career

'After six rounds of interviews for a job, their next request floored me.'

I think it's fair to say that the work climate is pretty grim at the moment.

I've made my way over to #careerTok where people are sharing the most chaotic and bizarre experiences they've had in the workplace, especially when it comes to interviewing.

From being asked to change their clothes to questioning their marital status, we thought we had heard them all. That was until TikToker Florence Fahmy posted about her recent experience interviewing for a fashion brand.

Watch: Horoscopes when there's a problem at work.


Mamamia

In her video which now has over one million views, Florence talked about completing six interviews for this role (yep, SIX).

She was then told that if she passed the final interview, they would progress with an offer.

However, there was a catch.

The TikToker said she received an email from the company at around 6pm on a Thursday night. The email was "very informal" and asked her to submit an assessment in relation to the job. She also clarified that there was no mention of having to complete an assessment in the job description of the previous six (again, SIX) interviews.

@florencefahmy

Stop asking creatives to do work for free and stop ghosting people after extensive interview processes. It makes your company look bad #interview #interviewprocess #jobsearch #interviewquestions #creative #artdirector #socialmediamarketing

♬ original sound - Florence Fahmy

So what was this assessment exactly?

Florence had to submit an "entire social strategy, a launch plan and a four-week content rollout for an active campaign."

She knew it was an active campaign because they had mentioned it throughout all of her (SIX) interviews saying, "This would be your job if you were hired." It was also requested that this assessment be submitted by Monday (reminder Florence only got the email on Thursday evening).

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Florence's reply to the email should honestly go down in history books as being the best form of "polite-clapback."

In the email, she said: "I'm a little conscious knowing this is an active campaign. To put myself at ease, would you be able to answer a few of my questions including: "I'm the last candidate? What is the timeline for a final offer following the assessment? How will this assessment get judged? And if they would be interested in signing a mutual NDA."

After she sent that email, she was
 ghosted. Yep, she never heard back from the company after giving them six interviews worth of her time.

From someone who also works in the creative industry, I've heard countless stories of people being asked to complete assignments only for the company to not hire them, yet actively use the ideas they gave for free during the interview process.

Like myself, the hundreds of comments under Florence's video are in complete agreement with her and are applauding her brilliance for thinking about including an NDA so her ideas don't get used, even though it unfortunately led to a workplace ghosting situation.

One person wrote: "The NDA is GENIUS 👏 Brands can't keep getting away with this, it's becoming difficult to know who to trust!"

"6 interviews?! that's the red flag right there," wrote someone else.

"You dodged a bullet there! Great initiative on the NDA," said another.

If you've had a horrible interviewing experience, I highly recommend you check out some of these stories like Florence's over on TikTok. I promise it'll make you feel a little bit better.

Have a job interviewing story you want to share? Tell us in the comments!

If you want more culture opinions by Emily Vernem, you can follow her on Instagram @emilyvernem.

Feature image: TikTok/florencefahmy.

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