So I’ve recently had a series of interviews with some top-tier companies, 5 phone interviews resulting in 3 on-site interviews. I kind of feel like the first phone interview didn’t go so well because of some coding language things where me and the interviewer weren’t communicating well, but that may be besides the point. And probably because it was my first interview in a long time. To get more onto the point, zero offers and feedback from two of the on-site interviews. Generally they had positive things to say around behavioral sorts of things and my passion around being a developer. The negative things are around coding or technical stuff, not any more specific on the negatives than that. I feel that I’m able to recognize the right data structures to use pretty quickly and generally can avoid gotchas. I did receive feed back from one specific interviewer that my code was clean and from another that I was able to quickly come to the optimal solution, bypassing the brute force method. I recognized before starting this that I wasn’t completing leetcode problems as fast as I should be so I worked on that for a bit and got to the point where I could recognize the appropriate algorithm/data structures to use and then solve the problem with an optimal runtime complexity, usually within 15-20 mins on most easy and some medium problems. I was feeling pretty confident there. So at this point I’ve kind of exhausted options with those particular companies for the duration of a retry period and I’m left wondering if it’s worth bothering trying again after the cool down period or if I just got dealt a bad hand with my interviewers. I think it’s probably a given that I should at least try to improve my speed before trying again. Right now I kind of feel like, based on odds, I just haven’t rolled the dice enough. I’m trying not to be overly optimistic or pessimistic about the whole thing. I guess what I’m looking for is some perspective and probably from someone who has also experienced rejection or even been on the other side of the interviewing process. Thanks ahead of time! -dev with 6 yrs exp trying to get some upward trajectory
Very few recruiters will provide feedback, and even if they provide it will not be detailed. Best bet is to keep trying and practicing.
Probably should have clarified, only applicable to ask the hiring manager. I am one and am always impressed when people come back to me and ask for help in understanding.
That’s interesting. From my experiences, I usually only have contacts for recruiters. Is it common to get phone numbers or email addresses of hiring managers? Is it cool to be requesting contacts? I might be a bit too timid and if that’s what’s killing me on these interviews then it would be wonderful to fix that now than to never address it.
You have a problem with describing the crux of the details. You wrote a wall of text but didn’t describe what happened in the technical rounds. People usually have a pretty good estimate of how they did. I mean you can pretty much verify online if your solution was optimal or not or close or whatever.
It’s hard for me to self assess how my performance was perceived. But I came up with optimal solutions and was able to communicate runtime/space complexity or close on all problems. I guess it would be helpful for me to know from what perspective that you can say that optimal is enough to get the offer? What other factors are important that one might overlook?
Then you failed behavior/system design. If you arrive at optimal working solutions you will pretty much at least get weak hire on the coding rounds That or you give off strong red flags.
My perception was that you should strive to get to point where you’re hitting optimal solutions in 10-20 minutes for most mediums. Mostly easy with some mediums may not be enough at this point.
I kind of had a sinking feeling about this. However it’s easy for me to get stuck in rut without knowing what my goal should be. Do you feel that it is generally easier to get to the on-site and that expectations in person are higher?
I ask for feedback at the end of the actual interview. In a nice way of course. “In case I am not selected for this position, do you have any suggestions on how I can be a stronger candidate in the future?” for example It also may just be practice. Software Engineering is difficult, a very wide domain, and has generally crappy interview processes. It can take some interview experience to get successful at them no matter how qualified you are. I take each one as a learning experience. After awhile the number of curveballs you haven’t seen before gets smaller and smaller. Also a little psychological trick is to ask questions that steer the interviewer to simplify the problem. Lowercase strings, even numbers, etc.
Yeah, I agree with the asking questions part. I do try to squash ambiguity where it may strike. I approach each question as if it is some kind of trap that has to be disarmed before proceeding. I did get some positive feedback for that, notably in the system design department.
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If you really want to join one of these companies, don’t accept defeat. Ask them why you weren’t qualified, in a very nice manner, you want to learn. Show that you are hungry to take the feedback and learn from this. This really shows your passion for the role and the company. You never know, another role may open up.
Do you have an example of when this worked out with being considered for a new position? Maybe I’m being a bit too passive. I try to express my graciousness for the whole experience when getting bad news and then go and reflect on the whole thing while kicking my wounds. I will solicit feedback with my last recruiter immediately! Thank you.
Yes. I hire lots of people and believe me when I say, even if I hire someone else and the 2nd in line contacts me (the person I had to turn down) I remember this person and have called 3-4 people back when new roles have opened up. If you are in a growth company which most people are on this site, there will be lots of roles opening up all the time. Just because you didn’t make it for 1 role, doesn’t mean you won’t get the next. Keep trying!