My frustration with this type of interview is that their costs are entirely asymmetric. The company puts together a set of requirements once, and then forces ev

My frustration with this type of interview is that their costs are entirely asymmetric. The company puts together a set of requirements once, and then forces every applicant to spend 5-10 generally unpaid hours completing it. If that were the bulk of the interview and the only further step was coming into the office for a couple of softball "culture fit" interviews it would be acceptable, but from what I've been told if you do great on the sample application you're just rewarded with a full day of technical interviews anyway. This biases the companies towards their sample application at everybody in their funnel, even if they have far too many applicants, are not that motivated to fill the position, or potentially if they don't actually have an open position at all! This wastes a great deal of candidates' time without any real chance of an offer.