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If the companies are worth their salt, they should be giving (or willing to give) you detailed feedback. _Especially_ if you got to a face-to-face interview. If

If the companies are worth their salt, they should be giving (or willing to give) you detailed feedback. _Especially_ if you got to a face-to-face interview. If they don't, then I'd consider that a lucky miss. First step would be to ask, at least, the 7 on-sites for feedback. If it's insufficient, ask for more. Explain that you're having trouble at the last hurdle and that their feedback will help. Take that feedback and integrate it in to your approach. Getting feedback can be difficult, especially when it's just you. Consider giving it to some friends and/or mentors to get a clearer view. Choose someone that can bring the most amount of objectivity. Otherwise... Attend some meetups. Consider blogging and producing some content. Build a profile that projects where you want to be (you should consider, a little, what that might be). If you're passionate and visible in a domain, combined with good skills and experience, then you're gold to these organizations. Often they will come to you. Also consider being proactive to companies that you want to work for. Engage and see if they have any jobs. Many roles get filled without a Job Description seeing the light of day. Part of doing the above should achieve that. Finally, consider tackling the problem in a structured way. Interview for a job that's well within your capabilities. Apply for roles that stretch you. These give you a broader understanding on the needs out there in the market (and hopefully what you're capable of). Good luck.

SeanBoocock 10y ago
"If the companies are worth their salt, they should be giving (or willing to give) you detailed feedback. _Especially_ if you got to a face-to-face interview. If they don't, then I'd consider that a lucky miss." Really? It's been my experience that companies will not give feedback, at least anything that could be considered detailed feedback, as a blanket policy. The perception at least is that giving feedback opens up the company to potential litigation and provides the company no benefit.
- jwilliams 10y ago
  I take your point, but I've seen this from a few sides of the fence and I really believe it to be true. i.e. If they're not willing to give feedback, then they're not worth their salt. An interview process is a huge investment for a person, especially if it's face to face. We're talking hours, maybe days. Not giving feedback is really an insult. A poor interview experience is a massive miss for a company. If they don't see that, then I'd take that as a bad sign. Equally, a good interview experience can be a huge positive. Word will get around, and on Glassdoor. That's a very real risk, significantly more than the threat of litigation. This is expecially true in creative, engineering, etc roles. The solution is good interview process and training, not a blanket no-feedback rule. That's a race to the bottom.
  - dvtv75 10y ago
    I've interviewed more than everybody else I know, and I always get great feedback on my interview technique, particularly when I hear from someone I know who works for the business. Not one of them has ever told me why I didn't get the job, with one exception. One place I interviewed at, an educational institution, apparently had some very serious behind-the-scenes arguments and some hurt feelings between friends, because most of the interviewers wanted me for the job but one of the decision makers had already promised it to someone else. (Which is illegal, I might add.) That's the closest I've been to "Here's why you didn't get the job..." [edit] I'm not including the times someone's discriminated against me for daring to have a disability.
  - lazyasciiart 10y ago
    > Word will get around, and on Glassdoor. That's a very real risk, significantly more than the threat of litigation. This is expecially true in creative, engineering, etc roles. Companies that have declined to give me feedback after an interview include Google, Facebook, small startups and medium sized places. I have not seen any evidence that you are correct.
- cookiecaper 10y ago
  Yeah, this has been my experience. The one time I got a company to provide feedback, it was that I "didn't seem assertive enough", which really couldn't be further from the truth (I'm usually getting in hot water for being too assertive), so I assume that it was a randomly chosen from a grab bag of meaningless-but-legally-sanitized "useful feedback" phrases. Even if someone does provide feedback, it usually can't be trusted, and often times, interviewers can't even articulate why they're passing certain candidates.
  - abraae 10y ago
    We do recruitment software, and one of the features that just never seems to take life is asking managers why they have rejected a candidate - even though that would be extremely useful for fine tuning the process. It seems people just don't like to be pinned down.
    - mjevans 10y ago
      It probably boils down to feelings, which seems unfair to introverts and those who tend to undersell themselves (but is probably how 'society' works).
      - cookiecaper 10y ago
        Yeah, when you're interviewing and have more than one technically qualified candidate, you pick based on "culture fit", i.e., "do they seem likeable?" A freeform box for rejection rationale will probably never get a good response rate, because it's work for people to make up a plausible-sounding explanation for why they liked someone else more (and this explanation is rarely if ever reflective of reality; people make up intellectually-satisfying stories to justify their impulsive/emotional decisions). However, a radio box that offered rejection reasons like "bad technical fit", "bad culture fit", or "good candidate for the future; not enough slots right now" may see better response rates.
  - thaumasiotes 10y ago
    When Google gave me feedback, it was that they thought I didn't seem to care whether or not the code I drew on the board actually worked. This despite the fact that they recruited me through their code jam, in which whether your code actually works is the only criterion.
lloydde 10y ago
> If the companies are worth their salt, they should be giving (or willing to give) you detailed feedback. _Especially_ if you got to a face-to-face interview. If they don't, then I'd consider that a lucky miss. Very few companies will provide specific, direct feedback even after a face-to-face interview. In fact, their HR has likely coached them not to. I try to provide both positive and one factor that influenced it not being a match. This sometimes ends up causing problems for my employer, likely mostly because I don't do it well, but it helps me grow in having difficult conversations and I feel some feedback is the least I can do after the candidate spending so much time and energy. I've learned to ask people first, "is it ok if I share some frank feedback?"

SeanBoocock 10y ago

"If the companies are worth their salt, they should be giving (or willing to give) you detailed feedback. _Especially_ if you got to a face-to-face interview. If they don't, then I'd consider that a lucky miss." Really? It's been my experience that companies will not give feedback, at least anything that could be considered detailed feedback, as a blanket policy. The perception at least is that giving feedback opens up the company to potential litigation and provides the company no benefit.

jwilliams 10y ago
I take your point, but I've seen this from a few sides of the fence and I really believe it to be true. i.e. If they're not willing to give feedback, then they're not worth their salt. An interview process is a huge investment for a person, especially if it's face to face. We're talking hours, maybe days. Not giving feedback is really an insult. A poor interview experience is a massive miss for a company. If they don't see that, then I'd take that as a bad sign. Equally, a good interview experience can be a huge positive. Word will get around, and on Glassdoor. That's a very real risk, significantly more than the threat of litigation. This is expecially true in creative, engineering, etc roles. The solution is good interview process and training, not a blanket no-feedback rule. That's a race to the bottom.
- dvtv75 10y ago
  I've interviewed more than everybody else I know, and I always get great feedback on my interview technique, particularly when I hear from someone I know who works for the business. Not one of them has ever told me why I didn't get the job, with one exception. One place I interviewed at, an educational institution, apparently had some very serious behind-the-scenes arguments and some hurt feelings between friends, because most of the interviewers wanted me for the job but one of the decision makers had already promised it to someone else. (Which is illegal, I might add.) That's the closest I've been to "Here's why you didn't get the job..." [edit] I'm not including the times someone's discriminated against me for daring to have a disability.
- lazyasciiart 10y ago
  > Word will get around, and on Glassdoor. That's a very real risk, significantly more than the threat of litigation. This is expecially true in creative, engineering, etc roles. Companies that have declined to give me feedback after an interview include Google, Facebook, small startups and medium sized places. I have not seen any evidence that you are correct.
cookiecaper 10y ago
Yeah, this has been my experience. The one time I got a company to provide feedback, it was that I "didn't seem assertive enough", which really couldn't be further from the truth (I'm usually getting in hot water for being too assertive), so I assume that it was a randomly chosen from a grab bag of meaningless-but-legally-sanitized "useful feedback" phrases. Even if someone does provide feedback, it usually can't be trusted, and often times, interviewers can't even articulate why they're passing certain candidates.
- abraae 10y ago
  We do recruitment software, and one of the features that just never seems to take life is asking managers why they have rejected a candidate - even though that would be extremely useful for fine tuning the process. It seems people just don't like to be pinned down.
  - mjevans 10y ago
    It probably boils down to feelings, which seems unfair to introverts and those who tend to undersell themselves (but is probably how 'society' works).
    - cookiecaper 10y ago
      Yeah, when you're interviewing and have more than one technically qualified candidate, you pick based on "culture fit", i.e., "do they seem likeable?" A freeform box for rejection rationale will probably never get a good response rate, because it's work for people to make up a plausible-sounding explanation for why they liked someone else more (and this explanation is rarely if ever reflective of reality; people make up intellectually-satisfying stories to justify their impulsive/emotional decisions). However, a radio box that offered rejection reasons like "bad technical fit", "bad culture fit", or "good candidate for the future; not enough slots right now" may see better response rates.
- thaumasiotes 10y ago
  When Google gave me feedback, it was that they thought I didn't seem to care whether or not the code I drew on the board actually worked. This despite the fact that they recruited me through their code jam, in which whether your code actually works is the only criterion.

lloydde 10y ago

> If the companies are worth their salt, they should be giving (or willing to give) you detailed feedback. _Especially_ if you got to a face-to-face interview. If they don't, then I'd consider that a lucky miss. Very few companies will provide specific, direct feedback even after a face-to-face interview. In fact, their HR has likely coached them not to. I try to provide both positive and one factor that influenced it not being a match. This sometimes ends up causing problems for my employer, likely mostly because I don't do it well, but it helps me grow in having difficult conversations and I feel some feedback is the least I can do after the candidate spending so much time and energy. I've learned to ask people first, "is it ok if I share some frank feedback?"