awful interview, WIBU to have ended it early?

[cigarsmokingwoman]

I had an interview this week for a fixed‑term maternity cover role in a field I’ve worked in for years. On paper, it looked perfect — but it turned into a complete nightmare.
The current postholder is full‑time, but they want to replace her with someone part time, on a short contract, no team, and still covering the same massive list of responsibilities. Straight away, it felt like they were expecting one person to do the work of several. Its not a senior role, but sounded it as they kept refering to "supporting our staff of over 2000".
Beforehand, I’d asked for some reasonable adjustments, as I have several disabilities, which they agreed to — but when the interview started, they hadn’t done them. I had to ask twice, which was awkward and made me feel like I was being a nuisance. They did send the questions in advance, again as an adjustment, but then on the day they started asking completely different ones, putting me on the spot and making it much harder to answer properly.
One of the panel was so patronising. They asked me to explain really basic concepts that I’d expect anyone in the field to already know. When I started talking about some of my biggest achievements, they cut across me and actually said they didn’t want to hear about the awards I'd won! The question was literally about qualifications, experience and achievements related to the role.
The whole thing felt off. The tone was wrong, the expectations were ridiculous, and there was no sign of respect for my experience or the effort I’d put into preparing. Eventually, I just said I was ending the interview because it was a waste of both our time. I left the Teams call feeling small, upset, and wondering why I’d ever applied.
I’ve done and sat on many interview panels, but I’ve never had such a bad experience.I've never exited an interview before either and I'm still shaken by it. AIBU to think that whatever the role is, the least you should expect is a bit of professionalism and basic respect?

Eh? Why on earth would you withdraw instead of saying "I've really got to get back before 12, would you mind terribly if I go first?"

A little equality act education for the people telling the OP that her reasonable adjustments are the problem.

https://www.acas.org.uk/reasonable-adjustments

Genuinely a bit horrified that you’re all on panels for interviews… Suggest you all read up on because reasonable adjustments are a legal obligation under the Equality Act 2010, not a preference to make your life more difficult. Get to know what they are otherwise you might see a lawsuit coming your way very soon.

There’s always room for organic questions and discussion but the core competency questions around the role and job description should be easy to share in advance.

I think that’s what happened here, and the OPis upset about these additional questions, no? It sounds like the interview process worked here. It doesn’t help anyone if they’re in a role which makes them feel uncomfortable and requires communication skills they don’t have due to their disability. The employer should have been clearer that in order to assess suitability for the role, additional questions may be asked on the day, but core questions will be provided as an adjustment.

OP be very proud of yourself. That takes guts, and they, hopefully, will have a rethink about their interview technique.

I am very surprised by some of these answers. For those who don’t know what they are going to ask, how can you prove consistency between candidates? How do you know that you have covered every key area of the role?
How does the panel know who is going to ask what? How can you provide feedback, or indeed score candidates if you have not asked the same questions of all candidates? It is so unprofessional to not have standardised questions for all candidates.

Because if the interviewer can’t be bothered to properly organise and schedule the interviews. What other simple tasks can they not be bothered with?

I completely understand. Personally I think questions in advance gives a more level playing field. Some people just cannot answer on the spot, even if they are ideal person for the job

You misunderstand @Bollihobs- I didn’t say people shouldn’t ask those with experience of reasonable adjustments at all. I mentioned googling as a catch all term for people to educate themselves further (other methods are available) rather than just say it’s ‘not okay’ or ‘that wouldn’t work for me as an interviewer’ and so on.

Out of that whole narrative, you thought the OP's action of withdrawing was the most unreasonable act? Gosh!

Of course you prepare. But meeting a candidate and seeing perhaps their passion for a topic I would want to follow that up more. I also agree with many that questions in advance is great. However might that also not lead to yet more tutoring on the right way to gain a job? Transparency: I don't need and never requested that as an adjustment. One of my DC does have a relevant disability - hasn't done to date, but might welcome that as a helpful adjustment in the future.

I disclosed my disability asking for reasonable adjustments on a lot of applications. Didn’t get an interview.

on others I didn’t disclose, and was more likely to get an interview

Interviews are a 2 way process and a way for you to assess if the job/company is right for you and the employer to assess if you could be right for them. I think if you know if wasn’t right for you then makes sense to end the interview.

Reasonable adjustments like asking for questions in advance are commonplace and should be stuck to so it’s unfair that didn’t happen. The role being part time to cover a full time person seems a strange business decision and unless they had plans to amend workload or the full time person possible wasn’t as busy as they should be for the role to be part time. Who knows! Try to be positive and just look at it as experience to take going forward for your next role

Ditto

I have sadly had the same experience.

You can leave an interview or a work anytime and don't have to feel bad about it. Don't think more about it. I think you did the right thing.

I’ll break my response down into 2 parts.

1- Good job @cigarsmokingwoman I think you did the right thing in this situation. No reason to feel small. You knew it wasn’t a good fit and politely ended the interview to nowhere. I’ve had people do it when I’ve been interviewing for roles and the the job was not a good fit. Honestly I was glad they did, saved me time. I think of interviews as two way streets… I want candidates to turn into content employees so I need them to really evaluate my company and role. It does me no good to hire someone who answered all the questions right, but then hated the org or the role. That person will not stay long.

2-On the advance interview questions. I don’t usually ask the same exact questions in interviews. I do have a few that I ask that are the same but I’d much rather have an organic discussion. I think both sides get a better feel : me for the candidate and the candidate on my organization. Yes, if someone asked for a reasonable adjustment I’d prepare a list of questions and send them over. But I think that person would be at a disadvantage if I felt that I couldn’t ask follow up questions or ask a different question based off of one of their answers. I actually don’t care about long pauses during an interview. Because I do know that people sometimes need a moment to organize their thoughts.

We send them to everyone as well, it works well enough. But generally the value of the interview comes from the probing/follow up questions, which we can't provide beforehand as they are based on their answers. And since they are meant to help the candidate, not to catch them out, people who can't be asked follow up questions can end up being disadvantaged anyway. These follow up questions can also lead to some questions completely unrelated to the original question.

In the end I’m trying to “hide” my disability while I’m still on probation

YANBU to leave early. I was in an interview once where one of the panel members didn't even greet me and sat there glaring at me. He then piped up with some completely irrelevant questions (for example asking how much it cost to make a documentary when I was interviewing for a clinical job). I withdrew my application as soon as i left the interview- I didn't want them and didn't need to know their opinions on me.

At my firm, we are advised to ask same questions to all candidates to promote fairness and facilitate the comparing of candidates.
We are also given guidance for taking notes and making decisions.

More recently we had been accused of discrimination in hiring. Having an agreed procedure had helped us support our hiring decision. (The person we hired, was same XYZ as the person who accused of discrimination … we were able though, to give lawyers our hiring notes. There was no case.)

I think it was completely reasonable to end the interview early - I too think you should feel nothing but brave for having the confidence and professionalism to walk away from such a badly conducted interview.

on a separate note, I don’t think bragging about winging it with interview questions is quite the flex that some people seem to think it is!

If it was a job where someone has to think on their feet, sales for example, it s perfectly reasonable for the employer to want to test that in an interview situation.

Reasonable adjustments have to be reasonable you wouldn't want a blind pilot flying a plane would you.

Sorry to read of your experience OP.
YANBU.

AIBU on MN is not the place to post expecting kindness and understanding.

Wishing you well.
It's them, not you.
You dodged a bullet I think.

Move on!

It's fine, you'll find something awesome

Companies talk so much shit, don't they?

If it makes you feel any better, I once ended an interview early and just walked out. It was a four day a week job and it wasn't compressed hours or anything.

They were complete fools in many ways, so I have had plenty of warning signs before this question - they asked me "how are you going to manage what effectively a full-time workload in four days?" I'd had enough at that point, so I said to them "if you're telling me that you've stuffed a five day a week job into four days, then you are wasting my time, I'm not here to be exploited.

They just looked at each other with shocked faces. I don't know what they were expecting, but what a bunch of idiots. I mean, they literally made the comment themselves!

I then said "I think we're wasting each other's time here, have a nice afternoon" -and left. After that interview, I always asked if companies covered travel expenses!

Honestly, none of this is your fault. They're a bunch of wankers - you dodged a bullet.

Good luck in your search.

I work in a place where we send out the questions in advance as a matter of course. Initially I thought this was a bad idea, I’m a complete convert. Naturally follow up questions differ as they are about probing the answers. candidates are usually more relaxed which makes for a more productive use of the panel interview part of the assessment.

I’m sorry you had an awful interview OP, I’ve had them and after the initial emotion wears off, it’s usually a lucky escape or a learning experience. Good luck for the next one.