Smarty Pants interview questions

Very unprofessional initial interview with management. Very unclear job description. Then was asked to do an assignment that was a TON of work and never heard a word back. Pretty sure they just wanted free ideas. Never do work for free!

Had an initial call with recruiter, then an interview with a senior researcher. Both went well. After that, I was asked to produce a PowerPoint presentation, which was not out of the ordinary. However, then the COO called and asked what my salary range is before deciding “whether to proceed” with me, and was not willing to disclose what their actual range was. I appreciate wanting to know whether those two ranges aligned, but doing so mid-process and not in the initial call was strange and felt like a waste of everyone times and energy.