I had an initial recruiter call, followed by a virtual coding screen and then four rounds during the virtual onsite. After being told I had passed the onsite, I was asked to provide references.

Two weeks after submitting my references, I hadn’t heard anything, despite following up. Eventually, I reached out to the hiring manager, who informed me they would not be moving forward.

I then contacted the recruiting team to ask about the decision and the possibility of reapplying. I was told that my application was still marked as open and that my references were very positive, which made the situation confusing.

A week later, I sent another follow-up. I explained that Anthropic had been a dream company for me and asked whether the rejection was final or if there were other roles I might be a fit for. The response I received was that they “assumed I knew” I’d been rejected because the hiring manager said so. I was told I could reapply in six months. There was no acknowledgment of how far I’d gotten or how confusing the process had been.

While I understand that not every candidate will receive an offer, I was disappointed by the lack of follow-up at the final stages. Clear and timely communication, especially after investing significant time, is a basic expectation in a hiring process.

A web crawler was part coding and part system design.