From the start I was concerned after having read other interview experiences here. I interviewed with a Sr Director, 2 other Directors and 1 Manager who admittedly wasn't actually hiring. I mentioned that I had noticed they have been hiring for this for role a while (over a year). They told me that even though the company doesn't let people go, a year back, they were forced to reduce staff. This didn't answer the question as to why this position has been open so long. They seemed to be looking for quick answers with no intention of actually hiring. I was given a live code test by the manager and an architectural test by one of the directors. Another director asked to do yet another live code test and after having mentioned that I had already done one they appeared to have no further interest. Answering architectural issues for a Staff Dev position and string tests for any Sr Dev, doesn't demonstrate how well you'll contribute to the actual job. Why Directors would be so over involved in doing technical interviews is very odd. Typically the hiring manager and some of the other developers will be the ones to perform the technical challenges. I advise you to steer clear of this place. They're don't appear to actually want to hire for this role or they're hiding a turn-over problem.

I met the hiring manager first for an hour long interview. He spoke over me through out the interview process, rarely letting me answer a question completely. He had me do a live coding exercise to determine an algorithm for aligning fonts and images of varying sizes along a shared baseline. He admitted this wasn't representative of the coding I would be doing. I completed the exercise successfully. Then there were three additional hour long interviews with additional managers. One of which had me do a coding exercise in a browser with absolutely no syntax assist or highlighting. It was to move a hypothetical robot around an x, y coordinate system. Another exercise that didn't represent the day to day coding the role required. I also successfully completed this exercise. Despite my accomplished 20 year career he still felt it important to focus on my lack of Comp Sci degree. I had two managers ask me about the worst engineers I had ever worked with, which seemed odd and hard to distill in an interview. Overall, only one of the managers was pleasant and amenable to interview with. They ultimately offered me a job at a lower level than what I had applied for, at a lower salary, telling the recruiter I would likely be promoted to the initial role within a few months. Their reasoning was the number of hats I had worn throughout my career may have limited me. Really, that was it. I would argue that most would see that as an advantage that has exposed me to the full SDLC, making me a more rounded engineer. Thankfully I had two other offers in the time I was waiting to hear back from IL, both for architect level positions. Their process is deeply flawed and their leadership out of touch.