Had an initial screen, followed by multiple panel interviews, each with two people. The panel interviews used scripted questions, where one person lead with the question and the other person asked follow-ups. I found the interviewers friendly and the questions thoughtful which was great, but reading the script the way they did really affected the flow of the interview and the ability to have a natural conversation. While this may be good for their process, it didn’t make it possible for me to answer the question “do I want to work with these people” as it didn’t give them an opportunity to present themselves as people. One interviewer while reading their script quickly answered “that’s great” to every response I provided which didn’t make me feel they were really listening.
I asked most of the interviewers what they enjoyed about working here, and only one of the many people I spoke with seemed truly excited about what they do and could explain how their work is connected to customer value. Most of the others shared that they value the people and the teams they work on which is important, but they did this in a way where the answer seemed a bit automatic. It’s obviously not necessary to be excited about your work, but I was surprised this wasn’t more of it given that they are still a small group of people and are still building.
Another thing that came up was multiple interviewers stated they were searching for candidates with specific cultural or personal attributes, but when I asked some what they were referring to, they were not able to articulate, only that they should probably be written down at some point. One interviewer even went so far as to say that if ServiceNow (parent company) was to get involved in the hiring process, they would be concerned about their ability to base hiring decisions on these attributes. I felt a bit uncomfortable hearing this and it was a strange experience as a candidate to learn that candidates are potentially being filtered on what sounded like personal bias. Not that they are the same thing, but ServiceNow seems to have a really great Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion portal, so I assume they have interview training and other guidance in place to create an unbiased process. I hope at some point ServiceNow is able to take a look at what is going on with this hiring process to see if it aligns with their values.
From these interviews I did not receive an offer and I was a bit relieved as it would have been a difficult decision of what to do. The problems they are solving are interesting and the solution they provide solves a meaningful customer problem, but I got a real sense of a “club” mentality here where they are trying to maintain a group of like-minded individuals. I expect the challenges they face moving forward will be less technical and more cultural, and wish them the best of luck in figuring that out.