Usually, during hiring, companies try to make jobs sound easier and more attractive than they really are. Long hours are softened with words like “fast-paced”, pressure is renamed “learning opportunity”, and exhaustion is hidden behind phrases like “passionate team”. Job descriptions are often carefully sugarcoated to ensure candidates don’t feel scared before even applying.
But one man recently came across a job description that did the exact opposite. Mildly concerned by what he read, he shared a screenshot of it on Reddit, saying it felt like the company was “threatening” candidates before they even joined. The post was shared on the r/recruitinghell subreddit, along with what he said was an official document sent to him during his job search.
The document detailed the recruitment process and listed several “Important Points”. What caught people’s attention was the tone. Under working hours, it mentioned “9:30 am till work gets over”, followed by a reminder that this was a startup and that “building anything of value takes time.”
It also openly stated that most employees leave within the first two months because they fail to adjust to the high-speed environment. Another line bluntly warned candidates to expect 10–12 hours of work every day.
The man pointed out that this wasn’t insider gossip or anonymous reviews. According to him, this was official communication sent directly to him. What bothered him most wasn’t even the long working hours, but how burnout seemed to be normalised and framed as a personal weakness. The message, he felt, suggested that exhaustion was inevitable and that if someone couldn’t survive it, the failure was theirs alone.
Source- https://storypick.com/startup-job-description-threats/