I was more or less unemployed during the last financial year due to a variety of reason including burnout.

I work in computational biology and mostly self-learned at that, so I've been trying to brush up on programming and such.

One of the "memorable" interviews that I had included:

1. HR Round over phone

2. Programming test: I'm mostly an R guy, but the test involved python a ton. So had to learn that

3. Meeting with a Team-manager

4. Meeting with the Team

5. Live programming test

6. Diversity meet

7. Another HR meet

8. Interview with their Tech. officer etc

A total of 4 days, between the assignments and such stuff. Of course I'd openly told that I was under-qualified for the round 5 and I'd already expended 3 days for the interview.

Still had to proceed with round 5 and I just laughed at their faces when they couldn't understand why my domain knowledge didn't give what they wanted. Or why I didn't care to learn XYZ when I never heard/use it before.

Not everyone needs a CS guy and at the end of the day, nobody's reinventing the wheel over and over again that justifies interviews being 10s of hours long.

Probably the best interviews that I've given are just face to face and doesn't waste too much time for all the people involved. My current job had just two meetings, one with the team-manager and the other one was to introduce the person that I'd be working with.

No pair-programming, no fluff. Got the offer within the month and its probably the least stressful job with ample time to work on my hobbies and spend time with others.

Also, a few things that I've noticed/done since then:

1. Use linkedin/indeed or job listings as exactly that. Just notify if the jobs are available. I tend to contact the people hiring directly and explain what I do in an email. This surprisingly works a lot of time.

2. For cold-calls/spam-calls etc, I ask them to check my CV and decide if I'm a fit worth pursuing. I'm not going to spend more than a set number of hours depending on the position the interview is for.

3. Yes, this results in a lower number of interviews. But the ones that I got were significantly of a better quality, both in terms of money, projects and respect.

4. Regarding not everyone needs a CS guy: Most of my field is built by these folks, no disrespect. I'd rather interface with them and get things worked on or make things easier for me than to rub my 2 brain cells that decide when to use a for loop or lapply.

5. Follow-up for the pointer 4 above: I hate programming, but I love documenting stuff. My current job allows me to do that, I'd rather leave programming things to professionals, and rather explain my issues, nuances or thought-processes to them and get things sorted out.