Friendly and pleasant process, but ultimately misled on technical expectations. Pros: The initial stages were great. The recruiter was incredibly friendly, transparent, and provided an excellent overview of the company, the culture, and the role. The subsequent behavioral interview with the Lead and Senior Data Engineers was equally pleasant and collaborative. Cons: The final technical review completely contradicted the instructions and criteria I was given, which was highly frustrating. After completing a take-home exercise (where candidates are explicitly asked to spend no more than 4 hours), I was told via email that the next 1-hour interview would solely be a deep-dive review into my specific solution, serving as a "jumping-off point" to discuss my reasoning, decisions, and potential improvements. During the interview, I walked them through my solution at a low-level. The interviewers seemed very pleased with my tech stack choices and engineering trade-offs, offering validating feedback like, "Ah yes, that makes sense." However, 24 hours later, I received a rejection stating that while they appreciated my technical expertise, they expected me to touch more on core data engineering principles and system architecture. In essence, they graded the interview against system design/architecture rubrics, which completely contradicted their explicit written instructions. At no point during the 1-hour call did the interviewers guide the conversation toward architecture or signal a shift in focus. Had they communicated that this was the priority, I easily could have adapted my approach. Advice to Management: You boast a very friendly and transparent interview process, and for the first few stages, you absolutely deliver on that. However, please ensure your interviewers stick to the brief provided to the candidate. If your evaluation priorities shift toward high-level system design and architecture rather than a code review of the take-home assignment, you need to communicate that clearly beforehand or steer the conversation during the interview. Misleading candidates regarding evaluation criteria is incredibly discouraging.