I have recently applied for a job that seems like a perfect fit for me. I waited a week to hear back and decided to message a director a the company on LinkedIn. They quickly responded and told me I should hear back from their team shortly for an initial conversation.

The recruiter reached out the next day but has been super slow and cold in communications (not acknowledging emails and sending interview invites with zero context) which is quite unusual at the beginning of the interview process.

I had the interview with the hiring manager that went extremely well, we went over time and could have kept talking for much longer. He told me I should hear back from HR the following week (last week).

Last week, I received an offer from a different company so I informed the recruiter and asked for their expected timeline for the process but they never replied. It has now been a week.

Should I message the hiring manager directly? I don’t want to “bypass” the recruiter and bother the HM with admin requests but I also need a response.