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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 furt

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.

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.