Round 1 went very well. The interviewer was very humble and a good listener.
Round 2: I am again saying, worst interviewer. Either he knows everything or he doesn't know anything. I think he doesn't know anything, and he was considering himself a problem solver.
Problem: Find the missing and repeated number in a given unsorted list. Answer: Me: I told him, first I'll use brute force and then we will optimize the solution till O(n) and O(1).
Interviewer: Ok.
Me: I'll sort the given array and check whether the consecutive numbers are equal or not. If equal, then the number is repeated. And in the 2nd iteration, I'll compare the index with the current number. If it does not match, then the number is missing.
Interviewer: Who told you to sort the array? (very arrogantly)
Me: It's just one type of solution, and I already talked to you regarding this.
Interviewer: Are you aware of what I am saying...? (arrogantly saying my name) It looked like, according to him, I was not aware of coding.
Me (In my mind): Dude, what's your problem? It is a brute-force solution.
Me: Okay, I'll give you a different solution using HashMap. Put all array elements in a HashMap and check the number whose freq == 2 (repeated), and loop from 1 to N. If i is missing in the HashMap, then it is the missing number.
Interviewer: Haaaiiiinnn.... how does this solution work? Did you get the problem?
Me (Now I realized he was pretending he knew about problem solving): This is a very common thing. A HashMap will store the key-value pairs, and it will help to find out the solution.
Interviewer: Give me a different solution. (arrogantly)
Me: I'll modify the array, i.e., assume its position in the sorted array, and mark that index element as negative. If the number is repeated, then we will find that the number is already marked negative, so it is repeated. And for the missing number, if any element is positive, then the missing number is i+1.
I wrote the pseudocode. I was explaining to him about the pseudocode and time complexity, but suddenly he stopped me and started shouting at me.
Interviewer: Who told you to modify the array? And he himself assumed my pseudocode and started dry-running it on his own. And it ended up looking like he didn't know about this solution.
Me (Now I realized he is an imposter in Commvault, pretending he knows everything): Let me finish my explanation, and then you can ask your follow-up questions. I simply explained the solution to him in plain English. Still, he did not get the solution, so I dry-ran an example and explained it to him. Although this is one of the optimal solutions.
Interviewer (Arrogantly): I am not understanding your solution. Give me a different solution.
Me: Started thinking about the bit (XOR solution), gave the solution for finding the repeated element, but was not able to deliver the solution for the missing number because he was not listening to me and was arrogantly saying my name and saying, "You haven't got the problem."
Then we moved to the next problem. 15 min was remaining. He told me to draw Chess.com HLD in 15 min. We had a short time, so I drew a basic diagram.
Interviewer: Anyone can draw this diagram. Me: But this was your ask, right?
Interviewer: I want the core logic in HLD. Me: Then we need LLD.
Interviewer: Then give me its LLD in 5 min. Me (Laughing in my mind, what is this dude?): Wrote some classes and their objects.
Then he again started yelling at me, like where is the logic? (I already told him verbally, i.e., the validation logic of every move.) He was saying, where is the code? (Now I am totally frustrated.)
I gave up on this guy. (He literally doesn't know how to take interviews and how to treat candidates.)
Some follow-up questions, and then it ended.
I realized:
- He literally doesn't know about coding, LLD, and HLD rounds, or how to take those rounds.
- He should be gentle with candidates.
- And he should learn about how to take interviews. Literally, he needs some guidance or some sort of classes on how to take interviews.
- He needs to be a good listener.
Literally, one of the worst interviewers I have met in my entire career.
