I can’t think of another interview that was a worse waste of time than this. Firstly, the approach: I’ve applied multiple times thinking that starling would’ve been a great place to work, but I got only rejections. Then one day a call from an internal recruiter, asking quite generic questions about my expectations and my ideal job. This was ok, but I got the feeling to talk with someone that didn’t want to stay in that call. Quick questions, no emotions shown. The second technical call lasted for more than one hour, and I spoke over the phone with someone that seemed competent, but once again very “cold“. I’m not there to make friends, but it doesn’t feel welcoming either. The third part: technical challenge. Writing an app in 2/4 hours. And it uses their APIs, which you have to register and “learn” to use. The document provided gives a quick start of how to configure a development account, but that’s it. It references categories of API to use, and these have multiple endpoints. I get that this might be part of the challenge, and I’m ok with it. But that totally unrealistic 2/4h to do everything? With daily jobs and more interviews adding up, I felt that it was a little disrespectful. They probably don’t need the app running perfectly, just the tests and the approach set in the project, but considering that they review each commit an that must be heavily tested, how can I be expected to complete the task in that time(including registration and setup). I got no feedback at the end. I’ve deleted my account and switched to a competitor.

I was told I would be having a conversational interview about the culture fit for the team. Instead it was 45 mins of technical questions that I was unprepared for.