I never went beyond the screening phase on a short list — all still via the outsourced talent hiring team. Note that they were all extremely nice, polite, friendly, communicative, responsive, and so forth — no problems there whatsoever. After a few interviews (using many different media — LinkedIn chat, email, video calls), the inevitable question popped up: how much did I want to earn.
And here is where all hell broke loose.
You see, their client had a fixed value in mind. From what I could squeeze out of the interviewers, it was slightly above minimum wages — for a senior job, asking for 10+ years of experience (I have twice that and more). I was even considering accepting it, in exchange for doing remote work full-time — a chunk of the salary must unfortunately cover all the costs associated with a car, as well as time spent commuting instead of doing productive things.
They replied that the client said that two things were non-negotiable:
- Salary
- On site (not even hybrid)
As expected, three months later they were reopening the position again, but this time my application wasn't even considered (the recruiters knew who I was...)
Again: I have absolutely nothing against the talent recruiting company and their fantastic team of people. They're very good professionals AND they're also personally very nice, too. Sadly, though, there is so much they can do, and their client dictates the rules — not them.