Over the past year and a half, I have applied to multiple positions at Duolingo on their UX design and research teams. Despite having almost the exact experience and qualifications listed in their job postings, excellent public references, relevant educational background and extensive exposure to linguistics, I have yet to receive any consideration for an initial phone screen. It completely baffles me. I have even reached out to members of their team on LinkedIn (one of them is a direct connection) to show my interest in a non-annoying way and they don’t even respond. I’m wondering whether any of the open job postings are real. I’m certainly not so egotistical that I believe that they will just call me and offer me a job on the spot, but to not even get a preliminary interest email is frustrating. I don’t get why this company seems like an impenetrable fortress. My local contacts in the UX space kind of roll their eyes when I tell them that I would love the chance to to speak with them about my qualifications and passion. I’ve been told that Duolingo only looks for people with advanced degrees or recent grads. If that’s not you, then you are out automatically. This seems kind of crazy when you have a candidate with many years of relevant experience, recognized ability and tons of enthusiasm for that market space. I feel like they are disqualifying some really strong candidates pretty quickly. From reading some of the posts on here, it seems like I’m not the only one who is frustrated with their completely mysterious and haphazard hiring processes. At this point, I’m giving up on the company. When I first found out that I could find a local role where I could marry my love of design and research with my love of linguistics, I was so excited. But, at this point, it’s not worth it anymore. I know that they probably don’t care, but it’s worth noting that word gets around here in our small design community and if they continue to be snobbish, they will definitely become a less attractive place to apply to.