I was contacted by a Netflix recruiter on LinkedIn and agreed to proceed with an interview.

First, I spoke with the recruiter, who told me about Netflix and the particular team. They asked me some basic, non-technical questions about my past experience and salary expectations – the usual recruiter "stuff".

Then, they scheduled a 1.5-hour phone call with the hiring manager for that team. I was told it was going to be a technical interview with a coding exercise and all.

Initially, the hiring manager called me before the interview and told me he wouldn't be on time and would call 30 minutes later than the scheduled time. It was nice to get a courtesy call; I appreciated that.

The actual interview was a complete waste of time. He started by talking at length about his team and what they work on, which, in reality, was nothing exciting – a team of glorified Research Assistants. They own recommendation systems and basically needed a lot of work with machine learning guys, facilitating their A/B testing, and launching the one model that actually works.

Then he asked me to describe my own experience. I detailed different companies I've worked for and the projects I've completed. Mid-way, he interrupted me to ask how the transition from one role to another was, which I answered. He then asked what my teammates would describe me as. I answered, "someone with a bias for action who gets things done."

He then asked if I had any questions, and I asked a bunch.

He didn't ask me a single technical question. The closest thing to a technical question was, "How would you rate your coding skills from 1-5?" to which I said 4-4.5. Isn't that the whole point of this interview? Give me a question to code and rate yourself.

And then he proceeded to give me the most stupid reason for not moving forward: "You don't have the number of years of experience." As a seasoned interviewer myself, I couldn't believe he said that. I expect that from a small company run by a bunch of non-tech guys, but this was ridiculous beyond any reasoning. I understand if he didn't like something he saw, but seriously.

I've worked for 3 years for one of the biggest tech companies (13x market cap compared to Netflix) and another year at a video gaming giant, and I am currently working for the biggest online retailer. Hell, Netflix runs on systems we develop.

And he still somehow had the guts to tell me to keep in touch, that I'm smart and definitely have the right skillset, and should apply in a few years.

It was a complete waste of my time, and I don't know what he was trying to prove.

No technical questions asked.

Tell me about your experience.

How was the transition from role A to role B?

How would your team describe you?

How would you rate your coding skills?