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At work, we've had issues with Indian candidates informing us during interviews that they've already recently accepted an offer / started a new job, but that th

At work, we've had issues with Indian candidates informing us during interviews that they've already recently accepted an offer / started a new job, but that they're willing to come work for us instead. Completely oblivious to the fact of how big of an immediate red flag that is.

imglorp 8y ago
In some cultures, you're smart to get ahead any way you can, and they'd call anyone a fool who followed some set of rules or principles instead of getting ahead. For them, rules are artificial, arbitrary social constructs with zero benefit, while results are concrete. It's hard to argue they're wrong.
- musage 8y ago
  > rules are artificial, arbitrary social constructs with zero benefit, while results are concrete Sounds like "might is right". It's hard to argue that's wrong, you say? Why, then just kill the person who says it's wrong, EZ PZ! After all, only the results matter.
- code_duck 8y ago
  A business not wanting to invest time hiring, training and integrating an employee who is likely to leave prematurely is not an abstract principle.
  - matz1 8y ago
    Then the business must be willing to pay generously.
- mc32 8y ago
  That depends on expectations, whether in a given industry or culture. In most professional settings showing your hand as essentially a mercenary in terms of allegiance and showing no stickiness, will result in considering an alternative candidate, in the US.
  - imglorp 8y ago
    Yes I think there is some deceit required for those implementing this philosphophy but it doesn't change the strategy. We, also got burned by someone who accepted another offer and quit, a week after beginning work with us. Obviously, that guy--and whoever recommended him--are on our shitlist now. Word does get around hopefully.
- loco5niner 8y ago
  > and they'd call anyone a fool who followed some set of rules or principles instead of getting ahead > It's hard to argue they're wrong. Except for the fact that in this very thread there seems to be quite a backlash against them. Seems to be very short-term and selfish thinking.
  - thedevilslawyer 8y ago
    If the cost of multi-multi-billion dollar industry is backlash on the internet forums, that's hardly a difficult choice.
    - loco5niner 8y ago
      Except when that "backlash on the internet forums" is a reflection of what is happening in reality which seems to be the case here.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- otakucode 8y ago
  >It's hard to argue they're wrong. Eugenics. Thalidomide. Radium paint. Lead paint. Leaded gasoline. The list goes on. It's quite easy to argue against taking shortcuts and eschewing rigor in favor of "results" if you know some history and have some perspective.
- tlear 8y ago
  Actually it is quite easy, cost of doing business in such cultures is much higher as you can not really trust anything and must guard against a knife in the back at any moment. There is a huge amount of friction that eliminates if counterparty can be trusted vast majority of the time.
matz1 8y ago
A candidate who want to get better offer is a red flag ?
- eriken 8y ago
  You can always negotiate, but if you accept an offer I expect you to commit.
  - vkatluri 8y ago
    Just curious, commit for how long? I have been in situations before, where I have accepted an offer, started a job and was informed 3 months later that the company mis-calculated the budgets/revenues and have to let go a bunch of people. Guess who gets let go first? The people who started the latest. Doesn't this go both ways? In this day and age in America, there's no loyalty going in either direction, employer or employee.
    - varjag 8y ago
      Not entirely convinced that others' poor ethics are a justification for your own.
      - otakucode 8y ago
        What argument can you possibly make for an ethical burden that amounts to one-sided loyalty? The REASON is would be immoral to have no loyalty to an employer is because it makes the employers loyalty one-sided. If the employer abandons their loyalty towards employees, as all modern employers did throughout the 1980s and have now established as standard business practice, then there is no ethical burden on the employee to remain loyal. In fact, it becomes unethical to be loyal, a betrayal of your family and self for an entity that does not respect you. I am sure there are a great many employers who expect that they should be permitted to acquire dirt cheap labor to build their profits with no consequences. Their desires are irrelevant. "Make game of that which makes as much of thee."
parylose 8y ago
The problem is they have to give three month's notice when quitting a job. When other companies or headhunters learn that you gave notice, they do their best to hire you away from whatever new job you took. Our HR Department now calls new-hires every couple of days to keep them engaged so they don't take a job elsewhere. It sucks when you hire someone, plan things three months in advance, and.... they don't show up to the job without ever telling you they took a job somewhere else.
- kamaal 8y ago
  >>It sucks when you hire someone, plan things three months in advance, and.... they don't show up to the job without ever telling you they took a job somewhere else. And yet nobody ever agrees to lower the 3 month notice period rule.
  - thedevilslawyer 8y ago
    The workers want no notice period. The industry wants 3 months, so their benches are warm, and they can handle the buffer better. How thoroughly one side has won indicates how thoroughly the power is held. One could call it legal enslavement.
    - _Tev 8y ago
      The period is for both sides, so you cannot really say > The workers want no notice period. Im my anecdotal experience nobody wants "no notice period"
chappar 8y ago
I am not sure how you can generalize. I would not consider it as a red flag unless the candidate in question has history of hopping too quickly. I have direct/indirect experience of being both the sides. I once left a company in couple of months because company's culture was totally different than what I expected. I have also seen a friend of mine getting fired in couple of months after joining a company because company felt he was a misfit
- reaperducer 8y ago
  It is absolutely a red flag. If you've committed to another company, then you have no business interviewing elsewhere. If you don't take a job seriously at one company, why would I expect you to take a job seriously at my company? If I offer you a job, how can I be sure you'll show up for it, and not just take the next offer that comes along? I can't. So you're no longer in consideration as soon as you tell me you're disloyal to your other company. In some industries in America (especially media companies, but it's also common in high-end retail), if your boss hears that you're looking for another job, you're immediately fired. Sometimes it's even written into the contract, if you have one.
  - matz1 8y ago
    If you are serious then you better give a generous offer so that is unlikely for other company to give better offer. A job is a business. The loyalty is goes only as far what the company or the employee can offer. Likewise a company can fire employee anytime as soon as that employee is not needed anymore or better employee come along.
- _Tev 8y ago
  I think the key word is "recently". It might have been many months already for the interviewing guy, but it sounds more like 2-8 weeks ago, and that is really fast (==bad) job hopping.
PurpleBoxDragon 8y ago
I would expect most developers to do the same thing if the offer was good enough, but I suspect they would be far less open to mention it. I'm assuming this is just a difference in cultural knowledge of how it looks. They might have been thinking of it as social proof of desirability where as more local developers are aware that culturally you are supposed to pretend to be loyal to the company.

imglorp 8y ago

In some cultures, you're smart to get ahead any way you can, and they'd call anyone a fool who followed some set of rules or principles instead of getting ahead. For them, rules are artificial, arbitrary social constructs with zero benefit, while results are concrete. It's hard to argue they're wrong.

musage 8y ago
> rules are artificial, arbitrary social constructs with zero benefit, while results are concrete Sounds like "might is right". It's hard to argue that's wrong, you say? Why, then just kill the person who says it's wrong, EZ PZ! After all, only the results matter.
code_duck 8y ago
A business not wanting to invest time hiring, training and integrating an employee who is likely to leave prematurely is not an abstract principle.
- matz1 8y ago
  Then the business must be willing to pay generously.
mc32 8y ago
That depends on expectations, whether in a given industry or culture. In most professional settings showing your hand as essentially a mercenary in terms of allegiance and showing no stickiness, will result in considering an alternative candidate, in the US.
- imglorp 8y ago
  Yes I think there is some deceit required for those implementing this philosphophy but it doesn't change the strategy. We, also got burned by someone who accepted another offer and quit, a week after beginning work with us. Obviously, that guy--and whoever recommended him--are on our shitlist now. Word does get around hopefully.
loco5niner 8y ago
> and they'd call anyone a fool who followed some set of rules or principles instead of getting ahead > It's hard to argue they're wrong. Except for the fact that in this very thread there seems to be quite a backlash against them. Seems to be very short-term and selfish thinking.
- thedevilslawyer 8y ago
  If the cost of multi-multi-billion dollar industry is backlash on the internet forums, that's hardly a difficult choice.
  - loco5niner 8y ago
    Except when that "backlash on the internet forums" is a reflection of what is happening in reality which seems to be the case here.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
otakucode 8y ago
>It's hard to argue they're wrong. Eugenics. Thalidomide. Radium paint. Lead paint. Leaded gasoline. The list goes on. It's quite easy to argue against taking shortcuts and eschewing rigor in favor of "results" if you know some history and have some perspective.
tlear 8y ago
Actually it is quite easy, cost of doing business in such cultures is much higher as you can not really trust anything and must guard against a knife in the back at any moment. There is a huge amount of friction that eliminates if counterparty can be trusted vast majority of the time.

matz1 8y ago

A candidate who want to get better offer is a red flag ?

eriken 8y ago
You can always negotiate, but if you accept an offer I expect you to commit.
- vkatluri 8y ago
  Just curious, commit for how long? I have been in situations before, where I have accepted an offer, started a job and was informed 3 months later that the company mis-calculated the budgets/revenues and have to let go a bunch of people. Guess who gets let go first? The people who started the latest. Doesn't this go both ways? In this day and age in America, there's no loyalty going in either direction, employer or employee.
  - varjag 8y ago
    Not entirely convinced that others' poor ethics are a justification for your own.
    - otakucode 8y ago
      What argument can you possibly make for an ethical burden that amounts to one-sided loyalty? The REASON is would be immoral to have no loyalty to an employer is because it makes the employers loyalty one-sided. If the employer abandons their loyalty towards employees, as all modern employers did throughout the 1980s and have now established as standard business practice, then there is no ethical burden on the employee to remain loyal. In fact, it becomes unethical to be loyal, a betrayal of your family and self for an entity that does not respect you. I am sure there are a great many employers who expect that they should be permitted to acquire dirt cheap labor to build their profits with no consequences. Their desires are irrelevant. "Make game of that which makes as much of thee."

parylose 8y ago

The problem is they have to give three month's notice when quitting a job. When other companies or headhunters learn that you gave notice, they do their best to hire you away from whatever new job you took. Our HR Department now calls new-hires every couple of days to keep them engaged so they don't take a job elsewhere. It sucks when you hire someone, plan things three months in advance, and.... they don't show up to the job without ever telling you they took a job somewhere else.

kamaal 8y ago
>>It sucks when you hire someone, plan things three months in advance, and.... they don't show up to the job without ever telling you they took a job somewhere else. And yet nobody ever agrees to lower the 3 month notice period rule.
- thedevilslawyer 8y ago
  The workers want no notice period. The industry wants 3 months, so their benches are warm, and they can handle the buffer better. How thoroughly one side has won indicates how thoroughly the power is held. One could call it legal enslavement.
  - _Tev 8y ago
    The period is for both sides, so you cannot really say > The workers want no notice period. Im my anecdotal experience nobody wants "no notice period"

chappar 8y ago

I am not sure how you can generalize. I would not consider it as a red flag unless the candidate in question has history of hopping too quickly. I have direct/indirect experience of being both the sides. I once left a company in couple of months because company's culture was totally different than what I expected. I have also seen a friend of mine getting fired in couple of months after joining a company because company felt he was a misfit

reaperducer 8y ago
It is absolutely a red flag. If you've committed to another company, then you have no business interviewing elsewhere. If you don't take a job seriously at one company, why would I expect you to take a job seriously at my company? If I offer you a job, how can I be sure you'll show up for it, and not just take the next offer that comes along? I can't. So you're no longer in consideration as soon as you tell me you're disloyal to your other company. In some industries in America (especially media companies, but it's also common in high-end retail), if your boss hears that you're looking for another job, you're immediately fired. Sometimes it's even written into the contract, if you have one.
- matz1 8y ago
  If you are serious then you better give a generous offer so that is unlikely for other company to give better offer. A job is a business. The loyalty is goes only as far what the company or the employee can offer. Likewise a company can fire employee anytime as soon as that employee is not needed anymore or better employee come along.
_Tev 8y ago
I think the key word is "recently". It might have been many months already for the interviewing guy, but it sounds more like 2-8 weeks ago, and that is really fast (==bad) job hopping.

PurpleBoxDragon 8y ago

I would expect most developers to do the same thing if the offer was good enough, but I suspect they would be far less open to mention it. I'm assuming this is just a difference in cultural knowledge of how it looks. They might have been thinking of it as social proof of desirability where as more local developers are aware that culturally you are supposed to pretend to be loyal to the company.