There was a 20 minute phone screen which at the end I was told I'd progressed onto the next stage. This ran through my experience to date, why I wanted to work for the company, leave my current company etc all the usuals. Then there were 2 45 minute interviews about a week or so later. The first is a culture fit interview 1-1 about how you would deal with situations when people needed help, or when you needed to work with other people. Very focused on what type of person you are and if you would gel with the company values. The interview following that was all about the technical aspects of the job and your skills and qualifications, which was with a Manager and a colleague of the same seniority I would be coming in at. I heard back from that about 2 days later and then a week later I came in for my final 3 30 minute interviews. The first was an informal chat to meet my team have coffee etc and chat about myself, also ask any questions about my teams experiences which the company and how they find things etc. Then it was a chat with my manager to run through anything i wanted more detail on, career aspects what to expect from the team and company. The final interview was with the CRO which was really informal again. We spoke about his life and what he'd done in the past, family, motivations in life and then he asked me where Gocardless ranked and if i'd take to job if it was offered. I didn't actually end up getting the job, but 2 days after, I was called back about another position that had just opened up which they thought was a better fit for me. It was and I'm very happy as I didn't think my skillset would have been suited to what I was offered and now I'm learning a new business function which will hopefully serve me well if I decide to move within the business as I can appreciate how certain teams work.

From the initial stages, there was a clear disconnect between the recruitment agency and the internal HR teams - it was obvious that the recruitment agent found GoCardless very difficult to work with, both HR and wider teams. The telephone interview was fairly standard, but when progressing to next stage, I was asked to complete 2 hugely lengthy and time consuming tasks. At this stage in the interview process, I had not met anyone at GoCardless, so was not sure whether or not I wanted to work with them - I sensed a level of arrogance that GoCardless expect so much commitment before really engaging with a candidate. Regardless, and to my own fault, I completed the tasks and was asked for a F2F meeting. From start to finish, the interview was entirely unprofessional. Very little opportunity to find out more about the role, and more of a personality grilling from 4 very unenthusiastic, junior GoCardless employees - despite the fact that they kept assuring me how fun it was to work at GoCardless, the radio silence in the office and their expressions said differently. A positive aspect of the interviewing process was the emphasis on personality fit, as this highlighted the vast differences between what I was looking for in my next role, and what GoCardless could offer. When interviewing mid-senior level roles, GoCardless should be aware that the interview process should be a mutual discovery process - candidates should be in discovery mode as much as the recruiting company. I've read very similar feedback in previous interview reviews, so it might be time for the HR team to start taking notice... GoCardless would do well to remember that, despite aspirations, they are currently a very small direct debit software vendor, not Google!