My interview process began with a recruiter call, which was positive, friendly, and left me with a good impression of the company and the role. This was followed by a product conversation. Unfortunately, the experience during this stage felt quite different. From the moment the call began, I sensed that the person was disengaged and somewhat disinterested. Their demeanour suggested they were either unprepared or simply not invested in the conversation. I did not progress to the next stage, which I accept. However, the feedback I received was a generic (“didn’t go into enough detail.”), not especially constructive. If the person wanted more depth, it would typically be their responsibility to probe, ask follow-ups, or guide the conversation, especially when discussing complex product problems that require context to unpack. What was most disappointing was that the feedback felt low-effort. Candidates invest significant time preparing for interviews, so it seems reasonable to expect at least one clear, specific reason with examples why someone isn’t the right fit. That level of transparency is not only respectful but also helps candidates improve.

-Recruiter call -Manager call -Case presentation (never happened) -I assume final interview They reached out to me on LinkedIn. Overall, the recruiter seemed unorganised and there were little hiccups each time we scheduled calls. After the first two calls, they asked me prepare a case of the improvements I would make to their product. There was a gap in me submitting the case as I was traveling and unable to work on it, so when I came back I checked in if they were still hiring for the role. They said yes I asked me to submit my slides ahead of the interview. Then never scheduled the interview and when I followed up they said they were changing direction to use the budget they had for the product manager role for an engineer instead. Mind you, in this time frame the hiring manager shared my google slides internally as I got requests for access from them. Shady.