Recruitment, the Frontier Way

Candidates often ask us what the recruitment process at Frontier is like and whether it is as contrarian as the culture at Frontier. Given that, we thought to write a post on it which we can share with future candidates.

While specifics for roles differ, the underneath captures what everyone has to go through, including interns, on whose recruitment we place as much weight as on longer term posts.

The key take away from this is, it is very hard to get any sort of position at Frontier. There is a range of tests/interviews you need to take part in that would take a lot of your time, and even at the final level, after going through many hours of your time and ours, you still have a high chance of being rejected. This can be the cause of hard feelings by some, but in our view has been essential to our success.

As you may know from past blog posts, the work environment at Frontier is very independent and democratic. And this philosophy extends to the recruitment process as well.

The initial stages would have any new candidate sitting through multiple tests/questions. Some are done online, in keeping with our largely remote work culture. The tests done would be dependent on the role for which she is being hired. An economics related hire would face economics related testing and an equity related hire would face capital market related testing. Most interviews happen after this stage. Very often we try to schedule recruitments at a time we can blind test similar candidates. I.e. Tests are often given for which the answers are sent to the assessors (which include Amal, our CEO) without the candidates’ names on the answers. This is to assess the tests separate from the identity of the test taker without any sense of bias.

However, towards the end of the process, each candidate will have to be given the go ahead by every team member, including current interns. A new candidate will only move forward if he receives unanimous approval from the team, a question which is put to them on an anonymous basis, so they can answer it freely.

Further, at Frontier, prestigious qualifications and pedigree count for much less than how a candidate performs at our own tests. Almost all judgement is carried out based on performance during the in house tests that every candidate will be put through. Even those who have failed in the traditional sense but do well at the tests will find themselves on similar footing to those who have perfect CVs or perfect grades.

Even if we feel a candidate would be really great through all this, at varied points in the process we try to understand if Frontier is the best thing for them as we are open about what we don’t offer.

If we also feel that they would do better for themselves in another firm, even though they would add a lot of value to us, we lead them that way, because a core value we have is that:

… we help all stakeholders make the BEST CHOICE, even if it is not with Frontier.

We believe it is the right thing to do, to help team members find better jobs, and our clients better business partners, if Frontier is no longer their best choice.