A Lengthy Interview Process

I’ve got a friend, John, who was interviewing for Director of Inventory at a major shoe company. It would’ve been huge role for him, and probably the highest level he could hope to achieve in his career. It was really awesome.

Obviously, as part of his interviewing process, they were doing a background check on his past work and verifying his credentials. John had been working in inventory to some extent for nearly his entire career – he started his time with this company as the stock guy in the backroom, and his ascent to the top of the corporate office was the best-case scenario for every stock guy.

The company called me to detail my experiences in working with him. I’m a firm believer in fairness and honesty, and I wanted to make sure my answers reflected that. I answered some basic questions about working with John – I liked him – and what they had heard reflected the person I knew. Eventually, they mentioned that when they talked to another past co-worker of mine, she had noted that John had a tendency as a stock guy to put things in the wrong place. It wasn’t anything egregious, but there were certainly some Pumas in the Nike section from time to time. I told the company that this was true, and for the sake of transparency, I mentioned to them that I knew there were some inconsistencies with inventory levels while we worked there. I told them that I never saw anything firsthand, but that as the stock guy, inventory was mainly his responsibility. It certainly wasn’t an accusation, but I would feel uneasy if I wasn’t transparent with them. They thanked me for my time and we moved on.

Over the course of the next week, several former coworkers from the shoe store and I had a few text exchanges about John’s potential promotion. We were all honest with each other about what we had told the company. The girl mentioned that she told them great things, but that occasionally the stock room was improperly organized. I told them that I told the company about our inventory issues, but didn’t place any blame on John. Another former co-worker chimed in the next day and said that he had seen John letting his friend in the back door on more than one occasion, but that nothing ever came of it when he reported it to the manager. This was the first we had heard about this accusation, and it caught all of us a bit off guard. Combined with what I knew about inventory levels being off, this started to make us feel a bit uneasy about John’s time working with us. We had no concrete evidence other than bits and pieces that we saw ourselves, but it sure started to seem like John was stealing from the company in the time that we worked together.

It seems that the company arrived at a similar conclusion. Although they had no concrete evidence of theft, and even though it was several years ago, they didn’t feel comfortable having someone head up their inventory team who had a shaky past in that space, and John didn’t get the job. There were enough signs pointing to something sketchy going on that, despite years of success in his career, they didn’t feel comfortable putting him in such an important role. I certainly respected their decision.

John was, of course, upset. He downplayed the happenings of those events and insisted that he operated on a clean slate. For all I know, he may be right. I don’t have anything certain that proves otherwise, but several separate accounts acknowledging similar behavior makes me incredibly skeptical.

The company’s decision feels reasonable and justified. For such an important position, it makes sense to hold applicants to such high standards. I reached out to John and told him that maybe this just wasn’t the career for him. If he wants to apply to a job that disregards troubled pasts for the sake of their own agenda, maybe he should apply to be a Supreme Court Justice instead.