Applied through a recruiter and was sent to a 30 minute screening with a Staff Engineer. Mostly behavioral questions with a simple, verbal technical component. Was rejected with the same language mentioned by a previous reviewer ('a lot of potential, but not a match'). It's my first time not making it past a cultural screening, but on the bright side no time wasted on either end.

Basic behavioral interview questions were asked. The interviewer seemed bored and unengaged, and as if they had already made up their mind before even doing the interview. Which was weird because they were the co-founder. In my 15+ years in the field, I have never been rejected at the screening stage. This one felt different. Perhaps it was my lack of eye contact (neurological disability). Normally, at the end of a screener, I'll be like an awkward teenager and ask "so now it's the awkward moment, I like you do you like me?" — and I did, knowing I had already been rejected just based on vibes. "So next steps will come via email just gotta talk to the team first." Three days later I get the rejection email at 8:00:00 according to email headers. "It was nice to talk to you today, however we're moving forward with other candidates at this time and we wish you the best of luck on your job search." — saying "today" twice, which indicated to me that he had typed this up after our initial conversation and scheduled the email to be sent after the holidays. My advice: be boring, vanilla, and don't have a sense of humor.