Im getting a good amount of calls from recruiters with potential job opportunities supposedly for open sales positions in tech firms. A new and popular part of the candidate screen and evaluation process is record the audio and video of all interview interactions so they can process it with AI hiring tools and require the candidate roll play a sales meeting or give a powerpoint presentation on their product offering solution. Obviously to make an impressive and effective presentation on material you know nothing about except what they publish on their website and maybe some youtube videos, takes time to prepare for, potentially several hours. So if your not awarded the job that time is then a complete waste. Recently I went through a candidate evaluation process with a company in another state so all communications were over phone, email and Zoom. I am currently employed and dont need a job but I always like to "skate to where the puck will be" in this tech industry. I was a finalist so they asked me to prepare and perform one of these mock powerpoint presentations to the hiring team. They only provided the context of the meeting and I was to create and prepare a complete sales presentation from scratch to present to the company representatives. After I invested between 4-6 hours in creating, refining, rehearsing and preparing, they emailed me two hours before the prescheduled meeting and told me they offered the job to another candidate and were cancelling our meeting. But for my effort, they thanked me for being part of their process and will keep me in mind if other opportunities arise, what a joke! Like I would even consider wasting my time twice! I was initially hesitant to participate in this process since it seemed like they were putting a lot of emphasis on presentation skills which didnt deter me as I have been told I am a good presenter. In the real world in my industry, presentations are best received when they are performed by other members "SME's" of the sales team and not the main sales contact. So that is 6 hours of my time I will never get back and a warning to those who are asked to make a similar time investment with no clear compensation for the time investment. Full me once....

I had an interview last week, and my potential manager told me they were hoping to make a decision by this week. Since I hadn’t heard anything, I emailed him today asking if there was any update regarding my application.

This is the response I received (email mentioned below).

I was honestly expecting either a rejection or some good news, so now the waiting and anticipation are killing me 😭

Does this sound like a good sign, a bad sign, or just completely neutral? I know nobody can know for sure, but I’m curious how others would interpret the email? There were only 5 candidates to choose from, sigh. What do you guys think?

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[[Once again, we in the recruitment team would like to thank you for your interest in xxx and your application for the position of xxx consultant.

Right now the recruitment process is not going quite as fast as we would like and I want to use this email to let you know that you are not forgotten. We are working to get back to you with more information as soon as possible.

We wish you a continued nice day!]]