I applied to a senior-level Human Factors Engineering position that was posted on LinkedIn. Had my first interview with the company recruiter about a week after applying. It was quick (about 15min) and seemed more of a quick screener to gauge my fit within the role (i.e. "why Stryker?"). I was told as a disclaimer that the hiring process would take a long time. Within a week they scheduled me to chat with the hiring manager. I thought the interview went great and the hiring manager was really nice. I moved on to the Gallup survey shortly after. I reached out about a week later for feedback and received no answer. I never heard from Stryker again. I found out that I was no longer in the running after checking my candidate profile about a month after the initial interview.
I don't write reviews like this usually, and I understand how chaotic the hiring process can be from the other side, because I've been there myself. I'm not here to talk about the hot/cold interactions that are common during the interview process, where at first everyone is so communicative when they're interested, but when they're not, they couldn't care less about telling you, giving feedback, or answering emails. No, I'm not here about any of that, which is a pervasive practice. [Though, what's interesting is that we live in a small Human Factors Engineering world :), and I can't say that I'll be applying to this company again]. But what I found particularly irritating is how Stryker portrays itself during the interview process, making me think that they were above doing the kind of ghosting they ended up doing, and also that they use the Gallup survey as part of the interview process.
Since I didn't get any feedback from any of my interviews, it could well be that I didn't pass the Gallup portion somehow. If you're reading this before the Gallup interview, I would strongly suggest to prepare well for it, unlike how the company tries to make it into some kind of personality assessment for company fit (which it's not). Before I took the Gallup survey, I was told to prepare two to three examples from previous work experience that I could use during the interview, and to not over-prepare. Now, imagine someone asking you if you're a creative person and to give an example within the past week (as proof, I suppose), because that's what the Gallup survey/test is like. Are you a responsible and caring person? Be ready to give examples. At some point I couldn't help but laugh during the survey because whenever I said "Yes" to a question I was asked to give an example that happened within the past week. On top of that, the person delivering the questions is basically reading off a script and will not clarifying any questions for you. I didn't understand some of the questions or what they were getting at, and when I would get stuck, the person just went silent. It was an awkward experience. I also found some of the questions to be strange. There was one question where they were assessing my ability to manipulate a group of people into doing what I want without them knowing. It made me wonder if these are the kind of values that they encourage in the organization.
I'm not trying to discourage you from applying, but just know what you could be getting into with this company.
