This was a few months ago. Was recently laid off so I applied to Wealthfront, and one of the questions on their application was whether I've used their app. I selected "Yes, but haven't put any funds", since I'd downloaded the app and played around with it but didn't use all of their features. Didn't think much more of it. I talk to the recruiter (some more red flags here btw, tried to convince me to not interview at FAANG companies, also randomly brought up the fact that I'd applied to Wealthfront before years ago). I complete the take home assignment, get swiftly invited for an onsite. But first I have to have a call with a senior director of Eng. My immediate thought is ok, they seem to value culture fit if a senior engg director has taken time out to talk to me before the onsite. One other thing to note is, at every stage in the process, they repeatedly stressed to learn more about the product and check out their social media and blog posts - which I do. So by the time the call rolls around, I'm somewhat versed in what they do, and the eng director notices. He also tries to gauge how much I'm prioritizing their company over others. When I say that I have other companies I'm looking into as well (I was laid off - so obviously), he goes down a weird conversation route, saying if you're not ready to commit after the onsite decision then it's best to not interview here. And to reach out to them when I'm sure about committing to Wealthfront, if I can't promise that now. Wtf? I haven't even gotten onsite yet. At this point I'm like whatever, and say whatever he wants to hear to at least get onsite and just get some interview experience. I'm freshly laid off so I couldn't afford to be too picky then. Things go well and the director says he's looking forward to seeing me onsite. Three or four days go by and still no word yet from the recruiter on onsite scheduling, so I reach out. Recruiter says, yes sure, we'd like to schedule onsite, but the engg director wants to clarify a few things on a call. Again, my thought process is, how much extra time do these guys have if a senior director wants to chat again. He calls me and essentially wants to figure out this - in my application I mentioned I don't use it too much, but our conversations indicated otherwise. I say something along the lines of: oh I guess I put that because I hadn't used all the features at that point. He actually pulls up the job app form on the call and we walk through it lol. He seems satisfied, we chat for a bit about random BS and he invites me onsite again. I get a THIRD request for a call from him - I hop on and he says he can't get over my answers about my app usage, and decides it's best to part ways. Probably looked up something in their backend to see how long I've been on the app. At this point I don't care anymore. If they're devoting this much time to probing this instead of solving other problems, I can't imagine how much of a micro-managing nightmare it'd be to work there. TLDR: Had 3 separate calls with a senior eng director at a company - after passing the technical rounds and before an onsite was even scheduled - and rejected because I indicated on my job app that I didn't use their app too much, but the interview conversations indicated otherwise. Such a bizarre waste of time. Anybody have similar experiences at WF?
If that was the interview, imagine the day-to-day.
That was a great read. Write a blog man, name and shame if you can.
That eng director really needs some work to do
Can you name and shame the guy…please
Was he Rajesh?
Wtf is he even allowed to look at customer data like that? Could you perhaps sue him for accessing your data like that
Hahaha that's crazy, I had a similar experience ~2 years ago, but not with the same guy. They claimed I wasn't committed to the company enough since I had also interviewed and received offers from other firms, and I didn't want to firmly commit to Wealthfront (which is fair but I didn't even have an offer yet so no way I'm dropping my other offers). Crazy to hear other interviewers were similarly crazy, I thought I got a bad apple. Don't worry about it, we dodged a bullet (and I've been steering clear of their product since).
Which role was this for? I am also interviewing there.
Backend SWE. Good luck on the job
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Life is so strange. Live and learn. Thanks for sharing your experience.