# Six Rounds, Five Weeks, and a Take-Home With a $950 AI Tab

**[TRUE STORY]** — by Forward-deployed engineer candidate · via r/womenintech

A candidate made it through all six rounds at a Series C startup, ending with a conversation with a cofounder that seemed to go well. The rejection arrived anyway. The process had stretched past five weeks and swallowed roughly thirty-five hours of take-home project work, preparation, and interviewing.

The take-home, round two, was complex enough that getting it working ran up $950 in Claude API usage, and the first successful build took seven straight hours without a human touching it. The role was forward-deployed engineering. The project worked. The offer did not.

*Source: [r/womenintech · 4d old · Reddit upvotes unverifiable (Reddit 403)](https://www.reddit.com/r/womenintech/comments/1w7mhfc/rejected_after_6_rounds/)*
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