Phone screen( SWE L3): Interviewer joined 3 minutes late, which was fine, I was nervously waiting till then. Right after joining the call, he introduced himself and said I’ll give you extra five minutes aa I was late. Then we jumped to the question, I proposed a dfs approach, explained it to him, he agreed the solution will work. I asked him if he wants me to further optimise the solution but he said no let’s start with coding. I implemented the solution in next ten minutes. I explained the solution to him and he agreed that this will work then he asked me if I can further optimise the solution. I came up with a better approach using BFS, he gave slight hints and then I quickly implemented that solution as well. Explained him everything, he again didn’t point out anything. We were left with 10 minutes, he said I don’t have anything more, you ask questions and we can wrap up the interview. I was quite sure that I am gonna get positive result, I have given google interviews in past as well (got rejected after finishing all the on-site rounds) and I know few other friends who have faced phone screen, relatively my performance was great, bug free code, explanation, communication, most optimal solution, finished before time, took one example to run through the code etc. Today, recruiter called and told me result is negative. We are not proceeding with on-site. I was shocked. For few minutes I didn’t talk at all and she was telling how I can prepare and try again in 6 months. I asked if we can have another phone screen round, she told me result is strict no hire so we can’t. This feels unfair. People getting cakewalk questions and getting selected even after messing up things and I got rejected for I don’t know what! The feedback was, need to work on algo ds, man I proposed most optimal solution, coded it and that too before time, what do you want more. This is just a rant cause I feel like a loser. I want to leave Amazon and this was the best exit strategy and I was preparing for like 3 weeks, did mock interviews. Made sure I can solve 2 LC medium in 45 minutes. After all that hard work, strict no hire. YOE: 2 TC: 23 LPA
Cool down. I thought you are preparing for 3 months:p. Anyhow Google is not the end. Why do you think it's you best exit strategy? There are other companies in the world where you can apply and go. Today was not your day. Relax and have a beer. Try other companies for now.
Sure thanks :)
I am very sure the solution is multi source bfs only. If you are interested I can paste the question here and we can discuss further. My solution was correct, I took an example and did a run through too. Sloppy code? Naah. One thing he pointed out as part of feedback was code was clear and easy to understand.
Okay :(
OP, sorry about this miss. No point thinking about the past as decisions hinge on unstated or subjective factors as well, though I'd reflect on my performance and identify improvement areas. Recommend lining up interviews with low stakes companies so that you can practice and improve. Best!
I recently received multiple offers from stratups and Microsoft too. So, I would say, I am pretty much in practice.
One possible scenario: It could be just an initial question that they would ask for a followup. You ended up using most of the time on the initial question. Thus, there is no point of doing the followup and your interview ended early
I strongly feel this wasn’t the case.
I strongly believe that my interviewee often thinks their performance was great and this scenario wasn’t the case whenever I end an interview early. I always do that in a positive manner and make it sound like there is nothing left to do
When did u interview last time? Is it a 1+ year gap?
Yes
Ah then you have to wait an year more. Try MSFT, they can give you L61 if you desperate to leave or wait an year to get double TC and become L5
Sucks, keep improving and a good opportunity will arise
Thanks :)
Did you explain your thought process or you directly jumped into the solution, interviewers only look for how your thought process goes.
I made sure he clearly understood it. Even the feedback said, good communication, good coding skills, need to work on algo ds. It doesn’t makes sense to me though.
OP kindly post the question, maybe we could point out something. Or maybe the leetcode link
You are given a family tree. In the following format. vector <pair<string, string>> Each pair, {A, B} mean A is B’s parent. Each node has 2 parents (mother and father but we don’t need to take care of gender). I confirmed input will always be valid, that means either 2 parents or 0 parents. If A has a child with C, A can’t have children with anyone else. Given query(A, B) return if A and B are genetically related. For example siblings are genetically related but husband wife are not. Basically check if two nodes have common ancestor or one is ancestor for other. Created a class, wrote a constructor to create the tree in such a way that each key in adjacency list either have 2 elements or 0 elements. Basically storing parents of each node. I quickly identified that the usual LCA algos wont work here, as each node has 2 parents, not a normal tree. My initial solution was, do dfs from both, check if any common node occurs, worst case O(n). Final solution was, do multi source bfs with A and B as 2 sources, you will visit a node twice if these are related. Worst case remains same, average case will be better. I was able to implement both the solutions.
For the DFS approach, are you hashing the results? How is is checking for common node O(n)? Mukti source BFS seems correct and it is O(n).
Anyway, failing phone screen is okay, no limit on ohone screen. You can try again in 6 months.
Isn’t the cool down period 1 year at Google?
Sorry OP! That sucks!