Education : Masters from IIT/NIT/BITS
Current company : The one which you know has the worst WLB.
Current TC : 30 LPA (excluding signing bonus of course)
YOE : 3 years and 3 months at the time of interview.
Recruiter contacted me on mail. I have no clue how he got my mail id. He proposed an opportunity at Google and was extremely vague about it in the mail. I replied seeking more clarity and we had a call on google hangouts. He explained me that he had backend role and a full stack role. The backend role was looking more promising because he explained in detail about what is the tech stack required. It's atypical of google to reveal role descriptions as team matching happens in the end (or so I have heard). I asked him to give me one month of prep time as I wasn't looking for an exit from my current company. Since I am from a non-FAANG but well known company, they went away with coding/telephone screen round. We scheduled the dates for interview.
I prepped hard for this. The job felt more taxing than ever because I prioritized my google prep. That was one month of pure agony. Still, I pushed through. I completed 400 LC medium, 210 LC easy and 50 LC hard questions. In some cases, I watched a youtube video and just went with remembering the steps to achieve peak performance. For every question, TC and SC was calculated. I coded on microsoft word and when that got too time taking, I used a whiteboard and coded on that. For better advice on prep, please refer to other posts as well because they know much better than I do.
When the time came, tragedy hit. I was asked by my employer to give an important presentation. The audience size was 550 people. So I asked politely if google interview could be postponed. The recruiter was glad and he said that this was not so uncommon to reschedule. He was nice and practical. We rescheduled.
Round 1:
- Letter combinations
- Question on heap and map.
- Design question about an online compiler. It was a premise for CAP theorem discussion.
verdict : Strong Hire
Round 2:
- Maximum vacations [LeetHard]
I gave a greedy approach but interviewer was stoic and almost robotic. After 15 minutes from the start of the interview, he asked me if I had any questions for him. I hadn't coded anything by then. There was no discussion, no help, nothing! He said he's late for another interview and bounced. The whole interview lasted for 35 minutes.
verdict : Weak No Hire
Round 3 :
- Course Schedule 1
- Course Schedule 2
I coded it perfectly and covered all edge cases. I messed up about TC when asked but nailed SC. I rectifed my answer later. Apparently, that is a no-no in google. You have to be correct the first time. This guy was the best interviewer. He made me comfortable and asked about covid situations and what not.
verdict : Weak Hire
Round 4 :
I'll call this guy the sleepy dude because he yawned the whole way through. I gave cookie cutter answers from Jeff H Sipes. Elaborated them with my practical experiences.
verdict : Weak Hire
After getting ghosted for a month, I asked the recruiter to give me the results. I called him up 8 times in a day after I waited patiently for 20 days. He gave me the verdict report and we had a discussion that I could be hired if and only if I can give the last round another try. Game on!
Had to reschedule because my cousin expired that day. We rescheduled to next Monday.
Round 4 : Try 2:
Nailed the last interview, I could feel it in my bones. The interviewer literally said that he's impressed with my resume and demeanor. There's no way I messed this one up.
Well it's been 2 months now since that interview. I know I got rejected because of second round. Maybe the role got filled up. Google didn't let me know anything. It really messes with your other interviews too. I felt it. I lost Hotstar because of this panic attack.
Moral of the story : Maybe don't postpone interviews. They really take it as a red flag, even if you have genuine reasons. Give it your best and forget about the results.