On job searching and hope.

December 29, 2013 8:48 PM

Looking for experiences of job seekers who were offered a job long after the final interview. What is the LONGEST amount of time you have waited for a verbal and written offer? Some background: i quit my job somewhat unexpectedly to relocate after some crummy Life Things happened. I have been job searching for almost 7 months. I work in academic research (coordination and managerial roles, I am not a trained phd researcher). Back in the late fall I had a promising phone interview. The in person portion did not go quite as well, but I still had a good feeling. They told me that hiring occurs at a glacial pace and I probably wouldn't hear from them for a vague amount of time. I want this job and I want to convinced myself that maybe I am still in the running, but I still feel like I would have heard at least something by now. I was also told I would be reimbursed for part of my travel since it was out f state. It had been two months and nothing. I know they have not hired for the position yet and I was told it would be slow, but... Your experiences with long hiring processes? Or time between final interviews and offers or rejections?
posted by anad487 to Work & Money (11 answers total)

Once in college I applied for a summer job as a camp cook for a USGS expedition in western New Mexico. I thought the interview went well, but never heard back.

I got another job for the summer, and a month or so in, about 4 months since the interview, the USGS called to offer me the job.

I'm assuming the glacial pace had to do with the speed of the federal government. Or their first three candidates all backed out.
posted by colin_l at 8:51 PM on December 29, 2013

I certainly hope you haven't stopped applying elsewhere.
posted by ptm at 8:58 PM on December 29, 2013 [3 favorites]

I just was promoted ? Transferred? Something like that at work-application was in May, no interview until July, wasn't hired til august. And this was an internal opening-made me absolutely nuts.
posted by purenitrous at 9:11 PM on December 29, 2013

A former co-worker received a job offer about 7 months after her interview- like others, it was a government position.

But ya, you'll want to keep looking.
posted by scrute at 9:22 PM on December 29, 2013

When I didn't hear about a job for a long period of time, it turned out they had readvertised the position to get a larger candidate pool. They hadn't told me because they still weren't ruling out offering it to me if they didn't get a better candidate the second time round. I assume you are still browsing the relevant job boards, so you'd probably know if this were happening to you, but I'm mentioning it just in case.
posted by lollusc at 10:09 PM on December 29, 2013

I passed an interview with flying colors in May or June of last year; said they would contact me in a week. Didn't hear from them so I called them and they said "Oh yeah, yeah, of course. We'll contact you soon!" Never heard from them again. Called me in October saying they had a hiring freeze (nobody bothered to tell me!) and since it lifted they would like to hire me. Thankfully I moved on and got a better paying job between those months. Seemed like a good group of people, but I was a bit turned off by their lack of communication.
posted by daninnj at 11:31 PM on December 29, 2013 [1 favorite]

It has been my experience that if you are the one they want to hire, that you will know this within a week or so. I have had private sector jobs, so YMMV, but the premise is, you will be offered the job, in a timely manner. When my Dad was applying to Federal Government jobs, a notoriously S-L-O-W process, once they interviewed him, it was days before the offer was tendered.

Months and months is incredibly unusual after the interview, not hearing ANYTHING is not. Unfortunately. Anyone taking a long time to offer someone the job is taking the chance that the selected candidate will have secured employment elsewhere.

If you were promised reimbursement for expenses, find out what that process is and file for them. There's no reason you should be out any promised reimbursement. Check in with someone regarding your money and ask, "So, has an offer been extened to anyone yet?" They may tell you that it has been, even if you don't get an official communication.

Continue to look for and apply for jobs. When you are unemployed, your full-time job is finding a job. Until you have an offer letter in your hands, act as though you have nothing on the horizon.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 6:50 AM on December 30, 2013

Although it is veryveryvery hard, the best thing you can do is to assume you didn't get the job, move on, and keep applying to other jobs.
posted by radioamy at 7:12 AM on December 30, 2013 [1 favorite]

For the last job I had, there was an interview in November, a second interview 2 months later in January, a verbal confirmation that I was the chosen candidate in March, and the actual offer in June. And this was for a private company, not even the government. Sometimes these things just do take a long long time.

That said, do keep looking and itnerviewing elsewhere because it is no sort of given that this will work out.
And bug them about the reimbursement for sure.
posted by rmless at 7:15 AM on December 30, 2013

Best answer: Timelines vary, but I always ask for a notification deadline at the end of each interview. The longest I've ever had to wait after that deadline was two weeks. I assumed I hadn't got it, sent them a brief note stating as such and thanking them for their time, and got back a BCC'd mass rejection email within the hour.

One of my earliest jobs also featured a three-week wait, and I got a phone call in the middle of that time period, telling me it was.a choice between me and someone more experienced and he was still deciding. When I finally handed in my notice for that job, he advertised it in a national newspaper at the same pay rate he was giving me, and after 24 hours called up the editor to berate them because he hadn't had any applications. That should tell you something.

Other than that, the longest wait post-deadline that I've ever had has been 14 hours. People who want to hire me tend to move fast, in my experience.

Telling you that it would take some unspecified "long time" but not stipulating how long? Assclowns. I'd mentally reject them, if I were you. Move on.
posted by tel3path at 10:45 AM on December 30, 2013

I once hired a candidate 9 months after I'd initially contacted her on Linkedin. A LOT of stuff was happening behind the scenes that had nothing to do with the candidate, who was terrific.

Anyway, get the reimbursement immediately. They should pay you back for the interview travel regardless of their hiring outcome.

Also, there's no reason not to check in with them about the hiring decision, since they told you it would be slow. (Ordinarily I'd say a two month silence is an obvious rejection, but maybe they were telling the truth about their pace.)
posted by fingersandtoes at 5:17 PM on December 30, 2013