Google L5, Netflix & Twitter offers | AMA

First of all, THANK YOU to all of you on Blind that have shared tips on how to navigate the interview process at large tech companies. I'm hoping to do the same with this post. YOE: 4 - SWE Education: Master’s degree in ECE. Did not do a thesis. Did not specialize in anything either. Offers: Google L5 SWE: Accepted after negotiating. 190k base + 15% target bonus + 650k equity over 4 years. Was offered 40/28/20/12% equity vesting. First year TC ~= 480k. Netflix Senior Software Engineer: 420k all cash, did not negotiate. Twitter SWE II: Did not negotiate. Was offered $210k for remote from LCOL city. My rent is $800/month for perspective. Could have probably negotiated it up to $240-250k remote. Twitter offered $240k for San Fran before negotiation. There's no way I'd have accepted an offer in SF for only $40k more than offer for LCOL city. Halted: - Microsoft: Paused the interview process with them once I started feeling good about my other interviews and realized that MS would not be able to compete on TC. I passed the Microsoft Tech assessment (Very leetcodish). - Apple: Recruiter was sloppy af. She told me my resume was shared around and that they could not find a role that fit my background out of all the openings Apple has. I call B.S. Rejects: - Facebook E5 Enterprise Engineer: Rejected after onsites. More details later. - Jane Street: Resume rejected. General Interview Experience: - Got in touch with recruiters near the end of summer. Netflix and Google recruiters reached out to me first. For all other companies I interviewed with, I reached out to recruiters first. - Scheduled technical screens a month out for Google and Facebook. - Passed phone screens for Google and Facebook. - After G and F technical screens, scheduled onsites a month out with Facebook, Google, Netflix and Twitter. Twitter and Netflix HM/technical screens took place a week before onsites. - Onsites went pretty well, it was a brutal week overall but worth it. Detailed Interview experience: Google: - Got news that I passed technical screen 2 hours after my interview. - Was initially targeted for L4. - Solid interviews overall. More focused on problem solving and communication. Did not feel like interviewers were out to get me. - No focus on leetcode style questions. - Had 4 coding interviews for my onsites. Remember that I was initially going through the L4 loop. - All coding problems except a DP one were problems one would actually encounter in the real world. I loved that about the interview process. - The coding questions required mixing multiple data structures and techniques to arrive at a solution. I honestly enjoyed the interviews. - Recruiter was incredible. Always checking in, rooting for me. - Got positive feedback for my onsites a day after attending them. - After hearing that my interviews with Netflix, Twitter and FB went well and that I was being targeted for senior roles, my recruiter suggested that I attend a system design interview to target L5 at G. - I got positive feedback for the system design interview the same day. - Recruiter suggested we do team match before HC. Btw, team match before HC is not an indication of mixed feedback. It can only strengthen your packet. - It took a day to match with a team in GCP that I like. Spoke to another team that seemed to like but I was so/so about them. - Moved to HC and was approved for L5. - Got Executive approval of my packet on the same day as HC approval. Netflix: - Solid and very thorough interviews. I had a total of 10 interviews excluding calls with recruiters. - No focus on leetcode style questions. - Technical questions were heavy on design - I would definitely work there. It was hard to turn their offer down. - There's a heavy focus on the Netflix culture deck during their interviews. Make sure to go through the culture deck and find examples from your past experiences that fit the themes described in the deck. Don't skimp on this part. You've been warned. Twitter: - Shortest set of interviews. - Phone screen was focused on system design. - Solid system design interviews overall. - Only one coding interview in the entire interview loop. - Really loved the behavioral interview. They walk through your resume and ask your questions about your experiences. - Never confirmed level with recruiter. Thought I was being considered for a senior level role as per the job posting until I got the offer. Maybe I got downleveled? Facebook: - passed phone screen for infra/SWE but recruiter came back and said that Facebook is being very strict with their 5 YOE requirement for E5 SWE. So, I got offered an interview for Enterprise Engineer. - Very leetcodish and robotic interviews except for the behavioral ones. Felt like the interviewers were out to get me. - All coding questions were leetcode tagged or variations. - In first coding round, solved both medium level problems optimally while communicating impeccably. Interviewer did not even bother to turn on their camera. - Second coding round: Solved medium level problem and a follow-up using optimal time/space. - Had two behavioral rounds that went super well. Felt like I was talking to humans, instead of robots. - Design interview did not go very well because the interviewer kept expanding the scope of the problem and overcomplicating things as I was making progress. Again, felt like the interviewer was out to get me. - Did not hear from recruiter a few days after onsites. - Reached to recruiter and she told me that my packet will be going to HC the following week. - Did not hear anything for a few days after HC, then recruiter asked me what level I got approved for at G and Twitter. - Waited a few more days and messaged recruiter to announce that I had gotten an offer from Netflix. Recruiter replied to my email with a rejection. - I have a theory that since I was interviewing for Enterprise Engineering, Facebook did not want to bother making me an offer because they knew Netflix would beat anything they could offer. I got feedback that design round didn't go as well as expected. Also got feedback that coding rounds didn't go that well, which made me start to question things because my coding rounds went very well. FB folks, any thoughts? Negotiation (Only negotiated with Google): - Google recruiter asked for comp expectation but I pressed her for a number first. She lowballed me so hard I had to double check that I was indeed approved for L5. - Initial offer was TC of ~$250k (176k base, 15% bonus, 210k stock over 4 years). I almost laughed out loud as the recruiter was telling me the numbers. - After getting Netflix offer, I asked Google to match it. - Google recruiter initially said they would not be able to match but they got close enough that I was satisfied. - After telling my Google recruiter about Netflix's offer, she came back with $190k base/15% bonus + 550k stock over 4 years. - I expressed not being satisfied yet and recruiter went back to comp team to come up with a final offer of $190k base / 15% bonus / 650k equity, which I accepted. Decision making process: - To make a decision, I focused on only two offers, Netflix and Google. After talking to a number of partners in my network and some people on blind, I ended up choosing Google despite slightly lower average TC over 4 years. See my post https://www.teamblind.com/post/nF7RW6W4 for some of the feedback I received. Preparation: - Failed a phone screen with Uber last year before I found blind. The interview was offered by an Uber recruiter that reached out to me on LinkedIn. That interview experience was dehumanizing. The interviewer literally dropped a problem in coderpad and went about her day. I took a break from interviewing because I knew promo was coming up for me at GE. Wondering why I brought up my experience with Uber? Rejection is preparation. In fact, it's one of the best ways to get prepared if you can afford it. - For Algos and D/S, I read parts of Algorithms by CLRS, The Algorithm Design Manual, Algorithms by Sedgewick. I implemented fundamental Algos and D/S from scratch. - For system design: System Design Primer and Designing Data Intensive Applications. - If you have time, read Grokking the system design interview but don't let it fool you. You will NOT have time during an interview to go through all the steps listed on Grokking. Instead, ask the interviewers what areas of the design they'd like to focus on, they will almost always tell you. Following the grokking blueprint might actually work against you and make you seem unready for a senior role. - Get very good at designing APIs. They came up in all of my system design interviews. You don't need to focus on a particular implementation (HTTP, RPC, etc). Just be ready to discuss inputs, outputs, error handling, etc. Staying motivated: - this may sound toxic but any time I’d lose motivation, I’d open levels.fyi and get motivated real quick. - The posts on blind about high TC and multiple offers were also very motivating. Takeaways & Tips: - Google will lowball the fuck out of you but they're willing to *significantly* raise their initial offer if you have competing offers. - As someone who’s been on the other side of the interview game, I can tell you that 80% of the feedback for an interview is determined during the first 5 minutes. So, make sure to make a good impression early on. - Leave your ego at the door during interviews. Go with whatever tone the interviewer sets. Don't try to be a smartass. Think of your interviews as conversations, except maybe at Facebook where you're expected to just be a code monkey 🐒. - Always confirm with your recruiter what level you're interviewing for. I made the mistake of not doing that with Twitter. - During interviews, make sure to communicate impeccably and discuss your thought process out loud. Speak slowly if you're a fast talker. I'm happy to answer more questions. Oh and before I forget, my leetcode stats are: 47E, 68M, 12H. Make sure you master fundamental algorithms, data structures, easy LC problems before rushing into medium and hard ones. My submission history for leetcode can be found in the image below. Update Nov 4, 2020: I should add that I’m one lucky motherfucker. My experience is definitely not typical and I’m very grateful. Luck played a big role for me. #swe #interviews #interview #leetcode #negotiation #google #netflix #twitter #facebook #l5 #e5

Levels.fyi - Compare career levels across companies

Levels.fyi

Google vs Netflix offers - Need to decide

Blind