Did the candidate really risk burning bridges? If he said "fuck you, fuck this, fuck everything, I'm out" then clearly that's just a shitty way to go about it. If he said something closer to "Thank you all for your time. You're doing fascinating work but I don't think that this would be a good fit. I really enjoyed meeting you all and maybe I'll get a chance to work with some of you on a future project." and they decided that was burning a bridge then that is a bridge worth burning.
As an interviewer, I'd have a higher opinion of someone willing to cut an interview short if they realise it's not really going to end well and as a candidate, as long as the company hasn't spent money to fly me out somewhere or something, it's an option I like having on the table for an all-day interview since there's not much point in tiring oneself out if it's not going anywhere.
>>If he said something closer to "Thank you all for your time. You're doing fascinating work but I don't think that this would be a good fit. I really enjoyed meeting you all and maybe I'll get a chance to work with some of you on a future project." and they decided that was burning a bridge then that is a bridge worth burning.
That is certainly not the impression I got from reading the OP :
"At one point when he was asked to move to another conference room he decided he had enough and said that he was done with the interview and wanted to leave."
"When he went to leave the lead jumped into the elevator with him and asked him why he didn't want to continue"
We're forced to interpret a 2nd hand retelling of the events, but everything points to this individual leaving relatively abruptly. Why else would someone feel the need to run after him into the elevator?
We have way too little to go on to actually decide which way the candidate went. We have one side of the story second-hand filtered via our own interpretations. Thing of it is, given just what we know I could spend ages listing out credible ways it could have gone given what we have.
Assume that the candidate did give something closer to my latter statement. Perhaps the lead wanted a better explanation of what made the fit so poor. Perhaps the lead actually could not comprehend anyone not wanting to work there. Perhaps the lead didn't believe the explanation given. Any of these could feasibly lead to the same account we're given, as could simply leaving abruptly or literally saying "fuck you, fuck this, fuck everything".
And my point is that there's nothing to indicate that this candidate was particularly undiplomatic so it's rather senseless to attack them for burning bridges. This is a situation where, given sensible people, bridges will only be burned with the particularly undiplomatic route.
I'm with you. The comments diverged towards debating that particular case: "I think he was rude"/"we can't tell if he was…", but the point you're making is about the more general question: excusing yourself from further interviews is not necessarily burning bridges.
"I'm sorry but I don't think it's worth both of our times to continue. I just don't think I'd be a good fit here. It's nothing wrong with you or me, it's just that we don't have the same vision on some things. I really appreciate the opportunity, etc."
If the guy had three hours of interviews already and 3-4 more in the afternoon were planned, plus a lunch, I don't see the problem. It's very easy to end up doing interviews and realizing that the position is not what you had in mind: maybe there's more travel, less hands-on, you'd be working by yourself on the project, etc. You can often easily tell that's not what you're looking for.
Of course, I wouldn't leave in the middle of an hour-long interview and I wouldn't give the impression that I'm rushing out either.
> If he said something closer to "Thank you all for your time. You're doing fascinating work but I don't think that this would be a good fit
We can be almost certain this is not what he said, because the lead had to run after him and ask him why he was leaving. It's really quite challenging to leave unexpectedly without giving an explanation and leave a pilot impression: "Thanks but I gotta go" doesn't cut it when you clearly already booked the whole day for the interview.
As I said somewhere else in this thread, it's easy enough to think up plausible scenarios given what we've heard so far. One that fits the possibility of saying that quote is that the lead wanted to clarify why it was not a good fit (a situation I have been in a few times before from both sides0.
More to the point, however, is that I was presenting a spectrum, with the-only-thing-worse-is-to-bomb-the-office bad on one end and about-as-well-as-leaving-early-can-end-without-bribing-everyone good on the other end and suggesting that bridges would really only expect to be burned near the worse end of the spectrum.
Or, even more of a key point, we only have a fragment of a second-hand telling of a single account of an interaction that really doesn't mean a whole lot and yet people still see the need to take sides and attack one party or the other from this position. This is so many levels of ridiculous that I couldn't help but try to inject some perspective.
As an interviewer, I'd have a higher opinion of someone willing to cut an interview short if they realise it's not really going to end well and as a candidate, as long as the company hasn't spent money to fly me out somewhere or something, it's an option I like having on the table for an all-day interview since there's not much point in tiring oneself out if it's not going anywhere.