Suppose a company (a big and famous one) promised to get back to you after the final on-site round of interviews by a certain date, but never did, and does not reply to emails and phone calls. Should it be understood they are no longer interested?

"we will get back to you next week" is an industry standard lie.The correlation I observe that "big and famous" firms are worse.It is also the case that it is quite rare for only one person to make the decision, normally there are several stakeholders, and they may be on holiday, in an office the other side of the Atlantic or too busy.Another standard lie is "headcount" and this is something we will see getting worse over the next year.Again it is rare that a manager can just hire someone, he needs to get "headcount approval", and this can be bureaucratic, so he may be saying he wants to take you on, but has to jump through hoops.But it is not a good sign, perhaps a gentle email to see how things are going ?

QuoteOriginally posted by: DCFCBut it is not a good sign, perhaps a gentle email to see how things are going ?A gentle email was sent and remains unanswered

It's a bit late for you, but part of our standard advice is to gather as many names as you can for just this sort of purpose.There is a balance between keeping yourself somewhere on the agenda, and becoming a stalker.I will be as frank with you as I would if you were one of our candidates and say that I have low expectation of you getting an answer this year.HR departments are under stress, and your new boss is involved in some high stakes politicking, your job may be part of this.So may his...Thus I'd wait a couple of weeks before trying again, rather than add to his stress level.You can do the traditional email, or a P&D cluster bomb.It's Xmas, the time when the best pimps send boxes of chocolates out, maybe you might do the same to the people that interviewed you.