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      Thesaurus Manager Interview

      Dec 11, 2015
      Anonymous Interview Candidate
      Amsterdam
      No offer
      Negative experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I applied through a staffing agency. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Elsevier (Amsterdam) in Sep 2015

      Interview

      I was very much dissatisfied with my interview at the Elsevier. First of all, I have applied a few times via their own online database and only once got an automatic response about 4 months later stating that this position was already filled. Other applications are still hanging there with no response whatsoever. Then, I was approached by a recruiter and offered this position at Elsevier. Initially, I had an interview with the recruiter, which went fine. Afterwards, I was invited to Elsevier Headquarters for 1:1 interview. It began with two people in one room and 1 person by Webex. The position was initially for 6 months and they required you to be a PhD, which I am. At the same time, they offered a salary lower than I used to earn at the university. (I personally thought that you cannot earn less than in uni. Apparently, you can). When I asked about long-term employment options, they did not have a clear answer during the interview. Interview was also extremely long. After about 1.5 hours, the person by WEBEX left, then another person left and just two of us remained in the room. So, here I got the real impression about the company and job itself. It's a super boring position where you need to fill database in with chemical formulas, go through literature, search for new published compounds, put them into database and describe features of these compounds. Then the lady complained about her pension and even mentioned that Elsevier does not care about employees so well. Elsevier closed a big part of parking and many lost their parking slots. She was one of them. She also said that it is very difficult to advance your career at Elsevier. She, for instance, remained for 30 years in the same role. After the 4 hour-interview, I knew this job is a big NO-NO. And frankly, I should be absolutely desperate to apply for Elsevier again . And honestly, I believe that an applicant and interviewers must be dressed appropriately. One of them was dressed in scruffs.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      Interview was not difficult. They asked me to draw some chemical structures. Honestly, I am not a chemist but biochemist. I know the basics of the chemical nomenclature but not so familiar with complicated ring-structures. They are super easy to learn, not a rocket science, you do not need to have a PhD to draw molecules. Then I had to explain cys-/trans- isomerisation (which I knew). One person also prepared a stupid classification task for me, which at first neither I, nor other interviewer could understand.
      Answer question
      1