The worst interview process I have ever been through. I was told there would be an initial 30-minute Zoom with the recruiter, an "on-site" interview, and a final Zoom conversation with the VP's.
I made it to the on-site interview, which was a total joke. There was a lot of miscommunication on what to expect in the on-site interview. One recruiter told me it would be laid back and they'd only expected me to observe employees on the floor so I could see who I would be potentially hiring. The goal was to see if this was a culture I could see myself sourcing and hiring candidates for, which made sense to me. After some time observing employees, I would then be interviewed.
This information ended up being very untrue. The interview was at a working Panda Express, where they asked me to cater to customers, serve food, handle to-go orders, sweep floors, and essentially be a Panda Express employee on the floor while being assessed by the recruiter and district managers from afar.
Mind you, I interviewed for an HR Talent Acquisition role so this was confusing and extremely unnecessary for the position. This interview was scheduled for 3 hours and I ended up being there for almost 5 HOURS!! This was a paid interview, but should I have known the day would've played out like this, I would've never gone. The pay was certainly not worth my time and was offensive. The interview also required a very specific dress code, meaning I had to go purchase new items just to "interview."
After the interview, I was told I was moving forward to the final round with the VP's, but was ghosted after the recruiter shared they were "too busy" to schedule the call. Haven't heard from them since and I wouldn't consider moving forward if they did.
As a professional recruiter, it is always important that I provide candidates with transparency as their experience is just as important as getting them through the hiring process. Panda Restaurant Group did the complete opposite of that. While the recruiters were nice, it seemed very unorganized and I didn't appreciate getting ghosted after going through a 5-hour interview. Please do better.