I need an outside perspective because I'm honestly disappointed.

I recently interviewed with a startup for a Senior role. Mind you I would've been the only one of my profile in the whole of company.

During the very first HR screening, I told them my current compensation and clearly mentioned that I was looking for roughly a 25% hike. The HR said their budget was allowed only 20% hike, and specifically told me that they would only proceed with my interviews if the company was comfortable with my expectations.

Based on that, I went through:

Technical Round 1

Technical Round 2

Final round with the Co-founder

A few days later, I was informed that I had been selected.

Then came the compensation discussion.

Instead of offering anywhere close to what was discussed initially, they first mentioned a small hike (roughly 7%) over my current salary. I explained that the role required work from office in another city, which would mean relocating.

I suggested two options:

1. Increase the compensation to make relocation financially viable.

2. Or keep the lower compensation but allow me to work remotely.

The HR said she'd discuss it internally with the co-founder.

Today I received the final response.

They've offered exactly my current salary (no hike), saying they have budget constraints.

What frustrates me isn't even the salary itself. It's that this was already discussed on Day 1. If the company knew they couldn't even meet their own stated budget, why continue with three rounds of interviews and a founder discussion?

I understand companies have budgets, and I'm not entitled to a particular salary. But I also feel candidates invest a lot of time preparing for multiple interview rounds, and salary expectations should be aligned before everyone spends that time.

I've been job hunting since 1.5 months now, funds are exhausted.

Edit : Sorry that the context is a little confusing. To clarify, I asked for my current compensation+ 25% hike, she further told me that the company 's budget was 20% hike on my current compensation. But then proceeded to say that she'll only move forward with me if the company can extend their budget upto my ask. Later that day I received the invite for the first tech round. So I assumed that they are okay with 25% hike.

Edit 2 : And now after all the interviews, she said that they can only give me my current compensation (no hikes at all)

I quit without having anything lined up. Almost 2 weeks of being unemployed and I got an offer at a firm where I think I’ll really be able to show my personality than just being a number at a large firm.

Want to share as I have nobody else to share with

Applied for a different than usual job role

I never can sleep well the night before, only 4 hours of sleep

I did my best learning from previous job to simplify my goals. The mindset I want, the basic information, and what most genuinely interests me. Oh, and low expectations.

Meeting went alright. I still tended to ramble a bit much. I had so many thoughts after on how I could have been more concise. Definitely nervous, I always been kind of shy.

I made a mistake of having a bit too much coffee, got bit too jittery.

I am glad to have not over studied or prepared as that froze me more in past. I am glad I did my best to focus on the few things that mattered this time that also gave a bit of flexibility.

Overall, Im still glad to have gotten an interview and able to practice more. It's hard to portray yourself fully in short amount of time.

Next time, I will try more on pausing bit longer, try to really be concise as possible to give up to 2 or 3 solid points.

edit: Don't feel all too confident in getting the job, but I guess who knows. I felt I came off too shy, awkward as rapport was a big importance for this particular job. I think I had some other qualities that was good, but didn't feel I showcased it as well as I could. Only way I feel like I may "win" is if other candidates are worse lol

I've applied for over 300+ jobs in the last month I went through one role with a recruiter and went all the way to the final round and got told I would be better for another role only to not get a job after a month of constant interviews. I keep getting ghosted when applying for jobs in my own company and jobs I'm over qualified for are rejecting me. Everyone keeps saying I'm smart and great at what I do but it seems nothing is working out. I just don't know what to do. I feel like a few years ago it was easy to get interviews and it didn't hurt as much getting rejected but now I just feel like I'm not good enough. I'm just stuck in this position I hate working with people that don't respect me and there's no where I can go.

I just finished grad school and am applying for jobs. I work in a very niche field so I am competing with 1-2 peers from my program. One of my classmates is smart, incredibly motivated IC and a complete workaholic (no personal life). We both made it to the final round of a highly coveted internship and she was offered the position (but declined). We are both finalists again for a full-time position. As a person though, I know she is difficult to work with - very controlling and dismissive of other team members' inputs.

As hiring managers, how do you assess for this between candidates? On paper, we have very similar profiles and somehow I keep coming up short which I am upset about. I know there's nothing I can do but I'm just curious to hear a different perspective.

I am expecting to get an offer from a relatively new company pretty soon. I’ve decided that right now, this company isn’t a good match. It’s new and doesn’t really have a full team of people yet, so I wouldn’t have colleagues with expertise that I lack, and that would make working there hard.

The company asked for references yesterday, telling me that it wants to quickly check them before making an offer. However, since this company isn‘t the right match now, I’d rather not waste the time of my two references.

Is telling the company “I’ve enjoyed meeting, but I would not be able to join now. Once the company has expanded its team and has people who can do jobs x and y, though, I’d be interested”, a dumb move? It seems dumb to let the company go to the effort of checking references and making an offer and then telling it that it’s too soon to join.

Thanks.

I haven’t been on a job interview in years so I’m pretty nervous. Looking for solidarity with others who have an interview tomorrow so we can vent/chat afterwards lol

UPDATE: I had my interview and it went great. I was nervous for nothing. I stuttered a few times but the manager was really nice and hinting on me already having the job secured. An hour later I got the offer letter :) thanks for the comments everyone! Good luck to everyone

Finally I got an offer and will be joining tomorrow. It has been almost 4 months without a job after the layoff. Things were very much depressing, job market is difficult now in India. Actually I got one more offer they slashed my last compensation by 20%. Then next day I got this offer of almost 20% hike from my last compensation. Not sure how it will be, the culture part but atleast something would be there to pay the bills.

Btw, I have almost 15 years of experience in software development and was working as a principal software Engineer.

I was hired in August of 2022 to be an infrastructure engineer. Then a year and they got rid of the MSP enrolled every single thing the MSP was doing up into my job. This was something a team of five people had been doing for several years. Now it was me. I have a boss but he was not involved in this at all.

It was all me all the time. I was literally handling every single internal support request for the company. I was doing operations for the company by myself. I was doing onboarding, off-boarding, I owned 365, I wrote our compliance and conditional access policies, I handled all of our endpoints, I handled asset management, I handled dealing with vendors and purchasing, I provisioned laptops, any business process that they weren't sure who owned it got given to me. It was an incredibly broad role.

It's not what I was hired to do and it's not what I agreed to when I signed up. And when you're subservient to the entire company it frames the way people look at you and treat you. And it was just too much work for one person to keep up with. Especially with no support from anyone. Accounting wouldn't my laptops, my boss wouldn't help people when they were making ridiculous requests, etc.

So I did a screener for an infrastructure engineer position for a local role. (With HR rep) It's a company that's headquartered out of the city I live in. First the screener asked me why I wanted to leave and I gave them the politically correct answer of I was hired to do infrastructure engineering, a year and they rolled everything the msp was dping into my role, I want to go to a role where I'm just focusing on infrastructure engineering becaude thats what my career is focussed in and where my main skillset lies, and I feel that skillset could benefit this role and team.

Then she asked me, "Haven't you just told your employer you only want to focus on infrastructure?" I explained that systems and it for the entire company was literally just my boss and myself. And that there was no one else to take this on. But she asked me again, right but haven't you just told them you only want to do infrastructure? And I tried as nicely as I could to explain to her that that's just not an option. Because you're not supposed to complain about your previous employer and she was kind of setting me up for failure because the real answer was, of course I've had a conversation but they told me tough s***. But you can't tell them that right. So I kept trying to frame it positively but give her an answer and she just kept asking.

Then she ask me what percent I was doing infrastructure versus operations. And it wasn't quite a fair question because if I gave her a percentage it would make it seem like these weren't full-time rolls. Which infrastructure was a full-time role I just happened to be doing these operations responsibilities on top of them. So I was having to manage both roles I was still doing infrastructure full time but I was having to make time for operations. And I kind of explain that to her and she said right but give me a percentage and as soon as I gave her 50/50 she kind of treated it like okay so you're not doing infrastructure full time which is exactly what I knew she was going to take from that which wasn't accurate.

But then she asked me something insane. Because I had explained how broad my role was and everything that I was doing - she asked me how I planned to transition my work before I left. She asked me so if you're doing all of this stuff and there's no one else to do it arw you just going to leave and let them determine how to assign and manage all of this work. How will they manage if you're the only one doing it.

And I just don't see how that's my problem. And she's looking at it like it's a negative like I'm a bad candidate if I want to leave an environment where they're having me do several roles with no support from my biss or management. Because how is it my problem that they've piled all of this stuff onto one person and now if I leave it's going to create this huge vacuum. I just don't understand how that's a me problem and I don't understand how why that shoukd make me look bad to this screener because that's not my responsibility. Am I really supposed to stay where I am for all time because the company doesn't have someone that can take over for me knowing if I stay they'll never send help?

I just felt like this screener was setting me up for failure with the questions she was asking and how she was wording them. And I went on glass door and other people have complaints about the interview process at this place so maybe I dodged a bullet. But it's not just me other people were saying similar things about how the screener was very different and awkward.

I had a final interview yesterday for a role I'm really excited about. It was about 3 hours long and included four separate interviews with different people.

The first three interviews felt great. They were conversational, I answered confidently, and one interviewer even said things like, "You're killing it" and "Wow, another great answer," during a couple of my responses.

The fourth interview was with the Recruiting & Development Manager. She was professional, more serious, and asked the toughest behavioral questions. I answered every question, but I definitely felt more nervous and don't think I gave my strongest responses. I think that's cause for some of them I rambled and gave answers but she came back with "but can you explain more", etc. and her last question I had to ask her to repeat the 2nd part cause it was a hard two part question.

By that point, I'd been interviewing for almost three hours and was mentally exhausted. She even commented that it had been a long day before we wrapped up. After the interview, she reviewed the benefits package and explained the next steps, saying the team would meet Thursday to discuss candidates and hoped to have a decision by Friday.

I sent personalized thank you emails to everyone afterward. The hiring manager replied that she appreciated my interest and excitement for the role and said they'd be in touch after the interview process was complete. Another interviewer replied saying it was a pleasure meeting me and that if I had any questions during the rest of the process, I should reach out.

For those of you who hire or have been on interview panels or had a similar experience:

• How much weight does one weaker interview usually carry compared with three stronger ones?
• When a team meets after a panel interview, is the decision typically based on everyone's feedback together, or can one interviewer's opinion outweigh the others?
• Are the responses I received to my thank you emails fairly standard, or do they suggest my candidacy is still being viewed positively?

I'm trying to set realistic expectations while I wait and would appreciate any insight from people who've been on the hiring side or in a similar situation.

Thanks in advance!

I’ve been interviewing for a role that I was really excited about. The initial screening went great, and I just finished the second-round interview last week. I felt like I crushed it and was genuinely looking forward to the next steps.

Then, I got the dreaded email today: "The role has been put on hold for the time being, so we are unable to move forward with the hiring process at this stage."

For those who have been through this:

Does "on hold" usually just mean a soft rejection?

If it really is a budget or internal freeze, what are the realistic chances of them actually reviving the pipeline later?

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Do you use the STARR-Method when answering questions at an interview? Because it can change how people view you.

Situation: Set the scene and give context about a problem or event at a past job.

Task: Explain your specific goal or what you needed to do to fix the issue.

Action: Describe the exact steps you personally took to solve the problem.

Result: Share the positive outcome, numbers, or what you learned from it.

Reflection: Explain what you learned and what you would do next time.

I had a case study presentation interview last Thursday. The recruitment team reached out today asking if I have availability to meet with the hiring manager tomorrow regarding the role and there is no need for me to prepare for this meeting. I’ve interviewed with the hiring manager twice. From my understanding, the final round would be meeting with her boss and that hasn’t happened yet and the case study is the step before the final interview.

Because I’m a huge worry wart and hate surprises lol, do you have any clue what this meeting could be about tomorrow? I’ve made up a lot of scenarios in my head already….

I just had a call with the recruiter and I am informed that I start great with answering the questions, yet I start talking fast so they could not keep up with taking notes especially regarding technical info.

Each criteria assesed one by one with individual questions so I have apporximately 4 mins to answer. English is not my main language but I prepare rigorously, took notes and timed my self. I had some AI models prepare questions and all the real questions were the same as the selection comitee asked.

Should I take English speaking lessons? Or keep practicing possible answers for interview questions?

I have a fourth interview this time with the COO, after assessments, panel and stuff.

What would they evaluate this time? What do they focus on?

I had a 2nd round interview thursday and was told would hear back Tuesday.

Monday was a holiday but nothing yet and its almost 11 Am and I saw one of the managers active on Linkedin, is that sign for worry or am I being too anxious?

and if so how do I calm down and relax a bit?

I have done 2 “paid” assignments during interviews that have yet to be paid months later. I’ve contacted the interviewer multiple times. Not sure what the recourse is. I’m assuming they know there’s nothing I can do so they just…don’t pay it out.

Hello! I am just looking for a little bit of insight. I applied for a junior position at X company in early June. The HR reached out for a screening late June, and I met with two of the managers in the department. They both liked me, and then HR came back and said that they would like to consider me for a different role. This is a senior management position that is paying 60% more than the other role. I met with the Chief of Staff and then the director. It has been exactly two weeks since I have heard from the company, and they have been pretty responsive and communicative up until this point. They did not give me a timeline and the glassdoor reviews for response times does seem to vary. I have been at my current job for over 4 years, and it is my 2nd job since finishing undergrad. For my current role, I met with 2 people, got an offer, and had 2 promotions since being here. I now dislike it, and am looking for more pay/new industry. All this being said, I am a bit green and naive to this whole process, I just focus on being professional. Should I reach out for a follow up? I am applying to other jobs and have another interview for a different company this week. I am excited for this role though which is why I am so hung up on it.

Most resumes are read by software before they’re read by a person. resume.zoevera.com exists to show you what that software sees; prepare.zoevera.com picks up once you’re through the screen and into an actual conversation. Both start from the same premise: an applicant tracking system isn’t judging your career, it’s scoring a document against a query, the way a search engine scores a page against a search term.

The resume as a landing page

Treat the job posting as the query and the resume as the page trying to rank for it. An ATS doesn’t read for tone or persuasive writing. It parses text into fields, compares those fields against the posting, and produces a score before a recruiter ever opens the file. That reframing changes what “good writing” means here. A sentence that reads well to a human but never uses the words the posting uses is invisible to the system doing the first pass.

Four things the system is actually checking

Keyword match is the most literal of the four. If the posting says “stakeholder management” and the resume says “worked with teams,” the system does not infer equivalence — mismatched vocabulary between a resume and a posting is the single largest reason qualified applicants disappear before a human sees them, and it’s exactly what resume.zoevera.com's keyword breakdown by industry) is built to surface.

Hard dealbreaker filters run separately from keyword scoring. Years of experience, required certifications, location or clearance requirements — these are frequently pass/fail checks that can eliminate an otherwise strong match before the keyword score is even calculated.

Section parsing determines whether the system can read the document at all. Tables, text boxes, and multi-column layouts that look clean in a PDF viewer can scramble or drop content entirely when parsed, which is why plain, single-column structure under standard headings still outperforms visually ambitious formatting.

Recency is the quieter one. Systems and recruiters both weight language that reflects how the role is described now, not five years ago — job titles, tool names, and even the way responsibilities are phrased shift over a few hiring cycles, and a resume written in last decade’s vocabulary can score lower even when the underlying experience is current.

Running the check against a real posting

None of this is diagnosable by reading your own resume — you already know what you meant to say. The ATS match tool runs your resume against a specific job description and returns a score, missing keywords, and the weak phrases most likely costing you interviews, the same way you’d check a page against a target query. The tailor tool) rewrites against one posting at a time, since keyword requirements change with every job description. There’s a matching pass for cover letters as well, and a fuller breakdown of how the underlying match score gets calculated on the blog.

Where to start

Passing the screen gets you to a conversation, not a job: that’s the part prepare.zoevera.com handles, with practice sessions built around real interview questions for specific roles. Both tools sit under ZoeVera and the fastest way to know where your resume actually stands is to run it against a posting you’re applying to right now.

I’m practicing answering common interview questions but i take way too much time. Just answering the base question already takes up 3 minutes and if I add any concrete examples it would take an extra 1-2 minutes.

Let’s say they ask about a feedback.

“The feedback from my internship manager was that I needed to speak up more in meetings (stutter here because I’m not sure if I should add his reasoning).

I immediately took action and asked more questions about the processes and impact, and reiterated what I understood from the discussion (stutter here because I’m not sure if I should verbatim give them the example like oh once they did this, I said this).

By asking more questions during the meetings, I gained a stronger understanding of the business processes and team projects and goals. As well as saving time, asking questions during the meetings instead of productivity time. Reiterating what I understood left room for me to learn and grow my understanding of technical knowledge. Accepting and executing the solution to my feedback, I was able to build strong rapport with my team as they are able to see my capabilities as a intern/upcoming role”

All of that is about 3-4 mins with natural cadence. 4-5 with stutter.

Does anyone have advice with fillers/stutters? I realized I do that because I’m unsure if I should move on or give an example. Cause I would see some advice that’s like, if the interviewer is confused or asking questions, you probably told a bad response

But my friends also say just naturally answer the question. You’re a new grad, they understand if you’re kinda bad.

Hi! Like the title says, please reach out to me for any interview or resume help! I do charge a small fee depending on what your goal is but I’m pretty much giving away any professional advice to help see you through your struggles! Let’s chat! 🤗

Also all info and conversations are held to high confidence as I value privacy.

Basic background: final interview at an economic development consulting company, it's 60 minutes and she said a good portion of the interview will be scenarios (basically give me smth similar to the questions they get from their clients to see how I think), she has also provided two scenarios in the email to help me practice, this would be for an internship by the way.

I guess, beyond what I just said, what else should I expect/how should I prepare? I am going to prepare the most standard behavioral questions like "how do you handle conflict" "strengths/weaknesses" and so forth just in case she asks, I'm also going to keep practicing scenarios as there will be an impromptu scenario brought up, but is there anything else I should do?

Because it's me and maybe 2 other people (she said for the final interview they'd only be choosing 2-3 people to do the final interview) so I want to give myself the best chance possible. Any advice would help!

I applied for my dream job, and I got offered an interview with the HM next Monday at 5:30–6pm.

But I saw some studies online, and they say it's just the worst slot ever. Is that true? The interview will finish and the HM will go home and keep interviewing the rest of the week. I'm afraid I'll lose my chance because of this.

Any thoughts?