College: Tier 3
Batch: 2021
YOE: NA
Role: SDE 1

[Feb]
Got a mail from the Amazon recruiting team for different position openings.

[April]
Received a link for online assessment

OA

• 2 questions; had to write the explanation for the same
• Q1- Similar to Pair sum
• Q2- Matrix – BFS question
• Solved both the question + explained the approach

[July]
3 interview rounds in a day.

Round 1 (Technical):

• Tell me about yourself.
• Heap based question (LC Medium)
• String – BFS+DFS question (LC Hard)
• Leadership Principle questions.

Round 2 (Technical):

• Variation of rotting oranges (LC Medium)
• A stream based question – required hash map and linked list (couldn’t find it on leetcode).
• LP questions.

Round 3 (HR):

• No coding questions were asked in my case.
• Few LP based questions.
• Technical questions related to Networking, OOPS and project related questions.

5 days later the recruiter informed me that there will be one more round

Round 4 (Bar raiser):

• DP question (LC Medium)
• LP based questions (with some cross questioning)
• Project related questions

Solved all questions in each round
Next day I received a call from the recruiter announcing that I am SELECTED. "internal screaming"

Extra:

• I have solved the above questions (except for the data stream one) during my several months of practice. It was a plus for me during the interview.
• You need to be thorough with your explanation. A lot of time was spent in explaining the approach.
• For the LP questions you need to provide an in-depth scenario with facts and numbers (if possible). Vague answers won’t work. Use STAR method.
• Explain your code simultaneously while typing. DON’T BE SILENT.

My take and journey with leetcode

• I've been consistently solving questions on leetcode since Nov,2020
• Questions solved: 330+
• ried to focus on QUALITY more than QUANTITY
• I used to revisit same question multiple times and solve it using different approaches. It helped me understand the basics really well.

Also read: Paypal interview experience