Help with a particular location preference question-- Interview Friday!

Submitted by Maui Luka
in
General Questions and Comments

 Hi everyone

I have an interview on Friday with a company that is based in my current city, let's say Los Angeles. A recruiter has put me forward to the company and they are meeting me with a panel interview.

I really want the position, however, my circumstances have changed since the recruiter's initial interest in me.

I want to do the job, but I want to do it in a city that is a one hour plane ride away, lets say San Francisco, where the company also has an office, although it is secondary in size to the one in LA.

As far as I know, the role is based in LA. How do I ask for negotiation on location? Do I mention this at the interview, or wait until I am given an offer?

I'm really struggling with the ethical and honest way to let them know, that I DO want the job, but really prefer to do it in the other city (so we can move closer to family with health issues).

My husband thinks I should ask at the interview, and I tend to think it would knock me out of considerationand probably piss  off the recruiter, so I feel like I'd be better off waiting until I have an offer. What do you brilliant people think? The location preference podcast was helpful, but of course, didn't directly answer this particularity.

 

 

Any help or suggestions much appreciated.

 

Thank you

Samaui

Submitted by Maura Shortridge on Wednesday September 5th, 2012 2:06 pm

Until you have something, you have nothing.  I would not ask during the interview whether I could work from the other campus, and I definitely wouldn't mention why, as that could raise red flags (regardless of whether that would be fair or not).  But that doesn't mean you can't get any information about whether it would even be a possibility...
I think if it comes up in conversation you could ask about the overall team environment and structure, and whether their day-to-day work involves teams that are spread across different locations - that's pretty common these days, but if they say nope, we're all here and we're at each other's desks constantly, well, that's an important piece of information, but you haven't tipped your hand by asking.  You can also ask about career mobility or a long-term track, to see if the SF office has people in the same kinds of roles as the LA office does.  That would be a pretty innocuous way of getting information too.