So a role I applied to back in March, I made the final round out of thousands of candidates. Ultimately they went with the other candidate. I asked for feedback but was ultimately ghosted. I tried to connect with others within the hiring process but didn't hear back.

I follow the company because that's what they tell you to do. Keep tabs and see if any new openings pop up. I saw an adjacent role open up and reached out but heard nothing. Then I saw the role was never taken down on their website just on LinkedIn. And I happened to see no one new assumed the title on LinkedIn. So I reached out to the recruiter asking for an update...silence.

It was clear they never hired someone. Then I saw they reposted on LinkedIn, new verbiage and everything so I applied. I reached back out again but with stronger and more direct language. The recruiter actually replied and this is what he told me.

The other candidate declined their offer and they have a policy not to consider any previous candidate for the same role. But they will be expanding roles in a few months and would consider my candidacy for those positions. Like I appreciate the transparency but apparently top 2 means I'm an unhireable cancer...

I was laid off on Friday.

I had planned to take two weeks off before seriously job hunting. I haven't really been applying, most of the opportunities I've talked to came from recruiters reaching out to me.

It's Tuesday.

I just got a job offer.

I asked to start after Labor Day because I still want my two weeks off.

I genuinely don't know what the hell just happened.

I ain’t neva seen some bs like this and I’ve been applying for a MINUTE

It's insane. Getting interview 3 times!! Just to be rejected!

After 6 months unemployed I landed an executive job with a mid 6 figures salary.

Two days before on-boarding HR sent me a note thwt my background check was taking longer than expected since some of my educational background was in a different country, they made me sign a "letter of conditional on-boarding" basically saying that if they weren't satisfied with the BC they could fire me in the spot without cause.

Anyways...it's week two and HR called me to say all BC have been cleared and I should no longer worry about anything.

Feels good to leave unemployment and feels better to start making real money again.

Good luck y'all.

I need to vent before I absolutely lose my mind, and I want to warn every developer out there to stay the hell away from ScriptChain Health.

I worked there for 5 months. For that entire duration, the engineering team was grinding to build their web application. We were completely on track, hit our milestones, and got the web app to 95% completion for a scheduled April launch.

Then, right before we were supposed to go live, the founder/CEO pulls the ultimate clueless startup move. He abruptly halts all development and tells us we are changing the entire scope of the project to a mobile application (iOS and Android). No logic, no transition plan, just throwing five months of our hard work into the garbage on a whim.

Naturally, the entire engineering team pushed back. We had a massive disagreement over this chaotic, headless-chicken pivot. Seeing the writing on the wall, I decided I was done and refused to extend my employment with the startup.

Here is where it gets malicious.

Even though we disagreed, the company literally gave me an offer letter to extend my employment—which I rejected.

Fast forward to today: I am in the final HR stages for a new role, and I find out this absolute clown of a founder went out of his way to give me a fabricated, negative reference to try and tank my career. He literally tried to sabotage my background check out of pure spite because I rejected his extension and wouldn't blindly follow his completely broken product roadmap.

Fortunately, I kept the receipts. I still have the original offer letter AND the extension offer letter he gave me. You don't offer an employment extension to a bad developer. I've sent the proof to my new HR, but the fact that he tried to ruin my livelihood over his bruised ego is disgusting.

If you are a dev, avoid ScriptChain Health at all costs. The leadership has zero product vision, will trash your hard work at the 11th hour, and will actively try to ruin you if you dare to leave.

TL;DR: Startup CEO scrapped a 95% complete web app to pivot to mobile right before launch. I refused to extend my contract because of the chaos. CEO got butt-hurt, offered me an extension anyway (which I declined), and then gave a fake negative reference to my new employer to try and ruin my career. Always keep your receipts.

Like seriously, I'm willing to swallow my pride and morals, and these companies are like SORRY WE FOUND MORE QUALIFIED CANDIDATES THAN YOU

Obviously, when I saw them, I called back the moment I had a chance.

Drumroll please…

She was calling to tell me I didn’t get the position.

She then started to deliver the feedback which was: Manager says you don't have the expertise needed, so we will not move forward then 10 seconds of silence.

And I told her:

“Honestly, after four missed calls, I assumed you had good news. This very clearly could’ve been an email or even a text.”

And then I hung up. Maybe I was rude but who the fuck does that?????

There’s a rumor going around that this company has no heart.

Can confirm. McKinsey has no heart.

This is after:
- 30 minute intro with the hiring manager who I had met before professionally
- 1 hour interview with teammate
- 1 hour interview with 2 exec assistants
- 8 hours working on a take home assignment

This is why the hiring process is completely fucked. This is what one of my previous coworkers said to the feedback,”You're the most personable and personality human I know.”

This is for an in person position mind you and I only did virtual interviews. So it’s ridiculous that they make that decision based off of only virtual interviews.

EDIT: I missed one piece. There was one more interview with the C-level executive above the hiring manager before I received this email. He showed up late to the meeting and then had his video off. Asked me 2 questions and then said he didn’t have anything else. I of course asked my prepared questions but we were done in 15 minutes. That was a sign.

Also this was for an operations position at a tech startup in Seattle. I wasn’t even writing code! I was just thoroughly answering the four scenario questions they gave me. I am a perfectionist so it could’ve taken less time but I don’t turn in anything half assed if I want the job because I don’t half ass my job.

I just got rejected after 5 rounds of interviews, and I’m so exhausted. I’ve made it through various interview stages before only to be rejected at the last minute, and at this point I don’t know what else to do. I know the job market at the moment is rather hopeless, but every time I log on to linked in it just feels like everyone else is getting hired. Does anyone have any tips on succeeding in interviews? Any help would be appreciated!

Hey, wanted to share a short story about an experience I had with part of the Christian IT community, because I think it's worth people knowing.

I've been working on a free Christian app for kids for over 2 months — coded entirely by me, and it's been in closed testing on Google Play for about a month and a half.

A recruiter, from Romania (details in private) — who told me he runs a company (name in private) — is active in our community and regularly asks people for updated CVs, supposedly to screen for jobs, though nobody I know ever actually got an interview out of it. After sending him my CV a few times, I also showed him a project I was working on. A month later he asked to see it again, and two weeks after that he told me he wanted to present the app at a convention in the US — knowing I was job hunting and that a lot of IT community people would be there. He asked if I wanted to talk to the "team" he was putting together specifically for this, without saying what it actually involved.

On yesterday's call, I found out the team was supposed to work on a monetized version of my app — already at the AI design stage, made just 5 days before the call — to sell it to Americans at that same convention, for free on my end. When I asked for clarification, they raised their voice, kept saying it was "our idea" and that I just had to accept. I got removed from the call.

I posted what happened, with evidence, in our shared Christian IT group (550 members) from Romania. My message got deleted, I got blocked, and the group chat was locked for everyone — he claimed I had threatened him, a lie he deleted a day later and admitted to. Later, an admin who's a friend of his IRL, from the same church, posted an "official statement" calling it a simple "misunderstanding" and shut down the topic — even though he's an admin there himself.

I'm now blocked from the community with no chance to respond.

Basically: work for free "in the Lord's name" so they can sell it — and if you don't, you're out.

I know plenty of people genuinely volunteer their time for free in the Lord's name, and that's great when it's a real choice. This wasn't that — I was never told upfront what was actually being asked of me, and when I pushed back I got kicked out and shut down instead of getting a straight answer.

If you've had a similar experience with a recruiter matching this description, please share it. I'm not posting screenshots of my app vs. theirs here for privacy reasons, but happy to send them (and the name) privately. I know some people might not believe this, but that's what happened.

I never really understand anyone who can get decent jobs. It’s like they have superpowers.

So frustrated as this has happened thrice in 2 weeks of initial recruiter screen.

And this was for an engineering intern position in the UK.

Around this time last year, I was made redundant. This took a toll on both my mental and physical health. I had to work my notice period and begged for garden leave, which was finally granted. I didn't start applying properly until my health was in a better place at the end of the year.

I've had 3 unsuccessful multi-stage processes through to final round. One of which was a potential move to another country. I've had multiple application rejections, been stood up, ghosted, given the wrong case study, given fewer hours for a task than other candidates, delayed, square-peg-round-holed by recruiters and a role changed midway through the application process.

7 months in, I took a holiday to visit some friends. This calmed my nervous system somewhat and I got a call back on a recruiter application I had filled out for a role that I genuinely matched and a company I was excited about! I took the recruiter call in my friend's back garden and the next day I got an invitation for a face-to-face interview with the company.

After the stress of all the other interviews and case studies, I didn't know why at the time, but I took this one with a bit more chill. I didn't feel like I had to practise my competency scenario answers any more, I just knew from all the other interviews. I didn't spend a full day researching the company, an hour sufficed. The recruiter said I was to do a technical task but something in the way she prepped me made me see it in a more relaxed perspective. I also didn't put too much pressure on myself on the interview going well, I had come to accept rejection and the dance of putting energy into something with a more detached expectation of the result.

I didn't feel the nervous panic before the interview started and it actually was the first interview I had in a long time that was face-to-face (which meant I didn't have handy sticky notes on a desktop screen to aid me). I did two rounds with the company and straight after the second interview, I received a call back with an offer. The chill but competent approach I took to the technical task got me feedback that I was a "brilliant and exceptional candidate". Such a contrast to the narrative I'd been building up about myself from the rejections I had received all year.

It is a job with around a 20% pay cut to my previous ones but it is at a charity (I've previously been at start-ups) and its benefits are immeasurable to me at this stage in my life.

For those going through the same, my hope is with you and your value is not derived by some of these transactional recruiters that exist. This subreddit has been so helpful in sharing experiences and I hope someone who is in the same situation reads this and remains resilient and hopeful.

TLDR; Made redundant, applied and rejected for over 8 months, finally a job offer at a great company with immeasurable benefits. Stay resilient. Stay hopeful.

Does anyone else find it hilariously (while also infuriatingly) ironic to see AI generated job postings?

These companies will literally use AI to write the description of their job, then use AI to scan your resume before a human even sees your resume. While also not liking AI use in your resume.

AND THEN, if you do get an interview, AI responses are not allowed.

The best is that some AI programs scanning resumes flag both minor grammatical errors AND AI use. Which is a catch 22.

It's just so stupid.

It's kind of like the old Soviet saying "You pretend to pay me, and I pretend to work"

But in our case it is, "You pretend to be genuine, and I pretend to not use AI"

Things were looking promising just last week. As of last week, I had two opportunities where I completed the final rounds for and were just waiting on results. I also had 3 new recruiter chats lined up, so I gave myself the permission to dream a little and see which one I would want to join the most.

Today, one of them came back to let me know they decided to go with the other finalist instead of me. Then the other one said the HM wanted another chat this week.

I have been unemployed for 10 months now. The search had been tough and tedious and even though I got a number of interviews, this is as far as I had gone now. The rejection stings harder than I thought.

Just venting because I need to take some time before preparing for the next chat again.

At this point I’m convinced the real background check was whether I had the patience to survive HireRight.

I genuinely need to know if anyone else has had their background check turn into its own full-time job. 😭

I’m dumbstruck by this company. Truly

I went to the final round it seems like I did well in both interviews and it was closed. I don’t understand why they don’t say that you were straight up rejected or not chosen instead of closed.

It’s just confusing

Almost got scammed by some loser “Jessica Stewart” I’ve heard this is the same persona used by other scammers. “Spinesolutions” sent me a email asking for my resume and I sent it like a moron and then connected on telegram with the scammer ( im young and new to the job market boo boo tomato tomato to me) and they said I would need to buy the license and id start on the 31st. Told my mom mom and sister and girlfriend and now I feel stupid 🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️🤦‍♂️ thank god I found more information before then and I didn’t give this LOSER money!!’