The process was more or less fine up until the way they sent me my rejection. Applied, was contacted by someone from HR (who seemed disorganized given that they didn’t finalize my in person interview time until LITERALLY the day before, as if I don’t have to get time off approved) , got the in person interview, met the team, enjoyed my time there. Two weeks of radio silence, I’ve already written off any hope of hearing back. Whatever, time to move on. Then, 13 days after I have my in person interview, I get an email at 10am from the HR rep, asking if we can schedule a quick call. I quickly reply back, getting excited because I’ve only ever received rejections via email, and if you’re job searching, 99% of the time when your potential employer wants to call you, it’s good news. Not this time. They keep me in a state of anticipation and anxiety for 6.5 hours until they finally call, just to deliver the news that although I was a great culture fit and everyone apparently liked me, they’re going in another direction. To me, and to pretty much everyone else I’ve talked to (also reading stories on quora and reddit of similar experiences), this seemed like a low blow and then kicking me into the dirt. My advice to HR is to realize that your job is HUMAN resources- think before you act. Put yourself in the shoes of a job searcher before you give them news- positive or negative. Job searching is depressing. It’s dehumanizing. But you had to go and make it even worse by providing a small modicum of false hope, stretching that out over 6.5 hours, and then bluntly kicking me in the gut. Like I said in my follow up email, I’ve been searching long enough to know that an email is standard and will suffice. What athena did was basically evil.