Sweet Talk HR

It's been quite a while since I had blogged here ... a few reasons - getting onto interviews to try my hands at a new job and also getting the things settled down at my current location.

Could say that I was quite lucky - I did not attend too many interviews - but stayed onto to attend the interviews at two companies and got offers from both - but inspite of a slightly better offer from one, I chose the other for the sake of a better job profile - but I have to wait and see where this takes me from my current location :)

With respect to the interviews, I didn't have quite a good interaction with the HR personals.

At company A, it was mostly on the attitude of the HR with respect to compensation. I had asked the HR for a bonus compensation as I would not be eligible from my current company due my move. I got a very positive response from the person without any hesitation - I had still not signed the acceptance offer then. When I went to hand over my signed acceptance offer, the HR started to back saying that there was no provision in their company to compensate for lost bonuses. Step 3, I didn't like the yes - no approach but was willing to go the extra move to get details on a strong affirmation / a negative answer without any oscillation. I mailed the HR detailing the compensation issue and also cc:ing the technical manager, I would be reporting to. Finally, the HR person promptly calls me to discuss about how to go about the compensation!!!

At company B: the HR personal asked my current manager's contact information for reference and promised that the references would be checked only if I sign and accept the offer. Trusting their words, I gave them the details. But one day before they could even give me a verbal offer, my manager was contacted to verify about my profile and about me. The next day, my manager comes and questions me whether I'm leaving and why I hadn't told him about the offer!!! - Superb backfiring for a mistake I did - I shouldn't have given the contact information before I signed the offer.

Good lessons from both the interviews - I'm not certain why the HR at Indian workplaces - both the Indian companies as well as the MNC Indian offices - play spoilsport during the recruitment process. I had the high opinion the HR has to act as a facilitator to get candidates with proper technical expertise into appropriate teams - I get such shock when I see that the HR tries not to help the technical teams, but screw up the process - I hear that Indian HR act based on the incentives they get - I suppose this will ruin the company they are in, over a long run. Companies beware of such persons!!!