The interview process at Levee was the worst, most unprofessional nightmare I've ever had in my 20 years of working in startups. I was lied to numerous times by the CEO who treated me with utter disrespect throughout the process, especially considering I was going to be the most senior technical position at the company. In the end, they rescinded my offer with no rhyme or reason given after initially lying about the reason. I cannot stress enough that I would never work at Levee or would ever recommend anyone else work there.

The recruiters told me that this had been a very difficult role for them to fill at Levee. I soon learned it wasn't a difficult role to fill, but a difficult company.

To summarize, Levee gave me a verbal offer, then ghosted me and lied about why.

I first met twice with the CEO. We hit it off very well and things went smoothly in both interviews. Since I am very senior, the 2nd interview was barely an interview at all. We discussed what I'd be doing, what my comp would be, and my start date, which was only just over a week away. He wanted me to talk to two other employees and check my references.

The 2nd interview was on a Friday and we scheduled my first interview with another employee on Monday afternoon. I got in the Google Meet.......and she never showed up. After about 15 minutes, I sent an email kindly asking the CEO if I should stay or go. He got back to me rather quickly saying this person had cancelled the interview and sent me a note and asked if I had received either. I triple checked my email and I had not received any note. Furthermore, the calendar invite was still on my calendar. I gently responded to the CEO that I had not received a note with a screenshot of the meeting still on my calendar, but said no big deal, let's reschedule. I even figured out about half an hour later that it was a technical glitch common with their scheduling software and explained that to him and that it was not her fault and that there were no hard feelings: let's press on.

That's when things got weird. I heard nothing from the CEO until mid-Wednesday (2 days later) when he sent an odd email saying they were going in a different direction despite my being an "excellent" candidate since they "could not meet my timeline." Taking two days to respond had already set off major red flags for me and as a former CEO myself, I was starting to look at his behavior as extremely unprofessional. In fact, the most unprofessional I had ever experienced in interviewing at a technology company in decades. I was already heavily considering how I would be treated as an employee if this was how they treated one of their most important hires. I was very confused.

I quickly fired off an email to the CEO letting him know that of course my timeline was flexible. But for me red flags were going off everywhere.

I also kept in touch with the references (numerous CEOs I had worked with) I had given them who said at no time were they contacted by Levee.

Another 24 hours went by with no response from the CEO.

Eventually I heard that they were passing on me, with no explanation. The only plausible explanation was they found out something about me and revealing how they found out would be embarrassing to the company (I mean, why else wouldn't they reveal it?).

I reached out to the CEO, asking why they were passing on me. His response was again that he couldn't meet the timeline, which was a bold faced lie considering we had made it clear that the timeline was flexible.

Clearly, the CEO was lying about his real reason for not wanting to hire me because it would probably would be embarrassing for them to reveal.

I’ll admit I’ve had more difficult interview processes, but I’ve never been given a verbal offer and then basically been ghosted by a company. That’s a whole new level of unprofessionalism.

Ultimately, rather early I decided this was a company I would never work for as they treated me entirely unprofessionally, with complete disrespect, lied to me, and wasted a huge amount of my time. I cannot recommend anyone interview with or work for Levee.