Recently had 5 on-site interviews with one of the FAANG firms. I thought I did pretty well in 4 of those. The interview that didn't go well, went like this: - the interviewer verbally dictates the first question, I go over to the whiteboard to draw details for confirmation, she then changes/add-details to the question midway - I finally start working on the question and quickly come up with a DP solution (but DP was sub-optimal); so she rejects it - I try other approaches but doesn't work out, I eventually ask for a hint to proceed. She says "I can't give you any hint for this question" - (After the interview I lookup this question online for the optimal solution, and I figure out there was no way someone who hadn't seen the question before would come up with that within 15 mins) - I offer to atleast code up the DP solution (I read somewhere that coding up atleast a working suboptimal solution is better than not coding anything). But she brutally rejects saying "who said coding is required in the interviews" (at this point I am really annoyed :(.) - she gave me one more question, again verbally and modified description midway wasting time, I come up with optimal solution and request her to allow me coding it, she finally agrees Based on the recruiters feedback this interview kind of killed my chances. Did anyone else have any similar experiences with such interviewers.
Sounds like Google!
Give that feedback to the recruiter without sounding angry or frustrated. There are always aholes who could derail your chances. Generally, 20% success rate is pretty good! Better luck next time!
I did, the recruiter said we have noted it down for the future. They offered me to interview for another role, but after reading about that role in Blind I am really not inclined towards it
Feel like you are talking about SETI role.
Which FANG was this? Was this at G/F?
Sounds like one round I had at Facebook.
Which company don't have to be subtle about it. It's anonymous.
I am a little concerned about NDA stuff. Does my post give out any details that shouldn't have been here?
No. There are atleast 20-40 interviews in FAANG happening everyday. They can't id you plus you aren't reveling the question. Just naming the company where you interviewed. You should be fine. But hey it's your call man. Sorry you had a bad experience. We all had shit interviewers. I had one guy mute me on skype interview so he can focus on his work. lol I had to ask him a clarifying question and couldn't get his attention 🤣. I just sat there waving and yelling so he would notice me.
Sounds like one I had at Google—although, George, was texting on his phone the whole time.
"There's no way someone could come up with the optimal solution without having seen the answer beforehand". This is why FANG interviews are usually hard. There are people who are actually that good to come up with such answers on the fly. But obviously there are many other people who practice LC to get past that stage. (That's the whole purpose of practicing) So you can't really complain about the difficulty of the problem from that aspect. But not giving hint from the interviews is a red flag and you should definitely raise it with the recruiter. The interview must provide a good experience to the candidate, and not let him/her stay stuck. Providing hints can identify if the candidate is good with a bit of couching, or if they will be a burden for the team.
Wow, you would be surprised! At the end of the interview when she asked me to ask her anything, the last question I asked was if she could give me a subtle hint or solution for that problem. She said "no I can't do that". I don't understand the logic of not sharing details even after the interview :O
Not giving the answer to the question is valid, but not giving hints is definitely not. I interview people a lot, so I totally understand your frustration. Keeping the candidate stuck is one of the big no-no s in the interview trainings. This behavior must definitely be shared with the company (recruiter, or online survey that some companies send after the interview), so the interviewer gets more training and doesn't hurt other candidates.
The interviewer not wanting you to code part sounds a lot like my experience at Google, he asked resume questions for more than 10 minutes, gave a simple question and asked me how would I explain the solution to a non technical person, in 2 different ways
Hmm, not that this is confirmed to be G by OP, but all my interviewers there (except one) were really great. And the one who wasn't great was not awful, but he seemed new at it, so the interview was oddly paced. They were all pleasant people too.
Yep, had the same exp :(
Details please
So interviewer says a question verbally. I wrote it down and started it solve, then he remembers thats not the question he wanted to ask 😂 so he changed the question mid way! I tried to solve the new question as well and now he says he is confused about the question. Sad part is he gave a bad feedback that screwed up my chances.