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I was just wondering....

After you interview candidates for a job..... say a preliminary interview, and a second round interview with the firm, what happens after that? What does the company do in between interviewing you and telling you their decision?

why does it take 2-3 weeks? You would think they would already have a good idea right after the second round interviews...Do they do additional background checks in this time? Put together the 'offer package' (hhhaha... i'm dreaming about this one..... )

Its been 3 weeks since a second round interview I had. (first time someone has paid $300/hour to meet me. ( since it costs over $1000 to fly me across the country and put me up for 2 days)).

A fellow interviewee and a friend i made during the intervew has already been rejected by the company because he didn't do so well during the technical questions. I haven't heard a peep out of the company, despite a recent followup letter I sent, but that could be due to the holiday season and all.

Getting worried and anxious. I'm excited about this job. It promises to be very challenging and all, but my competitors for the job all seem to have had several years of work experience, and are doing their masters in Stanford...grrrrr....

anyways, just fretting about things well beyond my control. I should just concentrate on looking for more jobs......

They may not do a real background check until after the second interview, or until they're ready to make an offer. These things cost money.

Also, depending on how the job is funded (and whether they've already got a guarantee for the funds or have to get the money allocated _after_ they decide to hire you -- this happens), they may have to get three or four signoffs -- from the manager, from the director, maybe even from the VP. And any one of those guys could be in Korea this week.

There's a million good reasons like that, and a million bad ones, too. But I'm not getting into those.

Oh yeah, other good ones: the job is funded, but only in the next fiscal year -- which isn't here yet.

Or, the company is about to be acquired (or get venture capital funding), and they want to keep their headcount low until _after_ the deal is inked, because the higher the revenue per employee (total revenue divided by # or employees), the better they look and the better price they may get. Happened to me once: I waited three months.

No news is good news. Your buddy's rejection was plenty prompt, right? So presumably if you were in the reject pile, you'd know it.

Well, you can always drop a call to HR there? No news is ususally good news. If it works like the last job I interviewed for, it was a week or so after the second interview, then I got a call, we went back and forth for a bit, then got a package in the mail (the formal acceptance package). But if you are getting worried, at least give them a call, to show your interest is still there.

Well, I guess the reason for all the delay might be the holidays. Plus the fact that they interviewed 2 more people the week before christmas. I just called their offices. Even the receptionist is on holiday till next monday. I only managed to talk to the most junior consultant I met during the interview. And obviously she's not the one making the decision.

So I'll have to wait till next week for the news. urghs. The 'good' news is that I got a 'good' fortune cookie fortune the other day..hhhhha...

but I obviously know how the 'fortunes' work. They're so general and you can read so much into them, but oh wells...heh...

Sometimes a higher up has to sign off on it (usually a high manager or VP level). Like someone said, these guys are gone a bunch. Also HR is known for taking a lot of time to process these things sometimes. I think it took about 4 days from interview to hiring on my last job, but this was highly unusual. It took 4 weeks for the one prior to that.