Flipkart Interview Experience

I recently had the opportunity to participate in the interview process at Flipkart. A recruiter reached out to me after filling a google form, that I was shortlisted for the online assessment round.

Online Assessment (June 16th, 2024)SHL Platform

The online assessment consisted of three DSA (Data Structures and Algorithms) questions, all at a LeetCode Medium-Hard difficulty level. I was only able to solve two questions.

1. Graph-based problem :- https://leetcode.com/problems/reconstruct-itinerary/description/
2. https://leetcode.com/problems/create-maximum-number/description/
3. Tree-based problem.

Technical Interviews (June 20th, 2024)
On June 19th, I received an email inviting me to the next round of interviews, which took place the following day. There were three interviews in total:

Round 1: Problem Solving and Data Structures (PSDS) — 60 minutes
The interview began with introductions of both of us. then asked about my favorite data structure, I say LinkedList and then he asked why? The interviewer then provided a Google Doc link with a linked list problem:

1. https://leetcode.com/problems/reverse-linked-list-ii/description/ similar kind of this, instead of position, two unique node values is given and need to reverse it . all values are unique.
2. https://leetcode.com/problems/gas-station/description/.

I spent good time on first question(30-40 min), becz i code it completely on google doc and dry run it (2-3 example), limited time for the second question. I explained my initial thoughts and suggested a greedy approach. The interviewer acknowledged that I was on the right track ans didn't ask to code.
The interview concluded with the interviewer asking if I had any questions.

Round 2: PSDS Round 2 (60 minutes)
This round felt easier compared to the first. I solved both coding questions with correct approaches and discussed multiple solutions and their time complexities.

1. DFS/DP-based problem (similar to Frog Jump variations)
2. Two Pointers/Dp solutin: find total number of good subarry with some condition I forgot😅. there are differnt way to solve this question, i shared 3 differnt approches, disscuss time complexity of each then code it.

With some time remaining, the interviewer asked theoretical questions about graphs. We then had a good discussion about Flipkart, their team, technologies, and the challenges they face. There were two interviewers present, with one observing the session. I also had a good discussion with the observing interviewer too at the end.

Round 3: Hiring Manager (HM) Round (45 min)
The interview started with introductions. The Hiring Manager shared a detailed introduction about himself and his experience at Flipkart, technology, team etc. I then provided a brief introduction from my end.

Interviewer shared the Google Doc link:

Design a calculator with basic functionalities (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division) that can store the last five operations and allow users to modify any stored operation.

We discussed suitable data structures for this task, considering different ds like doubly linked lists, vectors, and ultimately settling on a deque. We had an in-depth discussion about the challenges associated with each data structure choice, like vector is not working, then why? what are the challenges with vector we have. Why dequeue and all.

I then coded the solution using object-oriented approach. The interviewer was satisfied with my code and move on to the next.

We then discussed about project that i have work on. I saw my deployed project to explain (he is more happy to see). He seemed interested and requested to see the code. I explained my approach and we had a good conversation of more then 20 min.
Then we move to another project.

We then moved on to HR-based questions, including:
Achievements and moments of pride
Instances of failure
Internship experience (since I had none) why? Clg have marks for internship then how you handle?
cross questions.
and many more i forget😅.

concluded by asking if I had any questions. Since he had already shared a lot of information in his introduction, I struggled to come up with any. but i asked two question and this way we ended up.
This round quite long (1 hour 20 minutes).

Conclusion:
Well, there are likely fewer chances of me getting selected since I messed up in the last round. Honestly, it was scheduled so quickly. It took time to adjust, and things didn’t go according to plan.

However, I learned a lot from the last round, even though I might not have learned much in the first two. While the last round was a challenging experience, it highlighted areas for improvement, particularly in my soft skills.

Result : Rejected.(😔)

KeyTake:

1. Speak loud, what ever in your mind (weather it's wrong though just shared, I the first round for the second question i was thinking about graph, but interviewer stop me, and give me hint, that there are not multiple paths). They are there to help you.
2. Not an issue if you ask for time, instead of silence, say like this just give me moment let me think about this/ frame my answere (I always ask)
3. hr/hm round is also not easy, be prepared before hand for hr questions.

I hope it help, all the best :)