'Got rejected over a comma': Job seeker loses data engineer role due to minor mistake

Job seekers are unable to secure the desired job roles for several reasons. These can range from not having enough work experience and the required skill set to even a lack of confidence while answering interview questions. One particular job seeker, however, got rejected over a mundane punctuation mistake.

That's right. A frustrated job seeker said in a Reddit post that he was rejected for a data engineer role at a well-known company. He mentioned that he answered everything correctly in the second round of interview except one small mistake. 

"Cleared the first round, and in the second, I answered everything correctly—except I forgot a comma between two column names while writing a SQL query in Notepad. The interviewer went off on me for 20 minutes about relying on AI tools and IDEs, completely dismissing my experience working with complex analytical queries and building ETL pipelines at a leading CDP," the user said in his post. 

"It was a simple oversight, not a lack of knowledge, but I still got rejected for it. Frustrating, to say the least. Any advice on navigating my first transition from DA to DE?" 

His experience struck a chord with fellow Redditors, who believed the hiring standard was pretty harsh. 

" 'The interviewer went off on me for 20 minutes'. Is this really happening because of comma ? Why are things like these are hard to believe. I have given and taken 100s of interview. Never such thing happened. Getting rejected is valid but schooling about AI and IDEs are hard to believe. Who has this much time in an interview?" a user asked. 

"The interviewer did you a solid. I once got lectured because I used interchangeable words, the interviewer was expecting a textbook answer and this was for a SDE2 role," another Redditor said. 

"Just want to say, Indian interviewers are the worst! Most of them are just there to stoke their own ego," a third user commented. 

"Well off course ur interviewer is a born genius, who learned the concept of SQL even before their birth. Bad luck for you, that u didn't get to work with them," a user said in sarcasm. 

"A friend of mine recently interviewed in a company which asked him to solve 20 or so coding questions in 15 minutes. And they were proper questions. Even if they were simple easy questions, typing out a solution definitely takes more than 1 minute. Why even pretend that you're hiring?" yet another user asked.