[cbloom]

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Just to clarify, I excused myself from the interview before I met with the first functional rep. I told the HR twit that I wasn't interested in a lateral move at this time, and that the message the company was giving me was different from what the recruiter had told me. I said I would contact the recruiter to clarify things. I then left, called the recruiter, and headed home.

So I didn't walk out in a huff, didn't burn any bridges (HR types have little influence in my field), but neither did I waste my time schmoozing with them.

I'm fortunate that my field has far more open jobs than qualified candidates. I'm also fortunate that my area boasts the largest concentration of firms in my field in the US. I've gotten to know lots of colleagues over the years and I like to think I have a solid network.

I didn't realize this practice was so common. That doesn't mean I couldn't smell a rat at this place, though.

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Sounds like you handled it fine, but yeah this is so so standard. It doesn't make it okay, but I wouldn't really hold it against the company too much. You just have to roll your eyes and go on with it.

It's pretty standard practice for HR people doing hiring for a spot to just set up interviews with like 10 candidates. If they find one that they like they usually don't cancel the remaining interviews because they want to look for talent and possibly hire for other spots, so you can find yourself interviewing for a spot that's already taken. Just finding a resume of a talented person that you want to interview is a lot of work so people hiring don't want to give that up.

I went on a couple interviews where I was supposedly going in for a director interview and didn't learn otherwise until I was introduced to the guy they'd already hired to fill the spot I was interviewing for. Umm, okay. I would usually go ahead and finish the interview and just use it as a chance to find out more about the company so I'd know if I ever wanted to get a job there in the future.

BTW if you want to hear a [censored] thing to do - I know people who were hired, quit their old jobs, made relocation arrangements, and then told the position was no longer available. There's also the semi-standard practice of waiting for someone's first day on the job and then telling them that the spot they were expecting is no longer needed and they can do this other job instead. There are different levels of sin in business, at least you were told at a time when you could get out early.

ps. obviously there are good recruiters out there, tuq sounds like one, but the vast majority of them just fire applicants at openings regardless of the fit, I've seen this both from the candidate side and the hiring side.