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Andrey Cooper
Andrey Cooper

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"Everything went well but they did not hire me...". Here's why:

We are suckers for the good signs.
We are easily attracted to comfort, friendly people, and a respectful environment.

An experienced hiring manager will make you feel right at home, just to crack your personality.

Don't fall for the good signs, they are unpredictable.
Look for the bad ones and stay away from such companies.

Every decent HR or hiring manager will tell you about the process, the company, and the team. They will tell you jokes and laugh with you. They will mention the school or a hometown if you have it in common.

That happens for the 3 main reasons

  • Learning as much as possible about your personality is done best if you feel comfortable. Hence the laughter. An experienced hiring manager establishes a relationship with the candidate at the hiring table. They would imitate situations that frequently happen in the team.

  • Hiring a person is not buying milk at the grocery store. The selling process goes in both directions all the time and telling you about the team, product, or development process is attaching you emotionally to the process for a longer time.

  • Keeping the high bar. A successful hire contributes to the company's value, while rejected hires contribute to the company's image. That's why every company that cares about its name will respect every candidate by maintaining a high level of positive experience no matter the immediate feeling. They will do anything so you spread the excitement further.

So what should you do to get a better understanding?

The following are 100% proof things went wrong for you

  • The interview ends earlier than scheduled. 15 minutes are usually set for a pre-sync before the process, 30 for an intro, 45 for HR or org level, and 60-90 minutes for technical or architecture sessions. An experienced interviewer knows how this time should be used. In case the meeting ends in the middle, they have no interest in you.
  • There's no follow-up call for more than 2 weeks. Good candidates are always hard to find. No matter the size of the company, in case they like you, a quick call or a message will always follow within a week's time range.

Bonus.
The list of signs to be avoided

  • The person is late for the meeting and nobody apologizes.
  • The manager who interviews you is strict and unsmiling. In case the interviewer is your direct supervisor, he/she tries to tell you "this is my style, love it or hate it".
  • The questions you've been asked are out of your position's responsibility. A manager is being assigned development questions, a developer's assignment includes a lot of SQL queries, end so on. The company either does not know how to hire or has no clear definition of the requirements. Both are to be avoided.

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