SINGAPORE: A Singaporean was taken aback after reading a Glassdoor review in which a job applicant revealed that her interview at a well-known local library stretched on for nearly four weeks.
Struck by how demanding the process seemed for a non-executive role, she went online to ask why hiring procedures have become so lengthy and “intense.”
According to the review, the timeline was unusually long, and the process itself felt unnecessarily tedious. The applicant explained that she had to prepare a presentation on library operations before the interview and deliver it during the session. After that, she had to sit for a written test that took about 30 minutes.
She also noted that the interview environment felt cold and unwelcoming, with the panel appearing disengaged and “just going through the motions,” which made the whole experience even more discouraging.
Reacting to the review, the Singaporean said: “Do people in the tertiary education field really think they’re so high up that becoming a librarian requires a presentation and a written test?”
“HR probably has too much free time.”
The post prompted a wave of responses online. One Redditor called the process “overboard for a school library position” and suggested that such thorough screening would make more sense for highly specialised roles, like positions at a national archive.
Another commented that if landing a job demands this much effort, they might as well stick to gig work, adding, “HR probably has too much free time and nothing better to do.”
A third offered a more practical view, saying that rigorous screening is now common in many workplaces. “For any role, if you were a manager, you wouldn’t want someone who causes problems. Screening helps filter such candidates. Is it the best or fairest way? No, but there aren’t many better alternatives,” they explained.
A fourth Redditor said, “It has been an employer’s labour market for quite some time. Maybe there are just too many applicants, and they want to hire the ‘best’?”
In other news, a young woman is pleading for advice online after discovering that her mum is being bullied into working overtime for free.
On Monday (Dec 1), the woman shared in a post on the r/askSingapore forum that her mum’s work usually ends at 5:30 p.m. (as stated in her employment contract), and she normally reaches their house around 6:00 p.m. However, ever since her new boss joined the company, her mum has been coming home past 8:30 p.m. almost every day.
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