How long should you wait to get a call back after an interview?

6 to 8 weeks. They are not supposed to make a decision until they have finished interviews. Since hiring ads run 2-6 weeks 6 to 8 weeks is reasonable.

I work in HR. (Human Resources - the Dept that hires for the company)

Last year my company had to hire five people.

For each of those hires we ran an ad for one month. For each of those ads we got about a thousand responses.

Each resume or job application that comes in goes through a vetting process. The people who open the envelopes: They look at each resume and if there is a picture on it that picture is redacted (covered up - removed so no one will be hired based on appearance) If the resume is cluttered up with a lot of small type or 'stickers' (yes, we get resumes with rainbow stickers, cat stickers, robot stickers, Star Trek Stickers...if they make stickers for it, some goofball will put it on their resume to make it stand out)

Resumes with stickers, drawings, doodles, too many colors, weird borders, white ink on black or any dark paper are tossed out. Resumes that have been emailed in a format that cannot be opened are deleted, resumes that have been faxed are tossed if they are unreadable. You will be surprised at how many people think that writing in gold ink on dark paper is just perfect for the fax machine - it isn't .

So, now it has been a few days and the resumes are just beginning to reach my desk. For each hire, I will have to look at about 400 resumes. This does not happen in a day. I have other duties. So I can get to maybe 10 or 15 a day if I am lucky.

You see where this is going? There is one person that is making the final decision on interviewing, and that person needs to interview the 10% of the people whose resumes were in line with the job description. That is still 40 people and you cannot interview them all on the same day.

So, give it some time.

But, you are allowed to send a nice thank you card to the interviewer. Say 'Thank you for the opportunity to interview with your company. It was very good to meet you and see the office culture. I sincerely hope that when the time comes, you will decide I am a good fit. Thank you again.

Spelling counts.

I don't wait. I continue job hunting in earnest. I couldn't possibly care any less if I never hear from an interviewer again - I'm a great hire and have no trouble finding work.

Don't call them for, "status," nor send some obsequious thank you note. They only scream desperation. Any where worth working will not perceive their absence as a sleight. Indeed, they'll think, "That Kelvin guy was great. We better hire him before someone else does. I wonder if that's why we haven't heard from him?"

in some cases they never call back. I know several friends who've gone on interviews they say they'll call back but never do. you could call them for a update but I would wait usually two days depending on how many applicants are being interviewed

Since you have no idea whether they're going to call you back at all, let alone with an offer, you shouldn't be waiting at all. Keep looking.

don't wait, continue to put applications at other places

A few days to a week