Rockwell Automation (RA) (TWINSBURG OH) is below parity in the recruitment process compared to industry peers. I went through two separate recruiting processes with RA and will reflect on them both.
1. June 2020 - Total interviews were 30 minute phone screening (generic, not asking any STARS questions), 1 hour interview with direct report (some STARS questions, poor quality in describing expectations of career opening), 1 hr (panel) with team members (team members were extremely under prepared, did not ask challenging questions, or provide any insight when asked to describe the career expectations), 1 hr with hiring manager (panel) (this featured more STARS questions, had a "Lightning Round" in which random buzzwords were thrown out to gauge your understanding - not sure why a pop quiz is appropriate). The final interview also featured a few question prompts, one was to provide insight as why a process had variation in its efficiency. Interestingly enough during my second round of interviewing with this company, I asked this question to various individuals and none of them could communicate a response when put on the spot. The overall interview process ran about 2 - 3 weeks. RA did not reach out and I had to close the loop only to receive an automated response that I would not move forward as a candidate. For as major as a time commitment RA requires, communication of candidacy is far below parity of peers.
2. Jan 2021 - Originally applied for Sr. Manufacturing Engineer role, was informed via phone this was filled but a Manufacturing Engineering role was available which I could be a candidate for. During the initial phone screening, the recruiter (same as June) was unprepared and did not seem to verify my information was current for the position they were interviewing me for. I had to request that they go into their system to verify I had applied (they switched HR systems to workday). I found this extremely unprofessional, as because of this negligence I was unable to track the status of the candidacy through the Workday portal. This interview process had a 30-minute phone screening, followed by a 60-minute video interview with the direct report. The direct report did not follow STARS format questions, and generally seem underprepared or uninterested in properly evaluating the candidacy. The final interview in this process was with one HR rep and one manager familiar with the department. The manager previously interviewed the candidate in June, the interview featured some STARS questions but was in general informal and neither party seemed to be well prepared. The HR rep and Manager had no response when asked what the next steps were - this is not a situation I have observed when interviewing before, extremely unprofessional. No offer was received for this candidacy, and the process of interviewing took over four weeks. Candidate had to reach out 5 weeks later just to close the loop, this time a response from the recruiter instead of a system generated response.
As an individual hunting for a new career since June 2020, I have found RA to be far below parity in their recruitment process compared to peers. Be prepared to bend over backwards to work their extremely lengthy interview process into your schedule. Companies larger than RA have streamlined recruitment processes, and RA has the absolute worst communication throughout the entire process. The interviews themselves are extremely generic, procedural but do not objectively aid the recruiters to determine competitive qualities between candidates. This feedback is not biased, it is based off of personal experience interviewing with companies such as Eaton, Parker-Hannifin, Steris, Lubrizol, Pentair, Philips, and Sherwin-Williams.
