I went through a multi-stage interview process for a senior engineering role. The early stages were well-organized — communication was clear, and initial conversations were professional and aligned with the company’s stated values. The take-home assignment required a significant time investment and included real-world challenges (data processing, performance considerations, deployment). However, there were issues with the provided infrastructure (broken Kubernetes credentials), which required additional effort to work around. This part of the effort was not acknowledged during the process. The final interview focused heavily on a single implementation detail. After identifying a minor issue, I acknowledged it and discussed how it could be addressed. Despite that, the conversation remained focused on the same point for an extended period, rather than moving on to broader topics such as system design or architectural decisions. The feedback I later received stated that I had difficulty accepting criticism and perceived questions as personal. This was surprising, as during the interview I explicitly acknowledged gaps and engaged with the feedback in real time. Since the interview was recorded with an AI note-taking tool, I requested the transcript. After reviewing it, I did not find evidence supporting the claim that I was defensive or resistant to feedback. Instead, the transcript shows that the issue had been acknowledged and discussed, yet the conversation continued to revisit it repeatedly. This created a disconnect between the documented interaction and the final feedback.