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Job applicant meets hiring manager who was his firing manager 2 years ago, and manages to get job offer nonetheless: ‘Walked into a final round interview and the hiring manager was the person who fired me two years ago’

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  • Smiling bearded man in a white button-down shirt talking on his smartphone while sitting at a desk with a laptop and coffee cup in a modern office setting.
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  • Walked into a final round interview and the hiring manager was the person who fired me two years ago

    So some context: I (34M) was let go from my previous company about two years ago during a round of layoffs.
  • My direct manager at the time, I'll call him D, was the one who delivered the news.
  • It wasn't personal, the whole department got cut, and honestly D was always decent to me.
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  • No bad bl d, we just lost touch after. Fast forward to last month. I applied to a mid-size tech company, went through two phone screens and a technical round, all with HR and a team lead I'd never met.
  • Everything went well, they moved me to the final round and told me I'd be meeting the hiring manager.
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  • I show up to the video call, the camera turns on, and it's D. There was maybe a two second delay where we both just stared at each other.
  • Smiling red-haired man with a short beard sitting at a desk in a bright office, hands clasped, looking toward a computer monitor during a meeting or video call.
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  • Then he laughed. Then I laughed. It was genuinely one of the strangest moments I've had in a professional setting.
  • Here's the thing tho - it actually went really well? Because we already had two years of work history together he skipped about half the standard questions and we spent most of the time talking about how I'd grown since then and what I'd done differently.
  • He already knew how I operated under pressure, he'd seen it firsthand. I didn't have to perform anything.
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  • I got the offer the next day. Start in three weeks. I guess my takeaway is that your reputation follows you in ways you don't always expect, and that includes the good parts.
  • I left that job professionally even when it hurt, stayed respectful, and apparently that mattered more then I realised at the time.
  • Has anyone else had something like this happen? Feels like a weird small world moment I need to debrief somewhere.
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  • TobididiT That's exactly how that type of encounter should Go, Goodluck G
  • tokyo_olivermoon Original Poster's Reply Thanks, G. I was bracing for awkwardness, but it ended up feeling like a quiet reference check in real time. Guess leaving on decent terms really matters.
  • Adventurous-Cycle363 Glad that people in the world still behave like mature and responsible adults, as they should. I wish this was the majority though..
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  • tokyo_olivermoon Original Poster's Reply Totally agree. Layoffs are messy and I carried some baggage, so seeing him pop up on camera hit me in the stomach for a second. But the fact we could laugh, talk through what I've learned since, and keep it respectful felt like the best-case outcome. If more people treated exits that way, careers would be a lot less stressful.
  • TonyBrooks40 as the saying goes 'Don't burn bridges'
  • tokyo_olivermoon Original Poster's Reply Facts. I'm so glad I didn't say anything spicy on my way out back then
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  • MJ50inMD How did he not recognize the applicant's name from the resume with the added help of a prior employer's name?
  • Charming_Anxiety Fired and laid off aren't the same.
  • Interesting-Bug2812 You weren't fired.
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  • AriOshu So D didn't remember your name or even bother looking at your resume ahead of time? That's weird, but congrats.
  • Wise-Independence487 Brilliant news. You had the right attitude, it wasn't personal. I was made redundant I would work under my old boss, the boss that my team worked with not a chance. She gave feedback in a car with other passengers. I had 2 weeks where I worked under her, she basically left me doing nothing and contacted me not once. I hope she has explosive diarrhoea in a traffic jam.
  • TrickdaddyJ My dad always preached to never burn bridges. It's a crazy small world in the scheme of things.
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  • jccaclimber I think your title makes more of this than is accurate. The person in the interview was the one who had to deliver the news, not someone who wanted you gone. It sounds like this interaction went as it should, though let's be clear, they should have known who you were before getting to the interview if they did any review of your resume.

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