or told anything about the work I’d be doing in this role) and goes out to get the HR girl. I sat there for quite some time, when some kid barged in and seemed somewhat shocked at my presence; I deduced that this must be his office and we were “squatting” while he was at lunch. He gave a “deer/headlights” look and stepped back out.

Good lordie, this place is dysfunctional, I said to myself. The HR girl arrived and led me to the conference room, where I met with yet another twenty-something girl who asked me if I can show her any of my work. “Did you look at my URL/portfolio?” “Duh, noooooo, sorry, I didn’t.” Again, another point where I really should’ve just walked out. But I pulled out my tablet, showed her all my stuff and she proceeded to ask what software packages did I use for every single piece. Each time I gave the same answer, Photoshop, Illustrator and Cinema 4D, and to that she repeatedly responded with “Oh, we don’t use Cinema 4D at all here.” Okay, so you’ve just clarified that your team’s skills are not up to par with mine. Good for you.

That ended and she left to fetch the HR girl. I sat there waiting for about ten minutes, and in a repeat of what happened in the last meeting, some kid barged in hoping to use the room, was shocked to see me there, exhibited the “deer/headlights” look and scampered out.

The HR girl finally appeared, and I finally got the chance to ask, “Can I SEE some of the presentations or slides you do, that you expect this person to create?” “No, sorry, I can’t show you anything.”

Well, that was one big fucking waste of time.

In conclusion, what I observed in this “company” was a mighty fine microcosm of what’s wrong with America: a couple of senior-level egomaniacs ruling over a bunch of inexperienced inept kids. Absolutely pathetic.