I applied online. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at Toptal (Montevideo) in Sep 2016
Interview
I had a first call and got told that I would get a second one as part of the process. After not getting any response from the company, I asked what happened. Nobody (including HR) was able to let me know what was going on. A couple of weeks later, I received a generic email announcing that they want to keep looking for other candidates. Total waste of time.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
My background. What kind of projects was I running at my current company.
Our policy is to always set expectations upfront and communicate clearly throughout the process. That being said, as we take time to review other applicants, we may not always have immediate answers. If you feel that we didn’t set expectations well or communicate clearly enough, please email contact@toptal.com with details of the issue so that we can investigate.
I applied online. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Toptal (Vancouver, BC) in Jul 2016
Interview
First stage: phone call with a staff. Second stage: upload resume. Third stage: don't know (I stopped at the second stage). The staff showed up 15min late due to another Skype interview that he had with another candidate. I had a 20-min Skype interview that felt very impersonal, and rushed. Nothing about what I want to learn in joining Toptal as a freelancer. But all about becoming one of their workers to work for big companies and getting $$ from that. It felt like a 'online sweatshop' for freelancers. So I didn't continue with the process.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Why do I want to work for Toptal, what rate am I charging, what role I am playing, how many years of experience do I have.
I applied online. I interviewed at Toptal (Remote, OR) in Feb 2016
Interview
Had a few interviews spread out over a couple of months. One of them included a design exercise (unpaid). Once accepted, you then have to create a portfolio up to their standards, which took several revisions. The whole process was very time consuming. I was finally accepted, only to find that Toptal is not a company that hires you on for a full time remote role, as they seem to insinuate. They also are not a platform for you to find jobs like freelancer sites allow. It is instead a group of recruiters, that pimp you out to small projects, for which you are competing with other freelancers who have been accepted to their network, all over the world. Considering I have not heard back from any application I have put in since I joined months ago, I do not recommend spending the time to do all this work for them. There are plenty of recruiters that can help you locally and who will actually keep in regular contact, without making you jump through hoops.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Typical questions about process, tools, specific projects