This was probably one of the worst interviews I have encountered in my job search and from previous years. I applied to the position and the hiring manager reached out to set up a video interview. Most all the options for the call were for after standard working hours so that raised a little bit of a red flag to start off with on how work/life balance may be at the company. I was really looking forward to the conversation as I was highly interested in the role/team. Right when she got on the call, she did not introduce herself and jumped right into the questions. It really felt like "prove yourself" from the get go and there was no engagement or follow up to my responses. I honestly wanted to end the call early and let her know, I don't think I want to move forward in the process...but I realized she didn't tell me anything the role, team or even who she is - I had to confirm, are you the recruiter or hiring manager. There were just holes that weren't filled. I asked those questions at the end but by then, I was no longer interested. I'm not sure if she was having a bad day or just not very personable and wanted to get straight to the point of what I can bring and my skill set but regardless, if you are conducting an initial interview - please try to be friendly to a candidate. Introduce yourself, especially as the hiring manager. The recruiter screen was bypassed and that is actually an important step in the process - if the hiring manager is going to interview first, please keep that in mind.

My interview here made me hate interviewing. First round was the phone screen that was casual and friendly and warm. Very much the kind of vibe I’m looking in my next career move. Felt like I was joining the cool kids who knew how to play hard and also work hard. I was told I would be moving forward to the first in a series of interviews. Great! I’m pumped! Let’s do this! As I prepared for my first round, an hour long, I pulled together some examples of my best work recently, and also spent time on the Riot site reading about their interview process. One tip was to have a fun background and be prepared to talk about it. So, I did just that. The interview starts and the team jumped straight into their prepared script of questions? Not even a hello- how has your day been so far? For the next hour, I was interrogated and grilled over a series of scripted behavioral questions that had nothing to do with the role I was interviewing for or allowed me to speak of my work and recent wins. Seriously? The questions I was asked were ones I prepared very early in my career, 10 years ago, like, tell me your strengths, weaknesses, a difficult situation with a co-worker. Clearly, they were just looking for me to say a few key words they could check off their list so they could move onto the next question. Zero engagement with me or understanding my work ethic, passion or energy to motivate others and be a consultative thought partner. 20 minutes into the interview, I looked at the clock with dread over how much more I had to suffer through this process. Miserable. In the end, no doubt they took zero time to consider my candidacy and qualifications and simply hit that button in their system to send the time delay rejection email exactly (to the minute) 48 hours after my interview. BTW- the rejection email is terribly generic and poorly written. Have you ever had your manager invite you to a meeting, very casual, like join us to share that quick thing you told me about, and then you get to the meeting and they actually want you to talk all this data and info that you have but not at the ready? That’s Riot Games. It’s on me for not having all those generic questions perfected with key terms, but in the end, is the culture I want to be a part of? Not so sure.

This was one of the least-skilled recruiters with which I have ever spoken. She asked me a list of four basic screening questions, none of which exhibited or elicited any knowledge of either the recruiting industry or video games, and that was it. After waiting for a response after four weeks, I requested a status and was sent a canned reply. I may have dodged a bullet.