I'm surprised at the downvotes and disagreement for this. I'd be fine with a four-hour take-home. I got one of my jobs by doing that.
One four hour offline/asych event, in practical coding rather than a whiteboard brain-teaser, to gauge the fit of a multi-year job relationship, is perfectly reasonable. I think the sense of entitlement might be getting a bit too high if people here say they would blow that off.
It is an unequal time investment. I have had multiple take homes where I got ghosted afterwords. Maybe 100 people did it, candidate number 3 did a good enough job and they never even took a look at mine. At least with a phone call or an in person interview I am assured they have some skin in the game.
I think the sense of entitlement is on the hiring manager's side if they want multiple applicants to burn through 6-8 hours of free time to take an assessment of their skills. Then those same hiring managers are the ones complaining about how they can't find employees.
No entitlement here. I copiously thank the candidate for doing it and make sure to offer feedback if it results in a decline. I would offer reimbursement if our company offered that (and I'll definitely bring that up).
But, I have to assess candidates somehow-- I don't do whiteboarding, riddles, brain teasers, etc. I wish a discussion would just yield the results I need, but as many other top level comments here state, that's just not the case.
One four hour offline/asych event, in practical coding rather than a whiteboard brain-teaser, to gauge the fit of a multi-year job relationship, is perfectly reasonable. I think the sense of entitlement might be getting a bit too high if people here say they would blow that off.