I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Skillz in Feb 2021
Interview
Someone reached out to LinkedIn about a position here and asked if I would be interested and they could set up a call with their coworker. I said sure and asked what the position would be, which they were a bit evasive about. Soon after their internal recruiter emailed me and asked me to schedule a call with her for an interview. It was a bit of a turnoff for me that the next available time was in 2 weeks and seemed to be a 30 min interview when I didn’t have any information on the position and whether or not I would even be interested.
Second red flag was when I received a survey to fill out prior to the interview which asked about my college degree and my GPA in college. I was pretty baffled and wondered if this was an entry level role - I haven’t been asked about my GPA since my first position out of college.
Anyway it was already scheduled so I decided to check it out but made the mistake of not seeing the glassdoor interview reviews until the night before. Obviously after reading all these reviews I was not at all interested in continuing to interview here. I brought up a few things I had read in the reviews and they confirmed for me that everything would be done remotely but the next step would be a 4 hour questionnaire and a series of interviews that would be around 6 hours. They did not mention the case study I read about here or final onsite.
As I have a decent amount of experience in IT already I pretty much noped out of there. At this point I don’t work for free and have no interest in wasting 10 hours of my time on, judging by the other reviews, people who won’t even follow up with rej. If you’re new to this field please consider the case studies mentioned in reviews are based on actual business problems is basically asking for free work and is pretty scammy, if not illegal. It’s common to be asked for work samples or to do a small assignment (based on hypothetical scenarios) that’s actually pertinent to your role. Those I will do.
Both people I spoke to were polite and professional. I don’t blame them for this, it’s obviously the corporate processes which are suboptimal. We could have had a 5 minute conversation and decided whether to bother moving forward. Seeing how their calendar is constantly booked each recruiter could probably save 20+ hours a week if they didn’t book 30 min with everyone they wanted to talk to. At the minimum, provide a job description and salary band to review prior to scheduling.
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Skillz (San Francisco, CA) in Mar 2023
Interview
I was recruiter via LinkedIn and this is what the process looked like 1. HR Phone Interview - typical call asking about my background. Note that the person I talked to on the phone was different than the person I was emailing back and forth with at the time 2. Skills Assessment - They give you 3 assignments and you have up to 4 hours to complete, these can be done outside of regular work hours. One is a 15 minute math challenge with 15 questions. It was like taking the SATs all over again. The other two were SQL questions and a case study 3. Zoom Call with Hiring Manager - talked about my experience and asked why I wanted to join skillz. They asked a lot about the product and games themselves 4. Second Round Interview - I was told to come into the office for five interviews. Four out of the five interviews were via a zoom link so I already thought that was weird that they physically wanted me to come in. I did the first 3 interviews and then was scheduled for a lunch break. After lunch I go back to the meeting room where someone from HR comes in and tells me that “they are done here.” I tried to ask why but they wouldn’t answer and just told me that the interview process is over and to call the recruiter I had been talking to. I asked if I could take the call in the meeting room and they said no, you have to take it in the lobby. I take the call and there is absolutely zero feedback, just the classical answer that they are moving forward with other candidates. After I get off the call the HR person watches me leave the building. I was treated as if I was stealing something?? oh yah they also asked for my username on the platform. Which i thought was super weird?? Thankfully I never created an account and it was just a guest account I had been using. Overall, I am super disappointed that interviewing with companies has come to this. I don’t understand how they can treat candidates with so much disrespect and get away with it. Will never apply here again, and would not recommend to others.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
showed an A/B test and asked which variant would generate the most revenue
Initial phone screen and then two separate super days of 2 hours (Round 2 and then Round 3). Very large time investment, and consistently changed the role interviewing for / salary range during the process before saying they weren't hiring any positions altogether.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Q: General personal interview background questions followed by various cases / thought exercises
Reading other reviews I now believe they are doing market research and are probably not in earnest looking to hire but gather data. They expect you to spend 3-4 hours on a project on top of all the other interview rounds and quant test.
