Interview with a recruiter and then a couple of phone screens. Then as others described, you do the "exercise." It was described in various ways: content overhaul, content suggestions and additional features. It was not clear how in-depth they expected one to go. It seems odd to think everyone will have a new idea or major changes when Facebook already has many content strategists working there and you would think, turning out quality work.
First, asking anyone to do free work is unfair.
Second, since you have 72 hours, people who have few responsibilities have the advantage in that they may be able to afford the time to do this exercise. What about more senior people who have children or aging relatives, may be on boards of directors, etc.? How can they drop everything for a 3-day marathon of free work? It is age discrimination.
Third, all the work is judged the same whether you put in 2 hours or 72. You are told you can decide how much time to put in but obviously the more time, the more elaborate the work will be.
Fourth, how is such an open-ended exercise indicative of the skills of a content strategist? Targeted questions about a particular scenario would be a better test.
Fifth, you have people making it past the phone screens but being rejected after the test. That seems odd, so maybe they should reconsider this test?
Sixth, the test seems to be more of the "precious we are so much better than you" type of test previously popular with tech companies but even Google has been dropping.
Seven, you are missing out of hiring some really great content strategists who don't have the time or inclination to work for free for you for hours.
Eight, candidates are not copywriters, they are strategists. How can you evaluate a strategy if you don't allow the person to present it and explain it?
I also agree with these comments from the others here: “The process itself is pretty biased because they're asking existing team members to be criticized by strangers, in some cases, asking people who worked on specific aspects of products to tell them what you'd change. They also want something super visual, but tell you it should only take a few hours to complete the exercise for a role that's not specifically intended to be a visual designer role.
“After numerous individual interviews, completion of a lengthy exercise, a large group interview where I presented my exercise, and two more hours of one-on-ones, I was told that I was not perceived as a content strategist.”
There was also someone who said they were told they were not a content strategist. Seems a very arrogant viewpoint as if Facebook is the final decider on what content strategy is, especially given that they don't create much content.
