Google googleyness/leadership round
I have an upcoming L4 on-site with google in two weeks and have 4 coding rounds and 1 googleyness/leadership interview. I’ve been cramming leetcode and plan to start my behavioral prep this week. Can anyone shed some light on what to expect for the googleyness/leadership round? I’m pretty shy so behavioral rounds always give me a lot of anxiety, would love any tips to help me get through this round. TC: 150k
For me it was so easy! He just asked me about the projects that I worked on. It was very informal. Also he just talked about his kids
It’s 45 mins if behavioral questions. But I think they only ask 5-6 in total given that you have to tell a story during each and talk about your values.
Think of some relevant examples from your past experiences, around 4-5 should be good. Look up STAR format and prepare your answers that way. Behavioral based interviews are a breeze if you just put in a little work beforehand
They’re the standard behavioral questions that a lot of the faang style interviews use. You can look up lists online. The way you should prepare is create a list of common questions and answer them using the STAR method then practice them several times till the answers come naturally. Usually the interviewers will ask you one of these common questions and then sometimes ask you follow up questions on your previous question to drill into experience a little deeper. If you DM me your email I’ll share the prep I used for my interview cycle with the faang companies.
I hate the STAR method. It's dumb. If you can't tell a story, you can't tell a story. STAR is a worthless false positive generating crutch.
I understand, but we’re not trying to hire story tellers. I would argue it’s a simplistic method to help people to convey a narrative. I was new to the star method when I interviewed, but definitely felt it was a net positive when arranging my response. We’re hiring SWEs not writers :\
Thanks all for the replies I will prepare the star format responses
As a guy that does a lot of these as an interviewer. I can tell you I hate doing the., and everyone I know hates doing them. Yet we must! I almost always give "HIRE" recommendation unless there is a giant red flag. What I noticed lately is people often don't respond to the question I asked but something else instead. Example: Me : Tell me about a time you went above and beyond your responsibilities to ensure good user experience? Candidate: That one time when i had to learn a new framework. Still I gave this person a maybe HIRE signal. But try to understand what they are asking and why, before you answer. Hope this helps.
Just had mine 3 weeks ago. Standard “tell me about a time” behavioral questions.
Have mine this week. Can’t stand these questions as I feel they hold no value. Is it really 45 min worth of them ? Or do you discuss who you are, why you want to work at G, etc?
I don’t know explicitly about the Google version but have been on both sides of the table for this question many times. I’ve seen the questions phrased in different ways, some more tactical (tell me about a large project), others it’s more EQ (tell me about a time you and a coworker disagreed on a solution) but often what they are looking for isn’t the exact project/tech but how did you collaborate, deal with conflict resolution, can you explain the details enough to demonstrate you understand the nuances of the decisions where you can adapt and solution based on a different environment. As an interviewer, I don’t particularly care what project/challenge/solution they choose, it’s just the vehicle to start discussions. I would suggest practicing an answer to this as it is common but with a little practice it’s not too stressful as they often follow a pattern. Good luck!