Background: Expert on Codeforces, 5 star on Codechef and solved 1000+ problems on Leetcode.
Experience: Summer intern at one of the Product Based Companies (Non FAANG). Got PPO, hence wasn't eligible for on-campus placements
Application process:
If you get an offer from on campus placement, you are not eligible to sit for further companies. I personally was not happy with the offer that I had. Hence, decided to apply for off-campus opportunities.
Navi generally hires students from tier-1 colleges. However this year they started a programme called Navi-Hackaverse in the month of August. It was held in a platform called unstop / dare2compete. Students from some selected colleges were allowed to participate in it.
A total of 6000 students applied.
MCQ Round:
It was an MCQ test. There were 30 questions to be solved in 30 minutes.
Only around 1000 were invited for the coding round
Online Assessment:
It was a coding challenge which had 2 problems.
The first problem was simple implementation based and the second one was based on strongly connected components.
I was able to solve both the questions.
After 3 - 4 weeks in the month of September I recieved a mail from the talent acquisition team that I had been shortlisted for the interviews. They selected a total of 200 candidates for the interview process.
The interview process consisted of two rounds 1 Technical + 1 Technical + Managerial. Both of them were eliminatory
Round1:
The interviewer came up with a graph problem. I discussed all the approaches (bfs / dfs). Coded it up in 5 minutes.
As a follow up he modified the problem. Initially I had no clue how to solve it. After reading the question 2 - 3 times I got a rough idea that it can be solved using DP.
But the transitions weren't that simple. After discussing with the interviewer the approach, he gave me a couple of edge cases where my logic would fail.
I quickly figured out the problem and told the interviewer. After recieving the green signal from the interviewer I coded it up.
It was one of the most tricky graph problems I ever faced.
Then he asked me some CS Fundamentals questions which I answered comfortably.
He then asked me if I had any question for him which he answered.
The recruiter informed me that my 2nd round was scheduled that day itself.
Managerial Round:
The interviewer came up with a design problem. Although I had prepared for system design rounds before but I had never attempted a design question in a live interview, hence was a bit nervous.
He asked me to design a movie recommendation engine with various functionalities. I first explained the HLD of the architecture. And then discussed about the class diagrams.
He was satisfied with my approach. Since some time was left he asked me another design problem which was a standard one (Snakes and Ladders).
I explained it to him with LLD code.
I later asked him about his experience in Navi and the general techincal challenges faced by fintech companies.
After a week I got a mail from the recruiter that I had been selected for the role of Software Development Engineer at Navi
Some key takeaways:
- No matter how much you practice system design, the real experience you gain is by attempting these questions in a real interview.
- You can still have a hard time to solve a problem even if its from your favourite topic, so never be too exited after seeing the problem.
Compensation: https://leetcode.com/discuss/compensation/2906870/Navi-or-New-Grad-(Off-Campus)-or-SDE-1