How can I weed out low-ballers from the beginning?
Howdy aus Bayern 😃 I guess if you need to feel better about life, my little experiences might give you a chuckle at least, even if you can't offer any insight for me, maybe the solidarity will help you. ❤️
So, the saga goes a bit like this:
Because I just sent a withdrawal letter for yet another position that looks absolutely perfect on paper, I need to know if other people are running into this same (new?) practice?
For context, I've been in my present career for over a decade, and when I was last job searching five years ago, this wasn't a situation I ran into, and now it's been four times in a row, with fairly large companies:
Each time, a company has required my desired pay (let's say I provided a range of 80-90K for this particular job, which is standard, and I am actually one of the few more highly qualified people in this field in all of Germany). They had my pay range, and invited me to interview each time, and each time, they hold the most vital info like pay or hours until far later into interview processes as if it is sacred chants or something. [I though this all had to be disclosed up front? Or is that just Austria?]
I just finished the second interview with fourth company last week:
Them: "Is 20 hours fine?".
Me: Knowing I double checked the job ad, and it is not listed as a part time job, "Oh, no I would need to definitely be full time."
Them: "You do have some other skills, maybe we could maybe scramble more work in other departments to full time. We will need a firm confirmation as to whether you would be willing to relocate for the job, or commit to the 50% in-office presence" [They are aware I live nearly four hours away].
Me: "Well, I would need to know the pay for full time to be able to determine that".
Them: "Oh! We will discuss that during the in-person interview here, where you will do more sub-interviews and a Probetag."
That's when I noped out. You see, I had been burned before, and please do note my progress and give me credit for learning 😛:
Company one: actually had me create an entire marketing plan for them, then said they couldn't afford to pay for my train ticket to the required interview at the company and kept the marketing plan (took me a solid day of work, unpaid of course).
Company two: only one interview! offered me the position the day-of, but then at the end not only offered quite a low salary, they shared I would need to be "cross-trained" in four different departments and be sent to the other campuses as needed (NOT in the contract). Think of an editor being told she needs to also train to produce tires, which is what they were asking.
The third company was through a referral from a previous client who loved my work. That firm couldn't tell me what position they would hire me for until I was in the second interview. It was a lunch during which he said, "Oh, you could do sales instead!" [I do niche technical editing and marketing work].
Him: "You will meet the executive hiring you in fifteen minutes and have the interview". Said exec was FURIOUS that I wasn't prepared to explain to him why I wanted to be a sales person, when I had actually spent a week analysing their marketing issues and prepared an entire presentation for that. The two guys got into a fight then about who decides what positions need filled.
But this fourth company says that somehow they demand 60% in-office presence "but, we have to hot-desk as there aren't really enough work spaces for all the employees". There's no mention of coverage for the interview travel, or relocation cost. They will offer a D-ticket, but are aware that they asked me to move to a very expensive city for 20 hours.
___________________________________________________________________________
TO all of that, how can I avoid this in the future? Demand that they provide salary transparency up front by saying, "I've found companies that aren't transparent about salary tend to be fishing for people more desperate to take a low-ball offer"?.