Should you even bother with a one-way interview

Question

I made it to the interview stage for a business analyst internship. I was disappointed, though, to learn that it would be a one-way interview. In a nutshell, you record yourself responding to various questions given by the hiring company.

I understand that this is to weed people out, and I have done once previously a one-way interview. However, I made a promise to myself that I would never do an interview in this way again because it screams laziness on the part of the hiring company, and I could spend hours practicing for it only to come up empty-handed. I would even understand if they conducted a technical test of some sort to weed people out.

**Now, should I even bother with this interview?**

Answer 1

I feel humiliated by self-interviews and I’ve always walked away if one was proposed to me. Never regretted the decision.

Answer 2

I don’t do recorded interviews. If they don’t treat me as an individual I don’t take them serious.

Answer 3

>I understand that this is to weed people out

Yup. The question is whether you want to be weeded out or not.

Answer 4

Take the interview as both the interviewer and interviewee.  During the interview, escalate things to a full fledge argument.

Answer 5

Ask yourself this: “is a company that one-way interviews me going to pay well?”

Answer 6

They’re annoying, not much worse than the usual initial screening interviews with the HR people though. I would do it, just don’t stress about it too much.

Answer 7

I’ve never even heard of this and it’s not something I think I would do

Answer 8

I did poorly on such format but I have gotten a job that way so I don't actively avoid it.

Answer 9

depends on how badly you want/need the job

Answer 10

>Now, should I even bother with this interview?

I used to fret over interview styles, then I realized that I was probably not seeing the obvious - if I wasn't willing to do something that wasn't harmful or otherwise advantage taking, did I even want that particular job? The answer, it turned out, was usually "no."

Now, sometimes the answer is no *because* of what the interview process looked like - I recently interviewed for a job I was sure I'd want but they were throwing out red flags like crazy and finally, mid-way through the last coding exercise, I just stopped. I sent a nice e-mail to the HR recruiter explaining that I was no longer interested in the position and left it behind me. It felt pretty great, to be honest, but I certainly wish I had come to that realization sooner.

In short, if something like a video screen/one-way interview is throwing you off the hunt, maybe it's time to consider whether this is even a job you want or a company you want to work for. If it is, I'd say move forward with the interview despite it's being annoying. And if not, well ... don't.