A big thanks to Leetcode and community here. I applied to the New Grad 2021 role online ( without referral). I was contacted by a recruiter for the phone screen round.

Phone Screen

2 Questions

1. Given an array return whether the array is sorted or not (boolean).
   true -> Ascending or Descending
   true -> if all are same
   true -> if just one element

   Rest false

   Solved this one easily.

2. Exact same question from leetcode (Bloomberg tagged) - > LFU Cache
   https://leetcode.com/problems/lfu-cache/

   After copy-pasting the question he asked me to solve it in constant time. I gave the psedocode for the the problem and then he asked me to code it (in last 8 - 10 minutes). I wasn't able to completely code the solution (Time's up).

Received a rejection email this morning.

Best part of the Interview : Last 5 - 7 minutes of discussion.
He asked if I have any questions - I asked him a few and the answers he gave were super inspiring.

Me : How do you think these questions will help me in the Job ?
Interviewer : These questions are building blocks of your career and people think that these questions are just for interviews but they don't understand that these questions help them to build their skills. Definitely, you won't get any of these when you start working for any company but these questions will help to think more logically about the approach. All that matters is your approach.

Me : You must have interviewed a lot of candidates. Any points on how to be best on technical interviews ?
Interviewer : I just answered that. The approach is what matters. People grind on solving for the best solution and if they find the best solution online they just focus on that particular solution. I would say, rather than going for the most optimal approach, try solving it by yourself and come up with an optimal solution. This is how you will learn.

P.S
I believe this was one of the best interviews I have ever given. Although I was rejected that was a fault on my end ( I was a bit slow in coming up with a working solution).

Suggestion
Do check LC tagged questions once.