Re: Skip the Interview

In article <4r4b58$l9t_at_sjx-ixn5.ix.netcom.com> manderso_at_ix.netcom.com(Michael Anderson) writes:
> Have you ever gone through an Interview process and thought "how in
>the world are they still in business?". Well, on May 13, I interviewed
>with Oracle in Colorado Springs with several groups. At the time, I
>was flying back and forth from San Francisco on a weekly basis while
>consulting for a large finance company using Visual C++ and ODBC.
> Prior to the interview, I told the Personnel Manager, Corey, I would
>interview if they compensated me for out of pocket expenses the $50.00
>airline fee for changing my flight plans. Corey agreed
>enthusiatically.
> After the interview, the Oracle people liked me so much that they
>wanted me to meet with a Vice President, Thomas , in San Francisco. I
>didn’t mind. But I told them I was downtown across the street from
>TransAmerica building and had no car. And I would be glad to meet with
>Tom for drinks, or dinner, or any where NEAR by.
> Well, the Oracle group in the Springs set up a 3pm meeting on
>Wednesday at their Redwood Shores Corporate Office. I was notified on
>Wednesday at 11am. Immediately, I asked the Springs Middle Manager,
>Chris, if they’d pickup the cab fare to Redwood (about $75+ roundtrip).
>Chris got back with me 2 hours later and stated I should paid for it to
>demostrate how much I wanted the position. He said all Oracle
>employees are expected to make sacrifices. I pointed out to him since
>Oracle has had such a high turnover of employees in San Francisco,
>lower cost of living (and wages) in the Springs, and the offer of
>$30,000 - $50,000 was so low that may be they should reconsider the
>deal they were getting. Chris responded ‘No way!’. Needless to say, I
>said no thanks.
> Well, 4 weeks later I asked Corey about the $50 of reimburement
>they had agreed to and still owed. Corey stated some accounting foul
>ups and I would see something in a few weeks. Two weeks later, I
>called Corey, and this time he didn’t return any of my voice messages.
>I wrote to Barry, and asked for help. A week after my letter, Corey
>called, to say that Chris had gotten my expense check and would endorse
>over to me and I would have it in a few days. A week later, on June
>29, I got the check. I noticed the date of the check was June 14 and
>the post mark was June 28. Oracle for some reason took their time
>reimbursing me.
> I would advise any one wanting to interview with Oracle
>reconsider. I thought it was a fine organization, I have 300 shares of
>their stock in street name in my IRA. To my dismay, I’ve discovered
>incompentence, lack of professionalism, and a mean streak a mile long.
>No wonder their support group is experiencing high turnover. I won’t
>want to work there and I hope you would think twice before interviewing
>with them too. I think I’ll be selling my shares soon.
>
>Sincerely,
>
>Michael
>

Seeing as how I expect to provide my own transportation to interviews, I think your expectations were way out of line. Maybe if you were interviewing for some hot-shot development or consulting position, but a 30K support position? Maybe it's just 'cause I grew up in a car culture. Seems awfully trivial to base an evaluation of an entire large company on. Sounds like you need some ego stroking, make the company come to you rather than you going to the company. Shouldn't you base your judgement on the micro-environment where you will work rather than some distant corp headquarters? They're Oracle, they don't have to care. Where there is obvious organizational disfunction, there is opportunity. I would consider it a plus that the large corp headquarters didn't micromanage the outlying sites, and vice versa. Not that I would ever move to either Colorado or SF. Any company will have controls over expenses, especially by people that don't even work there. If you consult for a large finance company you ought to understand that.

I agree it is stupid of Oracle not to have paid, just not with your response to it.

[crossposted to misc.jobs.misc, trolling for comments about whether one should _expect_ a company to pay the cab fare in the above situation.]

jg

-- 
Joel Garry               joelga_at_rossinc.com               Compuserve 70661,1534
These are my opinions, not necessarily those of Ross Systems, Inc.   <> <>
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