Virtual Job Interviews ‘Bait-and-Switch’

HR website SHRM.org reports of an unnamed company that recently interviewed an applicant to fill a key position as a senior engineer specializing in the open-source software.

The candidate sailed through three rounds of interviews “with flying colors.” What happened next might have drained the color from the faces of hiring managers and HR professionals everywhere.

They offered him the position. He accepted, went through on-boarding, showed up at his first real virtual meeting—and it wasn’t the same guy. He literally wasn’t the person they’d interviewed. 

He didn’t look the same, didn’t talk the same, and most important of all, he didn’t have the job skills they needed. Unfortunately, SHRM says this isn’t an isolated incident. 

As the number of virtual interviews has escalated thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, anecdotal evidence suggests the number of bait-and-switch situations like the one described above is also escalating. In fact, the writer of the article shared stories of not one but two bait-and-switch scenarios. s