Very rapid due to the flat nature of the organization... First interview phone screen, Second interview round table w/ three possibly four people.. All who you meet will be kind and friendly due to the laid back nature of the company. Be warned, however, because immediately they will try to drive your salary ask downwards 10-20k/yr.... When you hear that, RUN... no need working for less than the market calls for
Phone screen went extremely well, my skill seemed to align with a change in direction that the company wanted to grow into. Throughout the interview with the recruiter and with sr management, the goal appeared to be in finding someone with a broad range of experiences. While the obvious of them being a MS Gold partner, I was assured time and again that they lacked people with "other than M$ exposure"... Nevertheless, there seemed to be excitement about the skill set I brought to bear to the organization. From the ability to up-sell new products and services to my being platform agnostic and ability to operate in legacy environments and emerging technology spaces
Face-2-Face: This occurred the very next day. Sr Management seemed to be friendly and knowledgeable... But there seemed to be a huge disconnect on future direction and the ability of the new hire to be billable on the M$ stack... After meeting w/ the first two interviewers, I was positive that I'd win the opportunity with one person left to speak to.. In elucidating core background in the datacenter operations and 20+yrs on the M$ stack with certification in M$ technologies... The final person came to speak to me.. His goal was to clearly eliminate and the disconnect between the management direction and current company model became obvious. He drilled into IP port assignments and non-standard cloud and security models that are outside of best practices and dangerous for any client. It was a "gotcha" moment posed under the guise of "i want to see how you think" Still I felt reasonably confident that Sr Management stated corporate direction would over-ride a single platform SME's opinion... Alas I was wrong, 2hrs later I received a call from the recruiter indicating that AI needed someone who'd be billable immediately on M$ stack...
While I certainly accept the decision, it was the antithesis of everything I was told and Sr Management indicated up until that last interviewer...
Summarizing, take heed..... They will speak in glossy terms about needing a someone with a broad range of experiences in a vast array of enterprise environments... You'll hear much about corporate culture of being laid back and baseball games and picnics.... Do not be fooled.... If you have not spent the last 10-20yrs on M$ stack exclusively.. You will not be working for AI......
Sidenote: Don't be disappointed, move on.. The sun will rise tomorrow!!!.. . Read the employee reviews, because they seem to denote that there's not much support once you walk in the door... If you're looking to be set up to fail, this is the place for you...