On the other side of the coin, that necessarily means that most companies asking for 10 years of experience actually only needed to give a person with zero experience 2 weeks to ramp up on the proprietary CRUD apps and uniquely broken reporting systems, and they&#x27;d do just fine for the next ten years without learning even one more thing.<p>The ridiculously over-the-top interview process is one way to signal to hiring candidates that they will actually <i>need</i> some form of skill or experience to work at that company, and that it will therefore be an exciting, resume-building place to be for the next two years.  Unfortunately, since the boring, stodgy companies slavishly copy cargo-cult practices of the young, hip, trendy, and popular companies, that signal was already being swamped by the noise by 2004.