I went through all stages of interview process.
The first stage was the interview with their Design Lead. It went good, nothing special, just ordinary questions about experience etc.
The second stage was to make a test task. Product page and Product list. And also SMM post. Unfortunately, test task is unpaid.
The final stage is to visit their office to present your work, tell about yourself, your passions and met another team members.
The final stage was about 1.5 hours long. First hour was about technical side of the job – presenting test task, questions etc. And 30 minutes about my passions and overall.
So it seemed that everything is okay. People in the company seemed to be very nice. But unfortunately the hiring process leaves much to be desired.
The main reason for their rejection is that I do not have illustration and graphic design skills (do I need to remind that it is a UI/UX designer position?)
And also that I didn’t prepare enough for a talk about my passion, though I’ve been telling about it almost 20-30 minutes. So one of the rejection reasons even made me feel that I was not on a job interview but on a contest “who will tell more and better about their hobbies”.
It took the almost a month for a respond. But the problem in the overall interviewing process is that if it so crucial to have designer with illustration and graphic design skills, you should select people with those skills on the first step of the interviewing process. Because it takes time and effort for the candidate to make the test task, to prepare for a visit in the office and for the final interview process.
It seems that their reason is far-fetched. And they’ve just found candidate with better experience or UI/UX design skills. Which is 100% okay and I don’t get it why they wouldn’t tell me something like this.
But if my skill-set is the the real reason, then unfortunately they need to improve a lot of things in hiring process.
It also seems like a red flag to me when a company wants the so-called Edward Scissorhands, like to be skilled in everything: UI/UX design, illustration and graphic design.
Overall feeling about interview process: leaves much to be desired. Unfortunately, they do not value candidates time. And do not check skill match on the first stage.
I enjoyed the communication with their Design Lead, though. People seemed to be friendly here.
But be careful and find out from the beginning everything they need from the candidate, because they don't specify it normally and end up wasting your time for nothing.