The interview process was very efficient, cannot fault the swiftness and the consistent communication with the HR rep throughout. Having a phone screen with the HR rep, I proceeded to an interview with the Hiring Manager which was about my work experience and motivation to join the company. I was informed quite quickly that I was invited for a lengthy and final on site day where I had 3 rounds: role interview around past experiences, task interview based on a brief provided and a rigorous values interview. Again, all the team members seemed super engaged throughout and asked good questions.
Having failed this last stage of the process and having read the feedback provided, I can share the below in return and advice for future applicants who want to guarantee success at this step :
- My role interview where I primarily spoke about my past work experience did not give enough reasons as to why I want to work for Accurx. Make sure to really insert company values and why healthcare in your answers frequently because it seems that an isolated yet good answer about why you want to join Accurx does not suffice. I don't know how a candidate working in various other industries can genuinely keep tying their answers back to Accurx or the healthcare industry organically, I remain unsure but give it a try.
-Task interview: the feedback primarily highlights that I have missed on the opportunity to ask the customer to introduce themselves and chat to them more in a discovery call fashion. The task brief provided beforehand stated that I am meeting customers that are upgrading to some new features as "existing" customers. As a CSM for the past 4 years, I would not go through introductions all over again with a customer who is upgrading to new modules as we must have met each other and been working for a while. But don't take the brief too literally, it seems.
-Values: team members attending were lovely and very attentive. Having read the previous reviews, I knew that values and their constant demonstration were paramount. The feedback was that I sounded more self-centric despite giving answers on loving collaboration, being all about sharing knowledge and best practices internally. I feel like some companies offer very little to no flexibility as to what they want to hear from you and whilst it's not rocket science to read company values and keep mentioning them to score your best, I picked my battles to balance out demonstrating these values without screaming them in every single answer with intent to "show".
Currently working at Amazon and having gone through a very rigorous process with values included, I am surprised to say Amazon did give more manoeuvre space and thought for individuals who may have thought that an overkill of values in answering these questions is worse than authenticity that comes with honesty. Ultimately and reading the feedback, I no longer feel like I was a fit for this company to begin with where I am so rigidly meant to fit into a template. I do get the point of being obsessed with your culture and not wanting bad hires as I worked at many great startups, but I ultimately feel like my genuine motivations were mis-judged which resonated frequently in the feedback provided alongside praise for my experience, knowledge of the product and attitude.