LONG but worth the read.
First let me say I have well over a decade’s experience in sales and have been on both sides of many interviews as a candidate and in leadership.
First of all, so many red flags. They played good cop/bad cop with me at the Ed2Go branch in Temecula.
They wanted to role play with me, which IME is pretty hacky and I’ve only been asked to role play in interviews with Mickey Mouse companies in the past. What I take issue with is that you have zero training on the product or shadowing, and every sales approach is different. I’ve worked in medical, automotive, insurance, and finance. ALL have different approaches. I get that the exercise is about thinking on your feet, but get this:
First I ID myself from ed2go, and BC (bad cop) says “never heard of them”, so I said oh perhaps you completed the form with Cengage, “never heard of them either.” So at this point I’m like “ok..” and he says “well I DID fill out a form with [unrelated third party website I’d have no way of knowing]”, and it just continued like that the whole time.
Not only that but when I first opened the call he said he was busy, and then he wouldn’t let me close. I asked for objections and feedback (“do you have any concerns holding you back?” etc.), he wouldn’t give it. He just shut me down with “I’ll think about it” without giving me even a basic objection to overcome.
Even the Mickey Mouse companies keep role playing fairly light and generally will allow you to close if you navigate the call with even basic proficiency. It’s really supposed to just be to gauge your tone, not to rattle your cage.
Finally, he started asking me questions I’d have no way of knowing such as, “do the fees include the exam?”. Gee BC, I don’t know because I have zero product knowledge as this is our first interview and I wasn’t given any materials or anything, it’s a totally blind role play. And he even stopped me mid-sentence to correct me on something I had no way of knowing.
Good cop said I did a great job keeping energy up and keeping the call moving etc. etc., so who knows.
One of the questions I asked was geared to take their temperature on management style, to which I was informed (by BC) that they don’t want to have to “babysit” their people. I did two rounds of face to face interviews with them and BOTH times he made this abundantly clear to me. It just felt so disrespectful to their staff, and forgive me for believing managerial support is a key factor for a successful sales team.
Also when the interview was over, I asked if they had any concerns about me, and BC stated that they allotted 30 minutes for the interview (which in the calendar invite they sent me was a full hour), and that we’d been talking for 59 minutes and need to wrap it up. He stated that if they didn’t like me, we wouldn’t be talking, but I let the interview run long with too many questions.
I did end up making it to the final round and receiving an offer but ultimately turned it down. I don’t think I could work for BC. I’ve spent half my career in leadership, and I base my management style off of how I thrive: positivity, enthusiasm, support, and encouragement. Everything about my two interviews screamed “run away”, but I was dazzled with the company’s excellent reputation, good benefits, solid base pay, well-adapted COVID-19 approach, working from home, and decent first year OTE.
I will say that the internal recruiters in the MA office were very professional and pleasant, as well as the good cop the ed2go manager with seniority in the Temecula office. Unfortunately BC just really rubbed me the wrong way. I have had a handful interviews in the past where they tried to play Mr. (or Mrs.) Tough Guy/Gal. I get that it’s supposed to test your stress response but I just wholeheartedly disagree with this approach.
Also as some other posters pointed out, the process took forever. In this case due to a personnel change, however it was 3.5 weeks between interviews and I was ghosted even after sending emails to the appropriate parties asking for an update twice.
