Is this unprofessional?

[Mindthenicedeadpeople]

Job interview for 12pm

10 candidates all booked in for 12pm being seen individually by one person.

So whoever is here last will presumably be interviewed an hour later than booked.

You're talking about a recruitment day kind of thing. For just an interview, I've never seen everyone invited at the same time. There's not reason why everyone has to wait like a drop-in at the doctor's.

That’s ageist
Whether someone is 27 or 77 it doesn’t matter if they are capable of doing the job.

"I don’t think having the interview time at the same as the other candidates is that big of a deal"

They should have at least explained it. There will be people who only have an hour free and can't be siting there for half a day.

Of course it’s that big a deal. It’s extremely rude. This is not a several hour interview process where several candidates can be kept busy doing different things at different times during the day, it’s an 8 - 15 minute interview. You do not need to have particularly high intelligence to space the interviews out a bit, rather than invite 15-20 people along at precisely the same time and not even explain why you are not interviewing them in order of arrival, or what your logic is. This process is clearly 100% for the employer’s convenience and utterly condescending towards the candidates.

Very inefficient not to be able to sort out a sensible number of candidates. 6 would have been enough surely. Doesn’t sound like a very well run HR department.

The irony being people don't attend due to the long waiting times and not being seen at their appointment times.

Do people really only give themselves 1 hour for an interview?

I would have thought most people try and leave themselves a good 2 hours before going back to work etc.

Obviously if you’re a single parent then you may need to leave but if I was OP and the interviews were only a few minutes each, then I would have waited 30 minutes more to at least have been interviewed.

I wouldn’t have been pleased sitting there for an hour or more but if there’s only 1 staff member then it makes sense why she didn’t stagger it.

If that is how they timetable interviews goodness knows how they timetable appointments! Whoever gets the receptionists job will spend their time soothing angry patients who have been waiting for three quarters of an hour for their checkup. No wonder the last receptionist left and got replaced by a nine year old, no one would shout at a nine year old receptionist, 🙂poor kid has probably been there all summer, he will be so pleased to get back to school.

A dental surgery is unlikely to have a HR department. If it’s a small practice it may well only be one or two dentists, one or two nurses and a receptionist.

I had skipped through the thread and not clocked it was a dentists. To be fair sounds as though they need someone who understands how a business should run, so a practice manager of some sort ( my dentist has one of those, and seven dentists!)

If there is only 1 staff member, it does not make sense why the interviews were not staggered. They knew in advance they were physically incapable of interviewing more than one person at a time.

The way the candidates were treated, I wouldn’t be surprised if after 2 hours they hadn’t told everyone left in the waiting room that they had run out of time, now, so the rest of the candidates would have to go home.

I remember sitting in a waiting room outside a consultants office from 9am till 12.30pm with my mother having a real go at me about the time that she was wasting.
I hadn’t had anything since tea the previous day as I had to have an empty stomach with no food or drink other than water.
The irony was I was diagnosed with stress and stomach ulcers..
Pretty sure sitting in that waiting room for 3.5 hours with a mother making it known I was wasting her time for 3.5 hours on a completely empty stomach didn’t do anything for my stress levels or my stomach issues

It's pretty normal in some areas of life - the court system perhaps, where most people are told to present at 10am or 2pm, even if that's 50+ people, and then the court works through it in the order they want. Very inefficient for people (except for the court staff), but there are so many people needing a few more minutes, unexpected events, people.turnjng up late, not turning up, that it kind of works. Just not for the court 'users'.

For interviews though, really no.

Excellent analogy 😂

Not quite the same but I interviewed for a PT job at Argos after I left hospitality because of Covid. Hours suited while I considered my future. I may have posted about it when it happened.

Got there at the appointed time,10am I think, to find a room with about 30 people in it and two young men, looking very pleased with themselves at the front. They said that the first two hours would be [insert crappy management idea that they found online] then a break and then they would separate people out while another something or other went on, to interview them individually and "hopefully it will all be wrapped up by 4pm" I said that wasnt doable, I had another appointment to attend. One young woman said she only had a babysitter for two hours. Loads of people said the same sort of thing. The young bucks looked a bit thrown when quite of few of us said we were pissed off at being expected to give up a whole day no warning and we were going. I was left with the impression that this wasnt standard Argos procedure and something they had come up with themselves.

I saw about half the room leave, not sure how many others left after that. Shit show all round!

They've seen TV, they know.

But I love the visual of a bear working as a tailor and trailing behind the interviewee.

I remember having an interview for post-grad professional psychologist type studies. It was over the phone as I lived a distance away, so they made an exception to face to face interviews. They called me an hour and a bit late. I honestly thought they were doing it on purpose to see how we responded to stress and pressure and things not going to plan. I don't know for a fact, just speculation. Anyway, I made sure I was cool as a cucumber and was successful.

Maybe that's the rationale of the dentist's office?

It’s threadbare, not thread bear.

I dont see what your point is? Its not you so whats the problem and why would someone be late for an interview,

But why allow only 2 hours and not 3, 4 or 5... because, first of all where do you draw the line? Sure, an hour seems really really short, but it depends on the type of role it is - the OP said themselves most were really short interviews.
You usually get told in advance if there are stages, assessments, roleplay, breaks etc, or I'm going to assume it's a preliminary chat.

I would have also put on my email to the dentist, “Also, I would charge extra for babysitting.”

I've worked in recruitment across a couple of different sectors arranging interviews for candidates and this would never happen

All interviews are at a separate time

The only time it is appropriate is if you are told prior that it will be a group interview - which is usually for things like applying for an air hostess role and when you have to do a role play kind of thing

This is so unprofessional to just expect them to wait and have no clue when they will be called in

Go in their office and take their's, then leave. Your time is too precious for this rubbish.