I applied to Valeo for a position at the Indiana location through LinkedIn and received a response relatively quickly to set up a phone screening with the recruiter. The phone screen was very relaxed. Standard questions regarding the area and the company. The next day she set up an interview with the optics division at Seymour, IN. The interview, again, was very relaxed. I spoke with the hiring manager and the lead engineer of the group. They seemed impressed with my skills and we ended the interview on a very good note that resulted in an offer. However, the offer was laughably low. The benefits are very competitive but the base salary was not very competitive, especially for a company with over 100,000 employees. I suggested that we should negotiate the salary and they refused the first counteroffer without any compromise. The recruiter had given me their budget for the position in our initial conversation. I decided to make another attempt to negotiate and I even lowered my expected pay to fall within their budget and they outright rescinded their offer. I even asked what was wrong with my initial offer that was unacceptable and they did not provide any feedback. It is possible that I may have dodged a bullet because a company that isn't willing to give you the time of day to give you simple feedback on what I can improve is a red flag.

It was quite smooth. I had a basic round, then a technical round with background, questions related to work and whether I can handle a particular project. Then there was a HR round. They asked me about leadership roles.