In this article, I will share my Interview experience as a Cisco India Software Engineer Intern’2024. 🚀

Role: Software Engineer — Network/Embedded/Application Development (Intern) — India UHR

I participated in Code with Cisco, but not qualified. Suddenly one day, I received an email for the summer internship and they provided an OA link for that.

Online Assessment:

In the online assessment, there were 2 coding questions and almost 15–20 MCQs related to Computer Fundamentals. I didn’t have too much knowledge about Computer Fundamentals as I just started my 5th Sem, and only studied OS till now. I gave almost 70–80% MCQs and in the coding part, I solved one question and another 30% TC passed. I thought that I would not be clear about that.

But, after a few days, I got an email regarding further procedures and the need to send an inclusive resume. 📝
The Inclusive Resume concept is fine, but at the managerial round interviewer directly asked me to tell the college name. I don’t know why they did so, after that round, I was rejected, let's discuss it later.

Technical Round:

One day before the Interview they sent a WebEx space link to join there.
On Webex itself, they sent us the schedule of each candidate and as per that, my interview was from 8.30 to 9.15 a.m. They tagged and sent personalized links for the meeting for each candidate. I started my Interview at 8.40 a.m. 💻

At first, there was an introduction part, as usual, and then he asked me about my projects and we discussed my android projects and were interested in that more. Later we discussed more about my projects. Then, after the project discussion, he directly switched to Computer Fundamentals and asked which subject I studied till then. Based on that he asked many questions on the topic of Operating Systems. I was not revised more before the interview, so I could not answer statistically. ⚙️

Later, he switched to Problem-solving and data structure part, and ya that was my strong point. Now, it was my turn 😁. Asked three easy to medium-level questions and at first I discussed the solution and coded it on Notepad by sharing my screen. I took a maximum of 1 minute to code each question. He was extremely happy and He asked one more question in the last 2 minutes and was confident that I could code those questions also within 1 minute and ya I had done so. And the interview finished.

After a few hours, they sent a list of rejected candidates on the space itself. By god grace, my name was not there. 🥰

The next day we received that we had a Managerial round on the next day.

Managerial Round:

As with previous methods, on Webex itself, they sent us the schedule of each candidate, and as per that, my interview was from 9.30 to 10.15 a.m. They tagged and sent personalized links for the meeting for each candidate. I started my Interview at 9.30 a.m.

After a brief introduction, he started asking me about the “X Application (Not revealed the Name)” design, like how it works and uses AI/ML, how the Inventory system works, and How Delivery Boy is assigned using AI. How It delivered the products within few minutes. At peak traffic time when the app responds slowly how you can handle this situation? Discussed cloud, load balancer, clustering, etc. 😱

And asked more about the Cloud. I was totally shocked, as I didn’t expect this type of system design question as an intern-level job. As I am in my 3rd Year, totally unaware of this topic, But I give my best and respond to whatever point or idea I get. But, this is totally unexpected. He explained later all the things and then asked basic HR-level questions and wrapped up. It was not good, so I knew I would get rejected soon. 🥲

In the meantime, they started the ETR round (HR) for a few candidates, I just checked again and again whether my name was there or not and waited. But after a few hours,

They sent a list of rejected candidates. and, my name was there. 😔

Below mentioned candidates may please feel free to leave the space as you did not clear the interview. 
Thank you for participating in the hiring drive today. Wishing you all the best! ”

😔Everything finished.

Thanks, everyone 🙏🏻