More than two hundred people applied; he was one of five invited to interview. It was, he wrote, the best interview he had ever given — the panel laughing, nodding, taking notes, asking him for ideas.
Five days later, a rejection. And then the part that made it make sense: the company had hired the person who had been shadowing the role — someone who had already been doing the job for a year.
So the interviews had not decided anything. They had been the part of a process a process is supposed to be — performed. He had rewritten his résumé seven times and spent hours preparing. He asked what, exactly, it had all been for.