There was an initial chat on the phone then a take home assignment, then I talked over my approach for the take home assignment with the Director of Engineering and a Senior Engineer.
Everyone was very nice. The problem is that after we discussed my solution to the problem they were like, "yeah, that looks good" and they acknowledged that there was no one perfect solution to it and that mine was reasonable. But then they didn't offer me the position!
In fact, I followed up to get more feedback, and the feedback was basically, "you did great. It just wasn't a fit for the position."
Obviously if I didn't get an offer than there was something about my approach or who I am that was not a good fit. It would have been wonderful to have learned a bit more about what that was so I wouldn't waste my time.
The only reasonable explanation I can come up with is that there is something odd and mysterious at play. Maybe they aren't hiring at all, but want to give the impression they are hiring so they look good, after all it's a very new company. Frankly, I have no idea. I have interviewed with Google before and they were a lot clearer about expectations and feedback. Mastery is blackbox that will befuddle those staring out it from the outside. And after a while, when the blackbox loses its mystery, it just becomes annoying.
