Aside from that one, the rejections that were the least self-esteem-damaging were ones that said "we've decided not to fill the position". Even if not true, it's a good "it's not you it's me" type of rejection.
Unfortunately a day later I got a notice from them that the role I was interviewing for was being closed down. They encouraged me to look for other roles I was interested in and we could continue from there. I sent two, and then right after new years was informed they were freezing all hiring until mid January when they finalized their new head count. Then they were among the number of companies announcing new layoffs in the last couple weeks.
Talk about disappointed but still being appreciative. I'm still excited about maybe getting on with the company one day simply because they treated the hiring process with a lot of respect and didn't waste my time. It wasn't a me thing, but just bad news coming down from higher up internally.
"We'd rather have no one than you!" seems like it should be more insulting, really. But I get it.
That is: the litigation could probably happen in most countries and even not be summarily dismissed.
Having now been on the hiring side of things for technical interviews, I'll give feedback when asked, but I think that most people don't give feedback because its kind of a pain in the ass if you aren't organized.
The recruiter actually got on the phone with me, and pointed out the signals (from notes from the hiring manager) that I was lacking for them. And how I could improve if I wanted to interview with them again.
It all felt very respectful. Good for them for going above and beyond.
That said I don't expect any company to tell me anything beyond "No thanks" after a failed interview.
I don't want to be surrounded by people who can still brag about high school.
I paused and had to check with the recruiter to make sure I'd heard her correctly. (I had.)
It was also the single highest-density pool of talent that I've ever worked with, then or since. Our office manager had a PhD from Colgate.
https://www.futurescienceleaders.com/yvr1b/wp-content/upload...
https://gregmankiw.blogspot.com/2009/08/least-surprising-cor...
Saying that SAT scores correlate closely with income in response to someone claiming that SAT scores measure IQ could be a statement of agreement or disagreement, depending on the relationships among the various measures.
Also, if you want to measure IQ, why not use an IQ test and not some arbitrary proxy?
[1] http://www.equality-of-opportunity.org/papers/abs_mobility_p...
Those children might go on to score better on the SAT, leaving a correlation between parental income and SAT scores that would be unsurprising at each step.
Your point about inherited wealth is not demonstrated on the chart you showed, which was parental incomes (not wealth) and in ranges unlikely to be perturbed by vast inheritances.
> Also, if you want to measure IQ, why not use an IQ test and not some arbitrary proxy?
I don't want to; I suspect colleges and D. E. Shaw felt like SAT scores were an acceptable/practical proxy for whatever purpose it was that they had. I thought it was weird and slightly off-putting to be asked, but it seems to work for them.
[edit 1: added the below]
I don't think the best idea in the room wins - the most persuasive person's idea usually wins.
[edit 2: added the below]
Harvard's endowment in 2022 was apparently $50.9 billion.[1]
[1]https://www.usnews.com/education/best-colleges/the-short-lis...
[edit] I should have quoted de shaw's wealth
The weirdest ones were "we don't want you, but we will keep your data in the database just in case". Like, in which case? Do you have any other positions that you think I could match? Why not talk to me about them then? Do you expect to have them in some indefinite future and expect me to stay unemployed in the meanwhile? Or do you expect me to drop the position I just recently started in the meantime and jump to your company as soon as you call - because that's the kind of employee you're looking for? I'm just not sure what's the message here. Is it just general "we don't want to hire you, but don't worry, you're not a complete basket case, there's still a chance we might hire you eventually. Or maybe not". Confusing.
"there is a hiring freeze put into place"
bro it's early Feb-Mar, the job advert is < 30 days, and budgets came out but a few weeks earlier -- hiring ain't frozen.
best guess was that it was a security-related tech company, and turning down people, esp. reasonably qualified ones, in a way that makes them mad is akin to drawing a target on your head. give custom feedback to those who got through the interview process so they feel like they are at least looked at, and shootdown the rest via something that feels impartial -- otherwise these wanna be blackhats will try to DDoS you.