Uniquely strange process.
1. The first step was a 15 minutes meet and greet with someone from HR. They walked through a survey of old school interview questions (greatest accomplishment, greatest failure, top five skills, etc.). Had I chosen to continue, the survey would’ve been passed along to technical interviewers for step #2.
This stage was mostly about TopDevz getting information about me. Although I was able to ask questions of the HR person, she wasn’t able to tell me anything about the project and the focus was clearly meant to be them getting to know me and not vice versa.
At this point I asked the interviewer to clarify with me what the rest of the process would be. Below are the rest of the steps:
2. If the technical folks find your survey answers sufficient, they will set up a technical interview. At this point, you still will not be given any information about the project you’re signing up for.
3. If your technical interview goes well, you will receive a contract for the project. Even still you will know next to nothing about what you’re signing up for.
4. You are put on the project. This is the part of the employment game show in which they raise the curtain and reveal to you your team, client company, and what you will be doing.
When your project ends you will either be placed on another project immediately if one is already lined up or you could end up waiting an indefinite length of time for another project. A very important note is that you are not compensated in any way during the time you do not have a project. The company also offers no health/dental/vision benefits either during or between projects.
As I mentioned at the top, this was a uniquely strange process. Zero information was offered about the company, their values, types of projects they work on, support structure for consultants, anything about the specific project they were hiring for, etc., etc. I was able to glean some of this information by proactively asking, but all-in-all it was the least transparent, most mercenary interaction I’ve had in any job hunt.
I did not continue the process after the initial conversation, so I cannot say if TopDevz is a fantastic company with great people and terrific opportunities for personal and professional growth. It’s possible that all of those things are true, but I was given no reasons to believe so. Instead, I came away from the conversation seeing with multiple yellow and red flags raised.