Background:
Education: Tier 1.5 NIT
Experience: SDE @ Big 4
Timeline: OA in Jan, final result in April.
The Experience:
This process was, for lack of a better word, just like my ex. I dealt with significant communication gaps, scheduling errors, and long periods of silence. If you are currently in the loop and things seem slow, my advice is to follow up professionally but keep moving forward with other opportunities.
The Rounds:
OA: 2 questions, Mid-Hard, 1 Tree, 1 Graph.
Round 1 (In-Person): Focused on Tree variations (LCA modification and BST). I was able to solve them optimally, but be prepared for counter-questions on edge cases.
Round 2, scheduled after 1.5 months (Virtual, Was told to prepare for a LLD problem): Trees and DP. I struggled initially since I wasn't expecting a DSA problem, the interview gave a nudge on the traversal approach. I eventually found the solution, and was able to solve all the follow-ups and the second question.
Round 3, scheduled after 1 day, postponed a couple of times (Technical Deep Dive + DSA): I expected this to be non-tech based on previous HR discussions, but it was the most intense round.
GenAI Projects (30 mins): They grilled me on my project architecture and how I applied specific Leadership Principles (Innovate/Frugality). The interviewer was definetly not satisfied how I handle things at my current company projects.
DSA: A Binary Search problem, solved it using PQ though, the interviewer mentioned that I was missing some edge cases, although I checked after the interview and my solution covered all tc. Was asked a couple of follow-ups, and was nudged to think "dynamically" on the second follow-up
Round 4, scheduled after 1 day (Bar Raiser): A deep dive into my resume. We discussed every metric and decision listed. It wasn't about "right or wrong," but about consistency and depth of ownership and thought process. This went very well.
Key Takeaways:
Own your Resume,
Treat interviews as Co-Ops, not 1v1 match
There may be long periods of silence.
Hope this helps.
