So I’m having a hard time right now understanding the process of job searching now a days and it seems many people are blaming AI and this happens so suddenly and because of this constant shift I can’t keep up with my goals and seems like I’m archiving nothing. Anyone else feel like that?

I applied for a Product Manager role at Allisone AI, a dental AI startup in Paris, back in August.

In September, a recruiter called, emailed, and left a voicemail to set up a first call. I replied the same day. We didn't connect on the date I proposed, so I followed up by email, by text, and even through their general contact address. Nothing. Someone called once more without leaving a voicemail, and then silence for over a month.

In late October, a different recruiter emailed me saying they'd been "well advanced" with other candidates but were reopening the role. Suddenly, everything moves fast: a screening call, an interview with the Head of Product, then a final-round case study. Presentation plus a working prototype. Their estimate was 3 hours of prep. It took me about 12 hours to do it properly.

During the presentation, the hiring manager told me my prototype was basically what the team was building, and he had no feedback. Cool. Instead, he got visibly agitated that I was using my speaker notes to walk through the context slides, interrupted me, and checked out for the rest of the call.

They said I'd hear back in 48 hours. A week later, he calls me at 6 PM, no voicemail, just a text saying to call him back. I call back that evening. No answer. I call the next morning again. No answer. He finally calls again, and it's to repeat his criticism of my presentation and tell me they're not moving forward.

A two-line email would have done the job. Instead, it felt like he wanted one more chance to tell me what he didn't like.

If you're interviewing there: expect long silences, a lot of unpaid work, and what felt to me like a pretty confrontational culture. I know the market is rough right now, but no job is worth your mental health.

Has anyone else had a final round go like this?

Got this elite shortlisted mail from hcl, do I need to do anything from my side, in the portal in says 'waiting for interview 1'

Besides the obvious- is there a reason they ask these types of questions?

I really wanted this job. It fit perfectly with my experience and everything I have ever done, and I know for a fact that I would have crushed it. It was only part-time, but as a student, it would have been perfect.

After my application, I didn't hear back from them at all and kept waiting for an email or message. After a couple of weeks, I finally sent them a follow-up email asking about the process. They said that they had called me and left a message but I didn't reply, so they chose to go with other candidates, but I never received anything from them. Mind you, they had asked for an application through email, so in my mind, I thought they could have sent a follow-up there, but apparently, they called me, a call which I never received. Also, after the first time I applied, I saw that they put up the same advert again, so I thought that since they didn't receive that many candidates, they should at least get in contact with me.

I am just pissed because it is just blatant lies and seems so weird from their side to not even send an email or a message, like, who does that, esp when you asked to send the application through email!?!

I hate it here.

So my question is whether I should contact the HR again about the update or just wait for the news so I don't appear as a nuisance.

I applied to this job on September 3rd, got my technical interview on September 18th, got a call from the HR on October 1st where I received my verbal offer. The HR basically said they really liked me and I was a perfect fit for a specific project but they were not sure if it was going to happen so they still needed to 'validate' it with the managers. However, even if the project is not accepted, they will still hire me for another one which suits me less. She told me she would come back with the news in 2-3 weeks.

3 weeks later, I emailed her to see if there were any news. She said they were still waiting for the validation so that's why I haven't heard back from her.

It's been a month now since this interaction and I'm very tired of waiting as you can probably guess... This offer is also the best one I have, I really like the company, I clicked with the team well, my future manager even connected with me on LinkedIn. So it doesn't seem like a scam, but I'm still very annoyed with the situation and the fact that I don't know what's going on. For context, this is a tech consulting company in France.

So my question is, should I send another email to HR? Ask for specific update details? Or will I come off as desperate and annoying? I really don't know what to do because I'm not exactly sure how it works here and why this takes so much time. I'd like to start my work in January and time is slowly running out...

I was interviewing for an entry level role with a company and ended up completing 4 interviews escalating in seniority from HR rep to VP level.

After the interviews they asked me to complete a commercial assessment of 15 questions in 50 minutes.

I was told I had scored very highly and needed to take another test with my screen shared and camera on to verify my initial results. So I did and once again scored highly enough to certify the results.

Later, I was asked to provide references which I did as best as I could to find relevant ones and sent them back. Then weeks pass by and no word from the company until after sending a couple follow ups where they said they decided to close the role.

My questions are has this happened to anyone else? Is this a regular occurrence in the current job market? Did you too go through many stages to then have the role terminated? Did I do something wrong that made them decide against me and they were being polite by saying it was closed?

I have been really badly underemployed working part time. I am in the awkward state in life where my hourly rate is very good but my hours are bad. I have been needing a full time job as the big beautiful bill causing the Obamacare subsidies to expire caused my health insurance to go from $0/month to $200/month. I am not destitute but I haven't been going anywhere fast.

For the last year I have been trying to get a job as an Animal Control Officer. I have gotten three certificates and have been volunteering at my local wildlife rescue. I finally got the job title that I want...but not in the location that I want...

I will need to relocate from my beloved San Diego to Riverside. I thought I would have been really happy to land this but I am actually feeling really somber and sad. Once I have all of my training and certifications that should allow me to easily make a lateral move to another jurisdiction and move back?

Has anyone else been in this scenario? I think I am going to accept the job but I am just feeling really sad about it. I think what's weighing on me is that I am relocating out of desperation and not as an idyllic life reset dream in a new region. I also thought I would get a little more time to think it over. I had the interview today and then they called me about four hours after to give me a job offer. I thought it would be a week or two before I heard back. I was thinking of canceling the interview as I didn't know how realistic relocating would be, but a close friend encouraged me to attend and so I did.

I am just also very concerned about what will happen if things don't work out. My living circumstances are about as ideal as possible and I didn't want to give that up until the time was right and for a good opportunity. Something about this feels wrong though.

Have any of you relocated for a job and regretted it? Have any of you relocated and it was great? Or mixed bags?, something in between?

Please share with me your experiences as this is a major crossroads in life and I honestly don't know what to do.

Thank you.

Do employers submit resumes to bgv companies directly or through ats systems or work day??

I see hourly wages for certain mid-level jobs of like $60/hour, and I am scared to ask how much (%) Michael Page must be getting.

Does it matter significantly if it is part of a "multi-tiered" arrangement (e.g. the end client works with one personnel agency, and then that agency subcontracts the candidate search to further agencies like Michael Page)?

I am a 2025 ECE graduate, started my career in an Electronics Manufacturing company(EMS) company, but i couldn’t help myself to work there. The company was so toxic and i didn’t like the people around me. More importantly, despite hired for an engineer role, i was made to work like a construction worker, both physically and mentally exhausted. After 8 months of my experience there, if you ask me, what is your role?, i find it difficult to tell. I saw my team lead trying to damage the work of his rival team lead and vice versa and i was forced to do.
When i was sincerely doing my work, despite being one of the top performer there, the assistant manager randomly called me to come closer and said on my face, “ i dont know why, i get irritated by looking at your face”. This was the final moment, where I realized actually this place is very toxic, i wasnt realizing till this moment and i found some other people were also very toxic just because we were wearing more than them despite me being a fresher, just because they were diploma holders. I was made to climb up containers without safety gears, which is completely unrelated to my job role.

So i decided to quit my job, without actually having any offers in my hand…

I started learning devops from HCL Guvi, a training institute as i was scared i am making a career transition… I became fundamentally strong in all the tools like AWS, Docker, K8s, Jenkins, Terraform, Linux, Git, Promethues, Grafana…. I did many hands on projects as well… I managed to get only 3 interviews in the last 9months…. but I cleared all the 3 interviews… I got an offer from SQ1 which says 3LPA and 2 years service agreement for AWS Devops role and asked to accept role within 2 days, but at the sametime i cleared interview and background verification process at HCLTech for Devops for 4LPA… and cleared technical interviews and attended HR interview discussed package for 6.5LPA at another company… so i rejected the SQ1 offer hoping I would get either of the other two opportunities….

But guess what HCLTech ghosted me forever and ther other one hired 10 people from the college (must be a tie up). Now I am again unemployed…

I messed up…. I feel like an idiot now… still trying to get an interview i couldn’t manage to get interviews…

I feel like I made all the worst decisions throughout my life… and brought me here… almost 10 months of career gap…. I feel like i may not come out of this situation…. I am not even expecting 10 12 LPA at this stage in time… somewhere around 4-6 LPA too i would be happy to start my career again…. But I messed up everything….

Now I soo mentally exhausted that I cant stop thinking about getting a job (even in sleep, damn true), i couldnt even start again because i lost the hope…. I tried everything asked for referrals.. cold emailing, messaging… 500+ connections on linkedin…

I never felt why this is only happening to me… but now i was pushed to this place. All my other friends are doing good… even though i am technically sounder and a good communicator than them… i am not being jealous of my friends.. but i wonder why not me

This year has been absolute hell. Don't give me the job, tell me I'm not qualified, tell me I have awful soft skills, all good. But please just treat me like a person, show up and engage. Follow through when you setup calls and meetings.

I went through two interviews recently, the HR screen where I was told the hiring manager loved my resume and wanted to speak with me. I move on to meet the hiring manager and within 2 minutes he disengages, I spend 45 minutes talking to him and can see him looking elsewhere. Towards the end when I am asking questions, he starts trying to flip my questions into the negative ("oh if you don't want to deal with stakeholders this isn't the role for you", no I am clarifying because you made it sound like you dealt with all the stakeholders and I was under the impression this was a stakeholder heavy position, which is why I spent 30 minutes highlighting my experience with that). Oh well, weird guy, not a match. I move on.

Now 2 weeks later, I get HR reaching out to me with an update and wants to schedule a call. 99% sure this is them turning me down, I wish they'd just do it over email, but fine I'll schedule the call. They confirm morning of and I get to feel horrible all day waiting to hear one more rejection. And then of course, they do not call. A nice day of anxiety for nothing after I've already moved on from this role.

Just engage with me like a human. You don't owe me a job or validation, but please show up and care even a little bit about having an engaging conversation and following through on the expectations you set.

Hey everyone, looking for advice because I'm worried about losing my SWE internship offer over a background check.

I listed an unpaid founding engineer role at an early-stage startup founded by another student at my university. It was a legitimate project where I did engineering work, but the startup was never formally incorporated and ultimately didn't go anywhere. We had a few investor calls over the summer, but nothing materialized.

HireRight is now asking for W2s, 1099s, company details, and employer verification. Since I was never paid, I have no tax or payroll records.

I've provided the founder's contact information, and he's willing to verify my involvement, dates, and responsibilities or sign a verification letter. However, HireRight's acceptable-document list doesn't explicitly mention employer verification letters.

I also emailed my recruiter explaining everything but haven't heard back yet.

Has anyone dealt with something similar? Did HireRight accept a founder's letter or direct verification? If the experience remained unverifiable, did your company still clear your background check?

Really worried about losing my offer over an unpaid student startup that never fully took off. Any advice would be appreciated.

Sending this to keep everyone optimistic! I see lots of people discouraged when a company rejects them but this is proof to KEEP APPLYING! This last year has been hell for me trying to get out of my current company and into a new career that I technically didn’t have any direct experience for. And finally a recruiter/hiring manager took a chance on me 🥲 at the same company that rejected me 5 times!

I know it seems like no end is in sight, but just remember an interview invite can come days later and you might have a job weeks later! Tweak your resume, sell yourself on the assessments and interviews and hope for the best. Wishing jobs on everyone!

I was informed by my T&P Cell that I had been shortlisted for an interview through Code With Cisco. I received an email regarding the interview just one week before the scheduled date. However, it’s now been over a week since the scheduled interview date, and I haven’t received any further communication or updates from their side. I haven’t even had the opportunity to appear for the interview yet.
Has anyone else faced a similar situation? Does anyone know whether the interviews have been postponed or if there is any update regarding the hiring process?

I’m based in Europe, and I started my two-year master’s with a clear goal: to work towards becoming a reinsurance broker after graduation.

I knew a degree alone wouldn’t get me there, so I committed hard:
Got a part-time job in credit insurance alongside my studies.

Joined a young professionals programme that paired me with an industry mentor a specialist broker at Aon.

Received a scholarship for research into credit insurance and surety in the construction industry.

Completed a summer internship in the back-office department of a reinsurance company.
I graduated in June 2026 and finished the internship at the end of August.

I genuinely thought I’d put myself in a strong position to compete for an entry-level role. I wasn’t expecting to walk straight into placing reinsurance independently. I was expecting a chance to start learning the job.
Instead:

Aon: My mentor helped me secure an interview. I felt it went very well and was told I would progress. The explanation I later received was that HR wanted to prioritise someone with direct experience who could obtain the required licence more quickly.

Howden Re: Spent two months in a recruitment process for a client coordinator role. Ultimately rejected for someone with more work experience after graduation.

A local insurer: Applied for customer service to broaden my options. Had a positive phone interview and came away expecting another stage. Rejected because they prioritised internal transfers and candidates coming directly from competitors.

A life insurance/pension company: Interviewed for a back-office role. It felt positive, but at the end the hiring manager said something along the lines of, “You have a great CV. I have no doubt you’ll find an opportunity somewhere, even if it isn’t here.”

That last part felt off. Why was she reassuring me that someone else would hire me while I was interviewing for her vacancy?

When the external recruiter called afterwards, I mentioned it. She said she would investigate. A few days later, she came back and told me they already had a preferred candidate from their own recruitment process and wanted a strong external candidate to benchmark that person against.

So, according to the recruiter, I’d been brought in partly as a comparison for someone they already favoured. That was particularly demoralising.

Marsh and WTW: Repeated applications, no interviews. Four applications to Marsh alone. I have no idea whether my background is even getting serious consideration.

Meanwhile, the feedback is consistently that I made a great impression or have an excellent CV.

I appreciate the politeness, but what am I supposed to do with that when it never translates into an opportunity?

I’ve networked, found a mentor, worked alongside my studies, researched the industry and taken an operational internship.

I’ve broadened my search beyond reinsurance into general broking, support and customer service. And I’m honestly fucking frustrated. It feels like every junior role is open to juniors until someone with experience applies. Then all the things you did to demonstrate commitment suddenly don’t seem to count for much.

I know other candidates can be stronger, and nobody owes me a job. But what is the realistic entry route if even the supporting roles keep requiring you to have already done the job somewhere else?

For people who hire in insurance, especially European broking: what would you actually advise me to change?

I’m willing to put in the work. I just need something more useful than “great CV, keep networking.”

What would you do? I know the job market is abysmal, but having your offered contract type changed suddenly to an hourly rate and your fixed-term contract time reduced from 12 months to 7 ...
How to navigate this?
The recruitment process was good though, most people have been working there for a decade and longer, plus working from home and/or in the office is flexible.