How can I professionally say I will not work with a certain person?

[comeandhaveteawithme]

I applied for a job last year, but turned it down because the hiring manager acted incredibly unprofessionally during the recruitment process. I told her exactly what I thought of her (professionally).

Six months later, a completely different person has got in touch with me and asked if I would still be interested in the role. She partly apologised for previous behaviour, but not all of it. I'm not sure how aware they are. I don't need to reapply but they'd like to meet me again informally.

I really need a job at the moment and I still like the look of the role, however if the previous person is still working there, I am absolutely not interested.

How can I professionally ask if they are still there, and say I'm not interested if they are?

I've done some online digging and cannot figure out if they are or not.

Please don't call under a false name. That's a potential way to make a real fool of yourself.

What does incredibly unprofessional look like? Do you mean rude or not good at her job?

I think it's legit to ask about management structures.

It depends if it's a deal-breaker really. If so, you decide the right way to ask

This is perfect.

I have previously said, unless xyz behaviour changes then my team will no longer do work for them and you will have to send that work out (at substantially higher cost). But I had been in the organisation a long time and was well respected and this was very much a one off (and I did it out of a duty of care to my team)

Agree. Decide first whether or not it is a deal breaker.

@comeandhaveteawithme ring the company (withhold number) and ask to speak to the person. If no longer there they will likely say they no longer work there. Worst case is you get through and person answers and you just put on a voice and say ‘sorry, wrong number’ or something. Or just ask in the meeting, very lightly “is so and so still working in X department”? Something like that.

You could ask an open question and see what they come back with, like "since I interviewed for this x months ago have there been any operational or personnel changes that affect the role?"

I don’t think this would work though considering they don’t know that OP has an issue with one of their staff so they’d obviously just say no.

They'd say no since they don't know that OP even knows the previous interviewer. They are not going to run down their HR list and tick people off for the OP, not that they can anyway due to confidentiality and data protection.

I don’t believe that the op has been asked back

she just wants advice re how to find out whether the hiring manager who didn’t hire her and the op had a temper tantrum in front of…. still works there

Does it matter if she is still there provided you don't have to work with her or for her. How big is the company? You can't expect to get on with everyone in a company, it would make your employment possibilities very slight.

It's a bit difficult to say without knowing why you don't want to work with them. If it's because they are generally difficult, lazy etc then that may well be acknowledged more widely. If it's more specific to you, then you can't really refuse to work with them.

Why don’t you think she has been asked back?

This is highly unbelievable.

Call it a hunch

We all have to work with people we don’t like/ get on with. Could you just ask how much involvement they will have in your day to day role and make your decision from there.