Hi All,

Here is my recent Google Experience for L5 role and I can't express how I feel after this. Writing this post just to come back and update that all my efforts were worth it.

Recuiter's reached out over Linkedin: 23rd Oct 2024
Had a discussion for 30mins on my work experience, preparations, and interview process after which she shared all the prep materials and discussed about my Phone Screen schedule. I requested to setup PS on 1st week of Nov.
Got a call after 3-4 days and she informed that looking at my prep, she has got the approval for my Phone Screen and I don't need to appear for screening round and can directly appear for onsites. Instead of this she suggested to give a mock interview by Nov 1st week.

Mock Interview with Googler: Nov 1st week
Was asked a interval based question with simple follow ups and was able to solve it on time. Got some feedbacks on coding speed and readability.

After this, recuiter again connected and I asked for 2weeks before scheduling Onsites to which she agreed and scheduled my 1st onsite by last week of Nov and remaining 2 onsites by mid of Dec.

1st coding round: Nov last week
Was asked question similar to LC: 406 but the story was different and it had some other limitations and ambiguity. I asked lot of clarifying questions and then tried very hard but couldnt figure out the right data structure and algo to solve this. Since i was running out of time so i solved it in nlogn + n^2 complexity and dry ran the code.
Self Assesment: Took lot of time(was expecting No Hire)
Feedback: Hire

2nd Coding round: Dec mid week
Was asked a tree based question to apply some operations using two trees at same levels. Can't find any LC question on this. Solved the complete problem in optimal way and covered all the edge cases except that i missed on the level contrainst and directly applied the operations instead of checking for levels. Interviewer pointed this out towards the end of the interview and then i verbally explained the fix since no time was left for coding.
Self Assesment: missed most important condition given in the problem(was expecting Hire)
Feedback: No Hire

3rd Coding round: Dec mid week
Was asked a tree based question again which involved BFS and min heap.
Self Assesment: Took lot of time and got stuck at last on one of the codition while coding(was expecting No Hire)
Feedback: Hire

Overall feedback: Not proceeding to HC due to round 2 feedback and rest of the rounds went average. Recuiter told i was very close for this and performed well and lot of positives are written on my overall feedback and said she will contact again and I can re interview after 3months(after mid week of March).

Self assesment: After certain amount of hard work, it all depends on your luck. I was aware that Google mostly focuses on Graphs, DP, Greedy, randomization etc and there are high chance to face atleast 1 graph question. I gave my all for graph and it was my most favorite topic and gave bare minumum effort to Tree but unfortunately faced tree in all 3 rounds(1st was segment tree). I will take a step back and see what can be done next from my end.

Preparation till now:
YOE: 8+ (product based company)
LC stats: 506 (114 :: 317 :: 75)
Contest Given : 9 (1526 rating)

Completed Sheets: Strivers SDE sheet, Neetcode 150, Leetcode 75(58/75), Leetcode 150(128/150), Graph , DP and Heaps from Fraz Learnyard Sheets.

Youtube Channel followed mostly: Striver, CodeStoryWithMIK, Aryan Mittal

Link for future posts on offers i am going to crack: