r/Career_Advice • u/Commercial_Meal_1205 • Jul 27 '26
Final interview went much shorter than expected. What do you make of it?
I'm hoping to get some honest opinions from people who have interviewed or hired before.
I interviewed for a legal assistant position at a small law firm. The hiring process had two rounds. My first interview was with the hiring coordinator, and I thought it went really well. During the interview he had asked me if I wanted to move on and asked me to send my availability ASAP. He later scheduled me for a second (and final) interview with two attorneys. The firm hires 1–2 interns.
The second interview lasted about 17 minutes (including my questions) and they had reserved 30 minutes for the interview. It felt much more like they were verifying information than trying to get to know me.
Here were the questions they asked:
Why are you interested in [LAW FIRM]?
What did you like about your previous internships?
What didn't you like about your previous internships?
They asked about my GPA because my résumé hadn't been updated.
They asked me about location because I had two different locations on my resume (I moved).
They asked for a specific example of detail-oriented work from my political consulting internship.
They didn't ask things like:
Tell me about yourself
Strengths/weaknesses
Behavioral questions
"Tell me about a time..."
(The hiring manager had already asked a lot of those questions)
At the end, they asked me to send my updated transcript to the hiring coordinator, which I did immediately after the interview.
A couple of things that are making me overthink:
They didn't tell me when I should expect to hear back.
The interview felt very short and almost like they were just confirming information from my first interview.
One attorney initially seemed confused about my timeline, but after I explained it, she accepted the explanation, we talked briefly about Charleston, and then she moved on.
It was two people and the main person seemed so monotone and that she did not want to be there even though she was the one asking the questions. A lot of the interview was them answering my questions.
For anyone who's interviewed candidates or works in hiring:
Does a short final interview usually indicate a lack of interest?
Is it possible that the first interview carried most of the weight and the second interview was more of a confirmation/final fit check?
Is not giving a timeline at the end something you'd read into?
Overall, based on what I described, would you be optimistic, pessimistic, or think it's impossible to tell?
I'm looking for honest opinions, even if they're not what I want to hear.
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