"They don't have time to objectively evaluate this," to me, sounds like, "Our engineers follow extremely rigid and obtuse coding standards that have no relation

"They don't have time to objectively evaluate this," to me, sounds like, "Our engineers follow extremely rigid and obtuse coding standards that have no relation to the outside world, and are unable to read or understand code written by anyone outside our company." On being measured up with other candidates, I'd really rather they assess me based on my skills and experience, not on a time-unlimited mini-project. The major factor in those projects is free time. I am always going to lose to a person with more free time than me, even though I may outmatch them in skills and experience. And if all they're looking for is someone with a lot of free time, that's not the sort of job I'm looking for anyway.