I applied for a summer internship as a program manager at the on campus job fair. I got an on campus interview. About two weeks after this interview I got the good news that I had passed it and was moving on to interviewing at Seattle. They told me to expect an email soon. I received an email about coordinating the times. I sent a response. A week later the scheduler sends an email asking for a response. I told her I had responded and she replied saying she had found the email. Because of this the whole process got delayed and me and the scheduler kept going back and forth with available days until I get a surprise call from a Microsoft recruiter asking if I had any questions for my interview tomorrow. I was still in San Diego. I had not received anything about an interview date or confirming it. It ended up being their mistake and eventually the scheduler told me that the positions had been filled for that year and to try again next year. It was so disappointing because it was my third time interviewing with them and it was my first time I got invited up to Seattle and because of their mistake I didn't even get a chance to try.

Not a great experience with interviews taking 1 month to complete. Despite ongoing communication, the role did not move forward, reportedly due to approval constraints. The overall experience highlights a gap in aligning internal approvals before progressing candidates to advanced stages. Clearer communication and better alignment internally would improve the candidate experience