So, I had my final onsite interview with ?? and unfortunately it seemed like they won't be making a concrete offer though there is potential to perhaps work with them in the new year. I've been mulling this over for a few days now, ever since I got the news, but I'm not really sure how I feel about it. On one hand, my ego is hurt as is common with any type of rejection (especially after putting so much time into something) but, from a different POV, I'm proud of how I performed technically and think this might be the right decision if they are genuinely looking for someone that's more excited about the company.
My hope is that writing this blog post will help me organize my thoughts. Of course, it doesn't really seem like my thoughts matter too much in any concrete way as a decision has pretty much already been made. It would be more interesting if the ball was in my court, if I was the one who got to decide whether to join them or stay at ??. But, there's no point in thinking about what could have been. I think one takeaway here is that I shouldn't have tried to predict what they would say before I had a concrete answer. It just made things harder to accept. Instead, I should be open to either possibility so I'll be less disappointed in the future.
Anyway, so what were the positive aspects of the experience? I think the whole atmosphere in their "office" was really nice - it was super bright and airy along with having a plethora of snacks and drinks. It felt like the stereotypical "startup" office and it was probably the kind of social setting I was looking for. The team (with the exception of ??, who I'll elaborate on later) was really chill and I felt I did connect with them at least from an intellectual POV. Though I probably should have seemed more curious and asked questions about the work itself - but I was also trying to focus on the onsite project so I'm not really sure if that was even possible given the time I had. But yeah, the social setting was definitely appealing and something I think I would have liked to experience.
What about the negatives? Ultimately, the day-to-day work didn't seem that interesting even if these folks were all passionate about what they were doing. It wasn't even clear to me that it'd be more intellectually stimulating than my current role though there were some cool avenues to explore. The WLB is also extremely chill lately so, despite what ?? said about things there, I feel like I would be compelled to work harder than I am now. To be honest, working hard is fine - especially if it's about a new topic or project I'm interested in. I guess one other red flag is that the working style did seem to be too micro-managed for me. Daily standups and progress reports along with weekly planning might have been too much.
Perhaps the biggest negative though was my interactions with ??. While he seemed to have similar interests as me, I don't think I really resonate with his abrupt and direct working style. It wasn't specific to me, but even just seeing how he talked to other members of the team or handled meetings made me a bit uncomfortable. He just didn't have that warmth in his behaviors that the typical "nice" person kind of does. Lastly, while I think the avenue of research the team is pursuing is promising, I'm not sure it's something I'm 100% passionate about. If I had infinite resources (time/money) then I would probably try to investigate things more related to building a smaller model of the brain and exploring alternatives to backprop. I hope I can still find the motivation to do this kind of project independent of whether I join a startup or not.
So yeah, that's that I suppose. I'm not sure if writing down my thoughts really helped but I think, if the decision was in my hands, I'd probably be slightly biased towards not taking it. While the team was quite nice and the social setting was appealing (though perhaps I should try to have a happy social life regardless of work), I'm not sure if my level of interest in the work was enough to be a founding member of the team. Maybe it's the best for both of us and I should accept that - though I am curious to hear N's feedback.
I guess the last meta-point is that I really really really shouldn't think I know how things are going to work out or the best course of action in my life. I got rejected by ?? (Seattle interview) during college, ?? when I was trying to leave ?? and ?? wasn't really on my radar. While this startup was the one I was eying for the longest time, maybe it wasn't a great fit for me and I should be OK with having my opinion change from when I first heard about them. The sign of a mentally strong person is someone who is able to change their initial opinion about a subject in light of new information, so I shouldn't be afraid in that sense.
I need to just keep my eyes open and have an open mind to see what else can come along...
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