I did two rounds of interviews for the company's first-ever hire for social media; first with a recruiter, then with the hiring manager. Everyone was pleasant to talk to, but I found the recruiting team to be a bit messy and dysfunctional. First off, the recruiting coordinator emails me on a Friday telling me that I have 3 business days to submit either my portfolio or writing samples (in my head, the deadline is EoD Wednesday), yet she emails me on Monday morning asking me if I've done it yet. I write her back asking for clarity and if Wednesday was ok, and she simply responds by telling me "either today or tomorrow is ok." I tell myself that it's not a big deal and that I'll get it in ASAP, but was perplexed by the email after 24 hours. A few weeks later, I'm working with the same person on setting up the next round and after confirming a time and date, all she emails me is that a "member of the team will call your cell." I found this to be incredibly bizarre. Why the secrecy? I ask for clarity, but when I'm given a name and title, there's no confirmation that this is the hiring manager (which I figured out on my own). After my interview with the hiring manager, I'm told by another recruiter that things went well and that the team would like for me to take part in a take-home assignment, which I would've been ok with had I not been emailed on December 28 and asked to turn in within 3 business days (on the final week of the year, I found it incredibly odd to be asked to work on an interview assignment during New Year's weekend). I politely pushed back for two reasons: I'm not working for free during the holidays and the take-home assignment was incredibly vague. The recruiter then got back to me and said to take all the time I need and would follow up with answers, and when she did, she told me I had 3 days to turn in the assignment (not only did I not have all the time I need, but I didn't get much clarity on the vague assignment). Ultimately, I decided to withdraw myself from the role. According to their writing assignment, it was only supposed to take "a few hours," but some of the prompts were large exercises themselves (e.g. creating buyer personas, evaluating the company's social strategy in regards to its competitors...without being told who the competitors are). I've worked in this industry for over 11 years and don't have a problem conducting writing assignments for senior roles, but if I'm getting bad vibes from HR or asked to complete unreasonable writing assignments, I have to draw a line.