Having been part of the work force for a long time now, I have also interviewed with a number of companies. Sometimes I have completely ignored what were, in hindsight, relatively obvious red flags, while at oher times identifying such red flags has helped me avoid jobs that wouldn’t have been a good fit for me. Here, then, is an overview of some of these:
- No option for negotiation of terms
- If they’re unwilling to negotiate now, why would they negotiate later? No company you would ever want to work with would rescind an offer for negotiating.
- Refusing you time to consider an offer
- I’ve had this happen to me; the offer came through towards the end of the business day on a Friday, the new month beginning on the Monday. I was essentially given hours to consider, and was told that if I hadn’t accepted by midnight (less than ten hours away), they would go ahead with a different candidate. Again, no company you would ever want to work with would rescind an offer for asking for consideration time.
- Quoting you a range, then underbidding that range
- This one is particularly obnoxious, and when it happened to me, I rejected the offer citing that as one of a few reasons. In retrospect, and having heard rumors within the industry of how their employees are being treated, I am VERY happy with my decision.
- “We’re more like a family here”
- There’s absolutely nothing wrong with finding friends at work, but it has been my experience that anyone saying this are likely to make unreasonable demands on their employees’ time, might refuse (or threaten to refuse) reasonable requests for accommodation and so on.
Those are my major four red flags, but I’m sure there are more out there. Have you got any horror stories to tell? Share them in the comment section!
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