Wasted a lot of time with these guys. About 10 hours total and 3 weeks in waiting. Spent about 1 hour on the phone for initial phone screening, another 1 hour on the phone talking with the hiring manager, and a full 8 hour day for the in person interviews / testing. Everything seemed to be going great and the hiring manager said he would be in contact with me within a few days and would let me know either way if I got the job or not.
I was honest with the hiring manager on the phone before I came in for the interview and told him that I had another job offer on the table (I found this out just a day or two before AB contacted me about the Automation Engineer position). He really appreciated the honesty and told me to wait to accept the position because I would be a great fit at AB and I would like working for AB better. I told him I would come in for the interview but I would really appreciate a quick response if I got the job or not. He agreed.
About a week went by after the interview with no calls or emails from the manager. I tried to call a couple of times and left voicemails, no response. 10 days passed and I sent emails, called, left voicemails and recieved no response. I had a maximum of 3 weeks after the interview to accept the other offer on the table. 20 days after the interview I tried calling and emailed once again with no response from the manager. Finally I emailed somebody in the HR department about the situation. A couple hours later I received an automated rejection email from the same HR person's email account saying that I was not selected for the position.
I invested 10 hours of my time with this company and they couldn't spare 5 minutes to make a phone call and tell me I was not selected or 30 seconds to send me an automated email. Absolutely unprofessional and unacceptable, especially when the manager and I got along so well.
I couldn't be happier with the other job that was on the table (Electrical Engineer at Boeing) and I'm SUPER happy I ended up not working at AB. But it just irritates me that AB acted so unprofessionally and will likely do this to others. In retrospect there were tell-tale signs about what type of company AB is, which is focused so much on profit that they are blinded by the fact that PEOPLE are the key to profitability.
Here are a few things that I observed: (1)Primarily younger people in the engineering group (I am only 30 myself). Severe lack of older generations which tell me that this isn't somewhere to be for the long term. Job required unpaid overtime, travel, on-call duty, and eventually move to other cities for years at a time like military tours. The group seemed overworked and underpaid. I have heard AB takes advantage of younger workers. (2) There was a tornado that touched down on my street the night before the interview which caused me to be 5 minutes late to the interview. At exactly the time the interview was scheduled for, the manager called my phone and left me a somewhat nasty voice mail about not showing up to the interview. I didn't notice this until after the interview because I left the phone in the car. I explained what happened with the tornado and they really didn't seem too sympathetic. Definitely NOT a company focused on employee work-life balance. (3) Got a nice speech from the hiring managers boss that basically said absolutely everything AB does is to pinch pennies for profit, that's the just of it. Only concerned with the bottom line.
Advice: If you are an engineer find a better company to work for. Find a company that has older engineers that you can learn from, not somewhere that the oldest engineer in the group is younger than 40. There isn't much to learn from somebody who isn't much older than you (or younger). Look for a company that has good tuition reimbursement programs for continuing education. These are the companies that truly value their people. Find a company that has a good work/life balance. You will be happier and more productive at work.