The recruiter initially contacted me via LinkedIn and promptly scheduled an initial call. The interview process included rounds with the hiring manager, a technical assignment, tech debriefs, cross-functional discussions, and a leadership panel (with a presentation round added later). The technical assignment, which involved setting up Redis Community Edition and Redis Cloud in a replica configuration, along with a use case demonstration, was of average difficulty. I completed and submitted it within the provided timeframe. Following these rounds, I had two debrief sessions and a leadership interview, all completed within 20 days. However, after this phase, communication from the interviewing team abruptly ceased for about a month and a half. When I followed up with the recruiter, I was informed that the team was unavailable due to a leadership program. Despite this delay, I patiently awaited further updates. After approximately two months into the process, I finally had the presentation round. Feedback from this session was positive, with the team appreciating the fluent delivery and technical explanations. They expressed interest in having me meet with individuals in the field, which seemed like a positive development, albeit unconventional. Subsequently, there was another period of silence lasting 3-4 days. When I reached out to the recruiter for an update, I was initially informed that my offer was in the approval process, which was encouraging. However, upon further inquiry after 3 days, I was informed that - "the message was not supposed to be for me" ( This was a whatsapp message followed up with some chats ) and the team has given me a pass upon asking the current status which didn't make any sense to me. In summary, the interview process spanned over 2.5 months and proved to be mentally and physically taxing. Despite early positive feedback, inconsistent communication and an unexpected outcome left me feeling that a considerable amount of time had been wasted.