The 30-minute recruiter call was warm and lovely. Pretty straightforward. Good discussion about the team structure, and that she was hiring for a specific vertical, so it means you could be applying to different SA teams in parallel.

The 30-minute HM call wasn't an interview, it was an interrogation. The HM said their name and title, offered no more than that, and proceeded to just hammer me with questions. I wasn't asked to introduce myself or talk about my experience. In hindsight, two interpretations: this was already done in the recruiter call and recorded, so it was available to the HM, or this didn't matter.

For 30 minutes I was barraged with questions from the HM who had a mildly condescending demeanor the entire time. It felt that my answers to his questions weren't good enough.

Biggest red flag for me: "We're looking for high-ownership folks with a high bias-to-action. I was doing XYZ by week 2. There is no 30/60/90 here."

Yes, Anthropic is a Hypergrowth startup, and things are expected to be chaotic, but branding the chaos as a badge of honor is... interesting. Saying "we need people to help sort the chaos", or "we're growing incredibly rapidly", is understandable. Saying "there is no 30/60/90" tells me that I might not be set up for success.

• "Why Anthropic"
• "What do you think of our research papers"