I applied through a recruiter. The process took 5 weeks.

Major red flag! TL;DR: I was low-balled after they found out my current salary. A recruiter reached out, and I was upfront about the minimum salary I would make a change for. I went through the whole process and had a pre-offer discussion with HR about the expectation. We agreed that it would be close to what I told the recruiter on the initial call. Everything seemed fine until then. The next day, the recruiter came up with an offer that was 15K less than what we agreed on the day before. During the discussion the day before, I revealed my current salary, and so they thought they could significantly low-ball me. That was very unprofessional and a major waste of time for me. I rejected the offer immediately and I lost all my interest in even negotiating because they seemed too shady to put my trust in, and they were not willing to pay me the fair market value just because I was making less at my current company. I was hired during the early pandemic days at my previous company, so yeah, my salary was below average.

After another month of interviewing, I got an offer from another company 20% higher than what I asked on the initial call. In retrospect, I might have given them a lower expectation than what I am worth, and they thought they could exploit me even more since I didn't know my worth in the market. I dogged that one, phew!

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