Freedom House Interview Questions
& Process

I had a quick phone screening and then a 30-minute panel interview with the team members. It was more casual than I expected. I dressed up, but the interviewer was in a sweatshirt with a messy bun, suggesting a lot of people work from home, which I wasn't looking for in an internship. It was hard to tell what the work environment was really like.

The interview process started with two simple rounds. First, a 30-minute 1-on-1 call with the hiring manager. Then, a panel interview with 3 people from the Eurasia team, and be ready to demonstrate your Russian language skills on the spot. After that, I had a last-minute interview with the director of the Eurasia program, which was quite odd. Some strange, almost insulting comments were made, and the interview vibe was off. I never heard back after that. Just a heads-up, if they don't select you, you'll never hear from them. This has happened to me before after a final round interview.

Skype interview with multiple members of the Freedom House staff. It wasn't too hard, just some questions about my experience, what I knew about the organization, and how my experience fits the job. One question asked about how I would complete a research task. The interview team seemed very nice and I enjoyed speaking with them. However, the one thing that put me off and makes me look on this organization with much less esteem than I did previously is that they made a point of telling me, as in I didn't ask, that they would get back to me within the next week. The next week I waited earnestly for a yes or no, and no response came, none at all, not even a copy and paste form email. Given the time slots they offered me, I know they interviewed a small amount of people. It takes at most 5 minutes to copy and paste a form email to notify applicants who you don't want to go further with, who are people who have invested a large amount of time in writing an application and preparing for an interview, but they chose not to give any response at all. In my view, this shows a great amount of disrespect to applicants who are enthusiastic about the work this organization does. I don't think I'll apply here in the future.

I applied online and was contacted for what I thought was going to be an initial telephone interview with the woman who reached out. However, after we connected (via Skype), she asked for a full video interview, and was joined by program managers. A bit of warning would have been appreciated so that I could properly prepare. Additionally, they laid out a very ambitious hiring timeline over the holidays, that seemed a bit unrealistic. When January rolled around and I hadn't heard back, I sent a quick email asking about the status of the position and emphasizing my continued interest. Freedom House didn't even have the professional courtesy to send a quick "thanks, but no thanks" email back.