Would this be unattractively needy for potential employers?

[Frequency]

A job I interviewed for a couple of months ago has come up again, so I have re-applied. I never got any feedback from the last interview.

The hours, location, and role is perfect for me in terms of what I want, long-term from my career, so I want to send them a message asking for feedback from my last interview and tips to improve in preparation for the next one as well as putting across that I am keen to work with them (assuming I get another interview) but I don't want to come across as desperate or needy and put them off.

What's the best way to word it? Or should I not email them at all?

The time to ask for feedback is directly after you get the interview result. Someone asked me for feedback recently for an interview in Feb and I couldn’t even remember who they were!

other option would be to contact HR and see if there is any written feedback from the time of the interview you could have, that’s what we did with our person in the end.

Also it does look a bit like you only want feedback because the job has come up again rather than an innate desire to develop.

You really should have asked for feedback after your last interview. It’s possible that they won’t consider you for this role since you’ve been rejected previously but that will obviously depend on why you were unsuccessful last time. If you were a strong candidate who was just pipped to the post, you’re in with a good chance. But if they didn’t rate you, applying again is wasting everyone’s time.

I recruit on behalf of my global team and we get some candidates who reapply when we advertise new roles. Usually the reason we rejected them the first time is still valid.

I didn't ask for feedback at the time because I didn't receive a rejection, and they were unorganised during the recruitment process, e.g, arranging Teams interviews and not turning up to them/taking weeks to respond to emails, etc, so I didn't know if I had been rejected or if they were still going through the recruitment process.

I did send an email a couple of weeks after my interview to ask if there was an update but never received a reply.

Why are you keen to work with them? I know that’s not what you asked. If I was the hiring manager and I’d say offered to a person they’d not taken it or taken and rejected it I’d be getting in touch with the other candidates who came second and third and offering it to them.

the disorganisation you’ve described makes me wonder if whoever got the job had that experience and thought sod that

The hours suit my preferences, there aren't many roles in my sector which offer those hours, and they, on paper at least, seem to have a good training and development programme. They're also offering a reasonable wage. Most other jobs I've seen advertised are expecting more but paying less than when I was applying for roles last year.

They sound shockingly disorganised. Hopefully it’s just their recruitment process that is terrible rather than the entire organisation.

Where I work, we make a decision and submit our written feedback to HR within 48 hours of the interview taking place. The candidate isn’t usually given much feedback (HR just give a one liner) unless they ask for it specifically but we always submit much more detail just in case. We’re very thorough!! We can also see details of any previous roles that a candidate has applied for (and decisions made during that process) which candidates don’t seem to realise.

How long ago was it? If it is reopened and you don’t reapply you can’t get the job.

if you do reapply you might get the job. So maybe just look at the cold hard statistics and it shows it doesn’t matter what they think of you. The alternative doesn’t get you the job so go for it.

It sounds like they just put it on the back burner. Just re-apply.