There’s not much of substance in the CLO interview section here. There should be, for there’s much in the interview process which can give you a good indicator of what this company is like. It would also be a good idea to review all the entries at this site (and others like it) concerning this employer before even scheduling your interview. I was recently referred to CLO by someone who’d been working there for some time, for a position opening up which was an exact fit for the direction I was moving in my career. The first red flag indicating what kind of issues one could expect with this company came in the initial contact call setting up my interview, from the woman I was going to interview with. She seemed a bit rushed. She opened by telling me that the wage was lower than what I might expect for such a position. I told her I did not expect the kind of wages one could get on the west coast, and that I could manage. She set up an appointment for later in the month and quickly ended the call. Sadly, that call was the most professional part of the interview process. I arrived a few minutes early and entered by the main entrance. There was no clear sign of a receptionist, but the office of the person who referred me had an open door. She was friendly and directed me how to get to the correct office. I found the office, the door was closed, so I waited outside. The door opened at 4pm, our scheduled time, and she emerged. She frowned and ushered me in. She did not smile or offer any of the usual courtesies one would expect in a professional interview. She began with a summary of her qualifications, letting me know she’d been with CLO for thirty years. I’ve never had anyone do that before. It stands to reason that the person interviewing you has the necessary qualifications, the purpose of an interview is to determine if you meet the qualifications for the position and if you would be a good fit for the team or area you’ll be working in. My previous employment was not reviewed at all, the interview simply consisted of pre-employment screening questions involving scenarios one might encounter on the job or review similar scenarios one has faced in the past. Most were of the hypothetical nature, which means the answers were subject to the perspective of the interviewer without a clearly defined right or wrong answer. There was little opportunity to respond, with no follow up questions for clarification. There were follow up questions when she seemed to feel there was a deficit of some kind, a good example being questions about educational background (which did not include on-the job and in-service trainings). She breezed past any answers which focused on experience, with a slight frown every time an answer was given which she couldn’t tear into without giving me an opportunity to respond or clarify. At the conclusion of the interview, she was evasive and vague when I asked about a timeline for response. The answers to my questions about the timeframe of hiring were vague to the point of being ridiculous (oh, the new director starts May 25th, it could be weeks before she even looks at the issue). Her dissembling stood in stark contrast to the razor sharp and unfriendly persona she demonstrated during the rest of the interview. As we were concluding she informed me it would “not be necessary ” for me to exit the way I had come in, showing me a lower level exit, as I opened the door she pointed toward to the parking lot, with no exiting pleasantries at all. I was pretty sure this was a ghost interview— in order to meet legal requirements, external interviews are often held even though an internal candidate is already preselected, fairly qualified or not. Having the interview does meet the legal requirements of an open interview process, but it does not guarantee a fair one. . It’s a disrespectful practice which wastes the candidate’s time, as well as bypassing a fair and unbiased process. Given the frosty reception and vaguely resentful attitude which set the tone for my interview experience, I was prepared for outcome one would expect from a ghost interview. The interviewer’s vague response time had implied no action prior to the start date of a new program director. However, I was I was contacted the day after the interviewer had told me the new head of the department would start by an HR representative a subordinate of the interviewer. He informed me that they had decided to go with an internal hire. He then indicated that there was an open position at another site, but it was only 29 hours, offered no benefits, and involved an out-of-town commute. I told them to have the site give me a call and set up an interview. I was curious to see whether anyone would actually call from that site, no one ever did.