Firstly, I should say I was contacted on LinkedIn by a third-party recruiter. I thought it was a scam at first because she wouldn't name the company until she talked to me via Skype. Very secretive for no reason. Nothing about my resume would tell her I wanted this position, considering I did graduate work and clearly stated my preferred career paths on my profile. Nevertheless, I thought I may as well see if it was something worth pursuing, since sales is a good skill to have.
After the third-party recruiter and I Skyped, I had a phone screen with Keyence's HR person. I was then sent a Bennett Mechanical Comprehension test (II) which I passed. I was scheduled for a f2f interview early the next week. The process was very fast.
I was expecting the HR person to interview me, but instead I got two men who introduced themselves, but neglected to offer what they did at the company. After I asked, they said they were sales managers. OK great I'll get a chance to see who I'm working with, I thought.
They asked me about my background, which I rolled out. Then they asked me if I had sales experience, and I told them I did door-to-door charity work for almost two years in my early 20's. Then the main guy asked me the role playing question below about tea. Then the interview started getting weird. Interviewer 1 asks me about my first undergraduate degree (I did two) and what marks I made and if I'd ever failed a course. I answered honestly that I wasn't a good student at the time. He asked no follow-up questions, so I probed him a bit: "Why didn't you ask me about any of my other degrees?" and he says, "I wanted to see how you deal with failure." No you didn't, because you asked me no follow-up questions. Anyway, the interviewers stumbled forward with a few more weak questions that gave them no new information about who I was that they couldn't have gotten from my resume. Eventually, I asked them a few questions. Some of them I have written out below (answers paraphrased).
Q: Do you use sales tactics and/or tricks?
A: No, but sometimes maybe a bit.
Q: What percentage of days a week will I be working longer than 8 or 9 hours?
A: 60%.
Q: Japan has a reputation for workers working long and hard hours. Should I expect the managers to drive me to work this way, being that this is a Japanese company?
A: Yes. (Aside: I don't think this is the most efficient way of doing things, although it may seem like it is on its face, which is why I asked. Working hard is fine, but everyone works differently/at different base levels of efficiency, so it is a better practice to judge "hard" work based on output, not time spent doing it.)
Q: Do you have a sexual harassment policy?
A: Yes, but we don't know anything about it. You can ask the (female) HR woman about that.
Q: OK, but presumably you've had to deal with something like this before, afterall if someone is harassed by a client, they must have to let you know?
A: I've never heard of this happening.
Q: I have never not heard of this happening. I want to know how you deal with it. (Aside: This happens constantly and every where, so either a) no women work for their company, b) no woman who works there would talk to them about it because they are clueless, or c) women have told them, and they didn't take it seriously.)
A: Ask the (female) HR woman. (Aside: This really bothered me. Like it is a women's issue only, and they don't have time for that.)
Needless to say, I didn't come off as wanting to work there so I'm not expecting an offer. I thought the interview was poorly conducted, the main interviewer was probably in his mid-late 20's and seemed kind of naive/dull. The other interviewer was Japanese and didn't seem to understand any of my questions (he answered as if this was the case, at least), and had a thick accent so I couldn't understand most of what he said. Makes you wonder how these people were successful salespeople. I figure if this is Keyence putting its best foot forward to attract the right candidate, then we have a different idea of what the word good means.
