I had a great chat with the HR professional. We seemed to hit it off well, and he appeared to appreciate my HR background. I was also very excited about the potential to work for The Marshall Project, as I had previously worked for Newsweek and gained valuable HR experience there. I was hopeful that HR professional would move me to the next stage based on my performance and the optimism I sensed during our conversation. He mentioned that he would discuss my experience with his manager and keep me posted. I even sent him a thank-you note. About a week and a half later, I received a generic rejection email, which confused me. I followed up politely twice to ask for feedback—once on 4/26 and again on 5/2—but my emails were not acknowledged. I came away from this experience feeling quite confused and surprised. I hope the organization will focus more on candidate experience in the future.