A recruiter reached out to me after coming across my resume and wanted to set up an over the phone interview. I wasn't actively looking, but decided "Why not? What could it hurt?" A 30 minute phone call was set up and I ended up talking to a generic HR person who would not tell me anything about the position, the work, or what the company really did beyond what's already on their website. All questions were met with generic vague answers. I was told that I would have to work on a take home problem and write up a formal report detailing my methodology and findings before I could move on to the next step. Was told it should take 2-5 hours. The problem is rather straight forward. Just a set of data sets of points from a linear model with heteroskedasticity. You're told to estimate the intercept and slope for each of the data sets. Overall, I took maybe 2-3 hours to complete it. After submitting it, they got back to me within a few days and said they weren't going to move on to the next step of the interview process. No reason or details were given as to why. They offered to add my name to a list, such that I would be emailed the criteria they use to score my submission against once the problem is "retired." That was it. Overall, I feel that most of the other reviewers are extremely accurate in terms of what the interview process is like here. There's no feedback whatsoever and they make a point of being as vague as possible. I would have at least liked to know the details of the position I'm applying to and the company before taking the time to do the problem set. But again, I took the optimistic route of thinking that it wouldn't hurt. In hindsight, I'd say not to waste your time.

I had a positive initial conversation with the recruiter, who was helpful in setting up the technical interview. Unfortunately, the technical interview itself was a disappointing experience. The interviewer seemed to be following a very fixed script and appeared to have little flexibility in how answers were evaluated. It did not feel like candidates were rewarded for explaining their reasoning, making reasonable progress, or demonstrating practical understanding. Several questions felt overly niche or poorly calibrated relative to the preparation material provided. The interview seemed more focused on whether I produced a very specific expected answer than on whether I could think clearly through technical problems. As a result, the process did not leave me with confidence that the interview was assessing the skills actually needed for the role. I also left with a somewhat uninspiring impression of the work. Based on how the interviewer described the role, it sounded less intellectually engaging than I had expected. In the end, I was not disappointed to leave the process.