The person in question did reply and was very nice, so I give them credit. But I think at the end of the day the maximal nudge they could give was just "hey, make sure we put eyes on this dude's resume." It's a boost for sure, and I appreciated it - but still never got an email back?

I think my resume is nice, but it just doesn't give the full picture, and it's pretty hard to get across the experience that made me think I was a good fit in that format. I'm confident that, had I gotten to the initial phone screen, I'd have at least gotten to the next step in their process, but who can say.

Further, who knows if I could have passed the tech portion of the interview - and this company's is apparently pretty tough. If it's tough in the leetcode sense, I would very likely not pass it (at least without studying, which I wouldn't have had time for in this situation).

Anyway, was still worth it to take a shot, I have a good gig already so I'm not in the situation where I'm desperately throwing out dozens of apps - but this role did seem cool and I still think I could have done the job really well.