ASM’s HR team initially reached out to me for what was positioned as a no-obligation conversation. I was intrigued, primarily because ASM has been gaining significantly more visibility and momentum in the industry than it had in previous years, so I thought it was worth exploring. I’ve never been approached for a simple “hear me out” call! To my surprise, the initial conversation was excellent. The recruiter who contacted me was highly engaging and he did an impressive job representing the company and the technology roadmap. Despite there not being a specific role identified at that stage, he genuinely got me excited about ASM as an organization — which is no small feat given how long I’ve been in this industry. Following that conversation, the recruiter came back to let me know a potential opportunity was opening up, and I was enthusiastic about moving forward with interviews. Unfortunately, my experience with the hiring manager was markedly different. The interaction felt transactional from the outset. There was little effort made to properly introduce himself beyond mentioning the product group he worked in before immediately diving into questions about my PhD and my experience at competing firms. I also found it surprising when he characterized some of my questions as “too personal.” I had asked fairly standard leadership and culture questions — how long he had been at ASM, what his own career journey looked like, and why he would personally recommend ASM as a place to work. In my experience, those are entirely reasonable discussions during a senior-level interview process. After several additional conversations with various executive team members, I ultimately received an offer. However, I decided to decline, primarily because the equity component was not compelling enough relative to my current package (Bay Area) That said, I would absolutely consider ASM again in the future — ideally for a different organization within the company and with a more competitive long-term incentive structure.