How To Recognize A "Hell-Hole" Workplace Before You Take The Job (r/AskReddit)

when looking for a job what is a dead giveaway that the place and job is a hellhole to work for anywhere that advertises what you could earn instead of what you will learn they're going to use you up and spit you out this plus entry fee slash investment equals pyramid scheme watch out life insurance sales for recent college grads is a huge offender here this happened to me fresh out of college I go to a job fair on campus and the only people to call me back were a big-name insurance company but I'm staring at my impending debt payments and think all right maybe insurance is the way to go plus they call me so that must mean I'm going to get this job and make Bank I go in for my first interview and the guy shows me a pay stub detailing how much he made last year six figures Wow and almost promises that in a few years I could be - however before they bring me on I'll need to shell out $200 for this license $75 for something else and it's gonna take a few weeks to a month to get certified so probably about $100 in gas money plus I wasn't guaranteed a paycheck it's sales so commission based only and I would be working as an agent for this guy so a chunk of whatever I managed to sell would go straight to his bank account I nope the hell out and got an internship that turned into a cellar a desk job it's not six figures but at least I paid off all of my student debt I had an interview at an out back in college once about halfway through the interview the interviewer who owned and operated that location right by a busy highway and mall says now you realize that once you have this job I own you you can't take multiple days off to see family you can't take any holidays off and you can't go out of town that sounded like slavery to me so I got up and walked out two of my friends now work there and that guy was dead ducking serious about owning his employees duck Burt anytime you are interacting with a group of people at a potential employer and the boss is talking check out everyone else in the room if they are looking down and trying to act like they aren't there that's a huge red flag the boss is either extremely dominating and won't accept any opinion from anyone that contradicts his own or he habitually ducks up and they are perpetually embarrassed for him a third scenario is that the boss is overly hyping something extremely mundane I've seen managers try to hype up their employees when the job everyone is doing isn't even worthy of hype everyone kind of rolls their eyes because they've heard the same story every day for the past however many years and they know it's all [ __ ] whenever I go on a job interview and it's time for me to ask a question I always sneak in a friendly way of asking what's the best thing about working here and what's the worst thing usually people are really honest with you especially if their boss isn't also in the interview piggybacking on this I have found that if the answer is I really enjoy working with the people here that is a hint that it should at least be a manageable situation even if the actual job sucks yeah the culture makes a big difference in an organization you can have a ton of fun if you have some like-minded people on your team even if the job you are doing is lackluster it's why I always ask how the corporate culture is when on an interview so I can see what things I really like I would shovel man yer if I could do it with a bunch of people I liked a friendly work environment makes all the difference when the interviewer complains about their current staff it's a concern to me if someone is going to wear their dirty laundry when you first meet them they are almost certainly a drama queen manager first job interview out of college I was interviewing at a call center the HR guy at one point said yeah I'm really trying to find something better and get out of this place when you start walking in to get an application and a guy comes running out and tearing off his uniform saying duck this place truth story on my first day of a job I got into the elevator on my way up to my desk and a woman in the elevator turned to me and we had this exchange oh is this your first day me yes it is I'm named nice to meet you Oh get out while you still can any kind of telesales business a lot claimed they don't have a high turnover of staff turns out it's a fancy way of saying we like lying to people I've worked in telesales we like lying to people may as well be the full Job Description you can be your own boss okay pyramid scheme I recently went to pyramid scheme a makeup / lifestyle company called are born my friend had told me she just got a new job as networking manager or some [ __ ] - ISM she asked me if I would come support her new endeavor as a friend I said of course I asked her for some more details of what her job consists and she said something along the lines of well aren't you sick of knowing all these people in different industries don't you want to get paid for connecting different people all the while doing whatever you want to do well sure does sound good at this point this should have been my first red flag why wouldn't my friend tell me specifically what the heck the jobbies so I go to her party to celebrate her new job a lady there makes us listen to this ciphered PowerPoint presentation about our borns awesome ingredients and how you can get a white Mercedes if you hit your sales mark all you need to do is pay for your membership usually around five hundred for products then find five people to buy a membership underneath you and you could be making fifty thousand a month just by sitting around your house who wouldn't want that also I thought I was gone or at least munch on some party food there but after the two Irish presentation we only got are born health bars and health chips what I came to understand ds1 duck my friend just got roped into a pyramid scheme my friend is trying to sign me up 3 in order to make money you have to pretty much ruin all your friendships by harrassing your friends to support their job if they tell you to start calling all your friends and then Friends of your friends to sell knives go away vector marketing I went into one of their meetings because I was a naive teenager who could potentially be making sixteen per hour just by selling knives they told me to leave when I asked too many questions at the interview and paid training and or you have to buy uniforms from them upfront I've had both happen and I just nope the duck out of there with a smile on my face in addition there are stores in the mall that require that you buy an entire new wardrobe consisting only of their clothing this repeats every season as new clothes come out in one of my own experiences when the hiring person or orientation person spends a lot of time trying to sell you on the job that's a red flag to me I once went for an interview where I was asked two questions and the rest of the job consisted of the HR guy telling me how bad and poorly paid the job was it's really cold and wet the work is very repetitive and intensive are you okay with that yeah but the pay isn't great and you have to stay late most nights well okay best to check the facial expression slash body language of the people you pass you can easily tell if a person is defeated / hate their job also ask your interviewer if they enjoy their job if they're hesitated their answer then that's an indication that it isn't the greatest place I just left an interview and that's why I have asked this question I asked what the company was like to work for and the two interviewers looked at each other and said the shifts are all right I'm not even joking my heart sank because I really wanted that job I applied for a job as a massage therapist during the interview the person doing the interview answered the phone four or five times a different business name every time when I got home I called the licensed agency and asked about them turns out they were appalled disguised front for prostitution they had alleged massage business which they were using to hide the fact that they also had Hoffer dozen not so legit massage businesses I was advised not to accept the position as they were once again under investigation a month later I saw my interviewer on the news in handcuffs be careful with anything that advertises as an entry-level marketing position I interviewed for this position last year which took place at a Starbucks where I paid for my own drink it turned out to be door-to-door gas payment planned sales they expected you tell so do sales presentations in people's house ah no all of these comments offer good suggestions for relatively normal workplaces if you have the misfortune of interviewing at a place that has a good reputation puts up a good front but is rotten map the core and toxic it can be very difficult to ascertain the crazy still if you pay attention there are a few clues one highly regimented interview process and schedule where you only talk to selected persons this is where having some idea of the organization chart can help if you only talk and interact with a few people in a department or company of several dozen they where - they do more talking about themselves than asking you questions they don't care to find out about you but want to convince you how wonderful they are and how you'd be lucky to join them therein lies the way of madness 3 your questions aren't answered not really for example if you ask about hours flexibility for appointments lunch etc and you are told that as a seller in person you want tract but oh by the way you need to tell your superior and three others when you arrive where you are when you leave run away micromanager ahoy source worked in a crazy toxic place I recently asked a potential employer where can someone who works hard at this job be in five years I meant as their upward mobility his answer hopefully somewhere else in terms of looking for a job never pay for a search firm to conduct a job search for you I once went into a headhunter who assured me that for the reasonable price of five thousand dollars he could find a job within a week turns out the company was one that preyed on desperate jobseekers especially new immigrants don't ever pay a penny to anyone offering to help find your job recruiters get paid by the hiring companies and they get paid damn well sometimes up to twenty-five percent of annual salary just for placement this is more of a comment for executive level positions positions high enough they are going to fly you out and put you up at corporate to interview the company is typically trying to appear as nice as possible during these meetings good companies are flexible with the flights have a car scheduled to pick you up the hotel room billed to them a relaxed schedule you're there all day after all a nice lunch break on them and generally realize you're probably burning a vacation day or two just to interview with them so they should be good to you that companies insist you fly at odd hours on some low-cost carrier leave you to a taxi make you pick up the room and expense it only to get a check six weeks later and then even though you are there all day try to cram everyone into a four-hour window over a working lunch because their team is busy if you voice any complaint about any of this you must not really want the job I've had a couple interviews like this and politely told the recruiter who in each case had called to offer me a position that if the company treated people like that when they were trying to put their best foot forward then I was not interested in finding out how they treated people day to day arbitrary confining rules I once interviewed for an editing job with ups where I would literally be sitting at a desk for 40 hours editing manuals in a room that had no windows or carpet and was basically also a storm shelter this job required a strict uniform my brother currently works as a package handler for UPS and can wear whatever he wants why did the editing job require a uniform what customers would I be interacting with if you're applying for leads by far the worst company I've ever worked for I had eight different district managers in a span of two years each one coming in and promising to make changes but never lasted long enough to make a difference let's treated the employees like [ __ ] because they are one of those companies that would rather fire you and hire a desperate 18 year old who they can pay nothing and squeeze everything out of until they are finally fed up with it and then repeat the cycle we promote from within as their motto ducking lying ducks you ask for a raise fired TLDR don't ever apply at Leeds oral its affiliate former Leeds employee here as well and agree wholeheartedly I was hired as an assistant manager the store manager left for a better job maybe six months after I started I was left running the store for six months with no raise no promotion during that time they changed the layout of my store so that our top sellers the 59 / 50s nice expensive hats that hood kids don't take the stickers off off move from back behind the counter to directly next to the ducting door you have an expensive product that thud kids wear and put it next to the door since my stall was so small the company refused to give me security tags I was written up twice for my shrink stolen items being too high then when they hired a new store manager they fired me a couple days later for being one minute late

Channel: Best Posts & Comments

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Keywords: r/ask reddit, r/ askreddit, best posts and comments, askreddit job interview

Id: VY19LUSJDBA

Length: 14min 43sec (883 seconds)

Published: Wed Oct 23 2019