Senior-level role was reclassified

Has anyone else run into this before?

I interviewed for a Senior Systems Administrator position for a semi-medium-sized company. Everything seemed ok and I was certainly qualified for the role. Interview went well, but HR came back and said they reviewed their positions and decided to not hire a senior-level role. They reposted the job immediately after emailing me this with the senior part taken out of the title and for the database parts that were previously required are now just preferred. They hammered me on my database experience but nothing I couldn't handle. It's also worth pointing out this job was posted for a good five-six months and they requested that I come in and talk about this role with them (I originally declined going after it, but rekindled it months later).

I've moved on already, but the first time I have seen this occur myself. I'm thinking it might just be all about money and they did not like the cost of a senior-level person. I was not far off market pricing for this work, at least my research/experience here is pretty accurate as I've been aware of this market for many years. In phone screening they mentioned to me about one candidate who required over six figures (we wont hire someone at that level was the message) - which is quite far outside of the expected salary range in this town for this type of role. Never will know if they had other candidates recently (indications were strongly no), but I was likely the catalyst for this change.

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Comments

Codyy

RoyalRaven wrote: »

Has anyone else run into this before?

I'm thinking it might just be all about money and they did not like the cost of a senior-level person.

Nailed it. It's always about the money. Likely scenario: They'll end up settling for someone less qualified who will accept a much lower salary, which will end up being a mistake if the role is overly technical. The department will be in shambles, management will spend countless hours trying to figure out the issue, and eventually HR will justify it as a lack of qualified candidates in the area. Rinse and repeat until they finally decide to pay for the appropriate candidate, and that poor guy/girl will walk into a mess.

/rant

ratbuddy

It could be budget, or it could be movement within the company/department. When we have openings for a senior level role, but then an internal candidate is promoted to senior, the job posting changes to a non-senior role. Happens fairly often.

echo_time_cat

Codyy wrote: »

Nailed it. It's always about the money. Likely scenario: They'll end up settling for someone less qualified who will accept a much lower salary, which will end up being a mistake if the role is overly technical. The department will be in shambles, management will spend countless hours trying to figure out the issue, and eventually HR will justify it as a lack of qualified candidates in the area. Rinse and repeat until they finally decide to pay for the appropriate candidate, and that poor guy/girl will walk into a mess.

/rant

^ This! Oh, how many times I've seen this...

sj4088

Interesting. What town are you in? In my town most senior systems engineers make six figures or at least close to it. Many make up to 125k.

RoyalRaven

sj4088 wrote: »

Interesting. What town are you in? In my town most senior systems engineers make six figures or at least close to it. Many make up to 125k.

Northwest Ohio area. Cost of living/housing is lower than average, so wages are in parallel. There are a few positions that cross that, but they are quite rare.

zcarenow

That company went cheap.

blargoe

This happened to a co-worker of mine earlier this year. They were even getting ready to process the background check, drug screen, etc, then the company demoted the hiring manager and reclassified the role into a lesser role, and moved the Sr. responsibilities to other existing roles. He didn't take the job, of course.