It’s interesting to me that 9 hours of interview time is considered excessive by some people. Over my career I’ve done interviews that required plane flights, hotels, and multiple separate days on site.

I’ve also done interviews that were brief 30-60 minute casual discussions followed by an offer during the hiring craziness that happened in a few years in the past. Anecdotally, coworkers at those companies were a completely random range from smart and kind down to the meanest, most clueless people I ever worked with. They had high turnover both because they were always firing bad hires (hire fast only works if you also fire fast) and people were burning out from the perpetual stream of bad hires being randomly injected into the company after they talked their way through the short interview.

Looking back, the interview processes that took the longest were certainly not perfect, but the companies that had them were much better about maintaining a coherent culture and high bar for the coworkers I would get. Every new hire felt like someone amazing who I was happy to be working with.

Everyone has different priorities, but looking back I think the relatively small amount of time I invested into long interview processes (relative to the 2000 hours I work every year) was time well spent.

IME those kinds of interviews are a waste for the applicant because you have to do your 5-10 minute elevator pitch and 10-15 minute dive into your experience 9 separate times. It’s terribly exhausting.

On the other hand I like meeting a lot of people that I’d be working with. It’s nice to start day 1 knowing who people are.

You are going to potentially spend a major portion of your life there - so it isn't that weird to set aside a full day to get to know them.

In my experience with this format it isn't like you are coding for 9 hours. It starts with soft HR stuff, ends with a sales pitch to you, and most of the middle is just pleasant conversation with interesting people.

I personally don't mind the multiple interview slots or 9 hours of conversations. It's fair since it takes their team members an equivalent amount of time (though it's split across team members, each team member is likely interviewing many others as well).

My blocker has been the initial written answers to the questions. I've had the questions half-answered for nearly a year now. I want to do it properly (sans AI) but other things come up and I question the EV of spending the time, especially since I'm not a strong writer in the first place※.

For Oxide, it makes sense to demand a strong writer due to their culture, so even if technically qualified I might not be a good fit, assuming I even get an interview.

※ - I write unambiguously, but use point form whenever possible and am not great at naturally writing concisely.

> Being rejected after investing so much time must also feel awful.

I did an interview process that was 6 hours, one hour per week, then flew me in for a 6 hour on-site. They decided not to take me at that point and provided no reason.

Right...so best interview process in the game for employers, not so much employees.

As someone who has dealt with both sides (interviewing and working with those that pass the interview), I really wish a long interview, like this, was standard. 45 minutes is not enough, unless it's easy to fire people.

At least you know what the time commitment is up front. Not true of every company.

I feel like this topic comes up every single time interview processes are discussed. Lots of people complaining "that process is too onerous! How do they expect me to invest that much time! In person coding problems are worthless!" And I don't necessarily disagree with that, but I do wonder what a lot of folks then expect a good process would look like while still allowing the employer enough information to make a decision.

Oxide can obviously impose a 9 hour interview process because they're a good enough company that lots of smart, motivated people want to work there and thus good candidates are willing to endure that process. Lesser companies obviously can't impose that process because there aren't enough good candidates willing to endure it.

My main point being, different strokes for different folks. If you think that process is too long, great, find a company with a less time consuming process. But Oxide's process obviously seems to work well for them, so I think it's pointless to complain about it (note I don't really think that's what you are doing, but a bunch of reply comments certainly are).

Nine hours is crazy