Worst professional decision I ever made - Avis employé Engineering Array (NY)

Clear expectations at a very stable organization.

High expectations can lead to friction in some cases

Got paid for interview and onboarding

I went through what felt like a “ghost job” type of process. I was given a two-day technical assessment that required very little sleep and included pulling an all-nighter. The assignment was highly realistic and closely resembled production-level work in both scope and expectations. A significant amount of time and effort was required before even having a clearly established or confirmed role. This also included a CCAT assessment as part of the screening process, along with employment verification, ~45 pages of documents, and several hours of video content. After that, I was asked to record two 5–10 minute videos based on those materials, with very minimal prompts and no clear grading criteria or expectations. I was then told I scored just slightly below “acceptable” and was terminated immediately. The entire process felt disorganized from start to finish. The technical assessment was missing key pieces, almost as if it was incomplete or still being tested. During onboarding, I was already being added to meetings and even assigned a task, despite not having fully completed the onboarding process. Part of the reasoning given for my termination was that I wasn’t proactive in pointing out that I had been added to meetings and should have been focusing on onboarding instead. This was especially confusing, as those meetings and tasks were initiated by the team themselves. Given the amount of upfront work required and how the process was structured, this raised serious concerns for me about whether the role was clearly defined or fully established, and whether the expectations for candidates were aligned with an actual longterm position. Advice to others: Be cautious about the time commitment required before the role is fully secured. The process may require substantial effort upfront without clear expectations or evaluation criteria.