The interview process itself was rigorous and time-consuming, though not too much more effortful than those of other top tech companies. The reason why this experience was so awful for me was the extremely unprofessional recruiter who was assigned to me. First off, she was audibly eating during our phone screen. Then, as I made my way through each phase of the interview process, I would send her follow-up emails after each interview that I attended and to ask her to relay thank you messages to each of my interviewers. She never responded to these emails, not even to confirm receipt. I obviously wanted to know how I did in the interviews and whether I would be moving onto the next round, and I wouldn't find out until I heard from the interview scheduler (a different person). Facing total silence in this process was stressful, and having to follow up again 1 week after each email just to make sure it was seen and received made me feel like a burden. I certainly doubted that my thank yous were ever passed along to the interviewers. Maybe she was super busy, but where she really screwed up was at the point in the interview process when I was supposed to give a presentation to a panel, which I was only aware of because of the information in the calendar invite. I emailed this recruiter more than once to ask for details about what is required of me for the presentation interview. Eventually she responded to me, 48 hours before the scheduled presentation interview, and she rudely said that we'd already been over this on the phone, WHICH WE HADN'T. I had to write her back and explain that we had never once spoken about any of the interviews because our only phone conversation had been the screening call! I needed to know what to prepare! The next day she gave me the presentation prompt details and I pulled an all-nighter preparing a lot of work for what ended up being a pretty difficult interview. Lastly, she ghosted me. After I completed all of the final interviews I NEVER HEARD BACK FROM HER. 3 weeks went by without a reply to a single email. I wrote her explaining that I had 2 offers in hand from other companies, and that I just needed a decision ASAP. No response. I had multiple referrals at Spotify and one of them gave me the email address to contact the hiring manager directly. When I emailed him to explain the awkward situation I was in with this recruiter and other offers to respond to, he did not reply to me, but I received an automated rejection letter from Spotify within an hour.
