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Ask HN: Why are there so many stages during the hiring process nowadays?

2 points by yiiiizzz ↗ HN
I'm currently in two hiring processes, and also had submitted my application to another two.

Last time I interviewed was 6 years ago, and back then, you had at max two interviews: screening and technical.

Now, one of the hiring processes I'm in has 5 meetings, in which actually one of them has 3 embebbed meetings. The other has 6 meetings. The other two I have applied but I haven't received any response are 5 and 7...

So, what's really the point of these long hiring processes? Screen, tech, take home, another tech, culture, manager, CTO, offer....

4 comments

[ 4.5 ms ] story [ 23.0 ms ] thread
arkitaip
Surely this only happens at FAANGs and VC powered startups? No way ordinary companies can afford these expensive hiring practices where you can throw overqualified and underutilized professionals at your recruiting pipeline instead of fixing your processes.
yiiiizzz
I think the problem is that everyone think they are a FAANG. Even in my current company, there is a noticeable shortage of people, yet the new management are letting candidates go due to impose this unnecessary lenghtly proccess.

It was funny because one of the candidates that received an offer actually replied back saying "thanks, but I accepted another offer a month ago". He was in the pipeline for about 4 months...

kisamoto
Agreed - companies realise they have a lack of engineering and want to hire. They look to see are good at engineering (FAANG etc.) and copy procedure.

A colleague of mine has been sharing their hiring experience recently (frontend engineering).

There is the initial screening, often followed by a take home technical test. This take home test is occasionally timed with potential employers asking between 4 and 8 hours of time in one-go to complete the technical task.

Depending on the results from those first two stages, a larger technical interview then follows between 1-2 hours, a second HR interview and sometimes an introduction to all team members you may be working with.

During these stages - despite asking in the beginning - there is no indication of salary or potential benefits such as home-office/part-time. As a result an applicant must jump through all the hoops until receiving the final offer before they can decide to join the company or not.

Personally I find this process quite disrespectful to the applicant and prefer to know expected salary ranges, company attitude to home-office etc. before even applying. Let alone asking for 8 hours of time to complete a technical task.

TZubiri
Tech companies naturally use the internet to recruit, so they have access to a vast pool of applicants. Scaling culture allows these companies to algorithmically process national or even global candidates.

The result is a huge process