Received an e-mail for a recruiter about a position at K-Rise. I talked to them on the phone and they we're able to set-up an in-person interview. The recruiters do a good job at making sure you're prepared for the interview, giving you sample questions and such. The in-person interview was antiquated. Multiple programming problems they wan't you to solve on paper without any tools, something that is laughable for a software company. I was left alone in a room and frankly, could have cheated on this portion but decided to do my best since I knew most of the material anyway. I met with a few developers who looked over my code; I didn't do perfect but I was able to move on to the next phase, a meeting with the owner. This is where the experience starts to get negative. He seemed stand-offish, wouldn't even shake my hand, as if he already made up his mind before meeting me that I wasn't hired. He asked me some basic questions but seemed uninterested in any of my answers. He was also very pedantic about the resume, so make sure yours is impeccable. I said I was OK with the hilariously low $50k offer and "contract-to-hire" stipulation. Then, I left. Received a call from the recruiter asking how it went. I said it went well, and they said they will have some feedback for me in a week. I never received any call. Upon retrospect this was likely a good thing. The pay is hilariously low for the skills they want you to have as they won't hire without a Bachelors. The work involves working with a custom tool -- so there is not a lot of room for growth outside of K-Rise there. On top of that it starts as a "contract-to-hire" while you learn the tool. The whole business model seems to stem on exploitation: hire CS graduates who are struggling to get a job, teach them to use a custom tool that won't be used anywhere else, underpay them, then focus on selling their services. I would avoid K-Rise unless you want to make sure that fancy Computer Science degree goes to waste, or you are in sales.

Applied online and was quickly able to set up a phone screen and in person interview. Recruiter was very nice and easy to work with. Interviewed with him in person asking basic questions, then was given handwritten tests to assess coding skills. Coding questions were typical manipulation of strings and tracing execution of arithmetic but required hand writing proper syntax. Some easy behavioral questions as well such as writing a proper professional response to an email from a client. Next phase of the interview was designing a database schema given a scenario, which then had to be worked out and presented to one of the lead developers. I was unable to achieve the proper result and was essentially shamed and insulted by the developer for the rest of the interview. As expected I did not receive an offer but regardless the rudeness of the developer likely indicates a poor work environment.