An extremely helpful recruiter found this position for me. Before landing the interview I was required to take a few tests on basic MS Office software which based on the job description (full stack development and essentially being an assistant to senior developers) is arguably irrelevant. Still, I took the tests and aced 4 of 5 of them even without ever having experience using some of those apps. One test I took twice and bombed twice. I later looked up answers for the test that I bombed, twice, and found that multiple choice answers were not accurate. I was still called in for an interview though.
Before meeting my interviewer, I had a chance to speak to 2 staff and also observed other staff who all were very excited about the weekend with a TGIF mentality. That's pretty common smalltalk, but in observing staff, I got the feeling that nobody truly enjoyed being there; they were there for a job and not a career. Company morale seemed nonexistent albeit this is based on just a few minutes of observing various employees leaving and entering.
The gentleman conducting the interview seemed disengaged, distracted, and bored. Mind you this after I've already had a few very successful interviews for which I received praise for my professional and friendly demeanor. Everyone has a bad day once in a while though so I didn't think much of it . . . until I later recounted part of the interview which we'll get to in a bit. Though I can't exactly fault the interviewer for this, I had an extremely difficult time understanding the interviewer's questions due to his accent. I had to politely ask him to repeat a few of his questions because of this which I don't think helped my case. Still, I remained upbeat, positive, and felt that I had the skillset they required on the job description.
One question asked was whether or not I had experience using the FTP program they use. Though I had never used the particular FTP program they use, I did clarify that I've used and am comfortable with 3 other FTP programs.
A couple days after the interview my recruiter called me back with the bad news (or good news depending on how you look at it). Freedom Health had decided to pass on me. The reasons were:
1) I didn't have experience using FTP programs
2) I didn't have experience using their PROPRIETARY software
I don't think I have to explain further.
