The Tech Interview That Never Ended

Photo by Ash from Modern Afflatus on Unsplash

When we go into an interview process, we expect a kind of standard tech interview experience. The interview format will vary according to the prestige of the company and job, but developers will often know what to expect.

“I went to an interview and thought it might be a typical interview process. If there was an indication that it would last for the entire working day, I may not have attended at all. That’s not even my complaint.

Here is the story of my interview that never ended.”

The Situation

Ideally, when starting an interview process with any particular company the candidate should know the expectations of them. That is, they should know the stages in the interview process and possibly even be coached in what is expected of them (Yelp is particularly good at this).

“When accepting a new interview, I always figure I’m going to be tested on my coding and interview skills. In this case, I wasn’t prepared for an interview that would also check my endurance and sanity.

The day of interviews took a mix of Google-style trivia and whiteboarding. Even though I was (definitely) junior I did well!”

I passed the interview despite this

There were a couple of curveballs in this interview.

“Spectacularly they had an hour interview session in a technology I didn’t use, so I had to use pseudocode. I passed.

I got asked about the famous 25 horses problem cribbed from Google. In my prep for the interview, I’d solved this puzzle. I told them I knew the answer and let go of their nonsense reply *we want to see how you think*. I got on with my memorized answer and got the answer correct. I passed.”

Then…another interview

The Secret Developer thought that they had survived the gauntlet of this marathon interview. However, they never progressed to onboarding our favorite blogging developer.

“I thought the lunch session over ramen would defeat me. However, as it turned out I passed the entire day. I felt a sense of achievement after passing 8 interviews and a lunch session. 

Then the twist came into the story. Another round of interviews awaited me, this time with the CTO.

I geared up. What would they ask me? Behavioral questions or a chat about how their product worked. I excitedly travelled back to where the company was based, making arrangements for another working day to be replaced with an interview.

No, this was a LeetCode round (think 2D Maticies). Being offered a Kitkat by the CTO as we neared lunchtime was a meagre consolation for my growling stomach and frazzled brain. This was because of course the interview lasted for several hours (no deadline, they just kept me there). Eventually, we were done, and they would let me know the result.”

Dear John

The Secret Developer probably developed their aversion to LeetCode at this point. 

“An email (on a holiday weekend no less) told me no job for The Secret Developer. I say that, but the email was so poorly writtenit wasn’t clear this was the end (something about applying again). 

Still no job and a ruined holiday weekend for The Secret Developer. Which was nice.

Only in the tech world, folks.”

Conclusion

We should ask the pertinent question here. Why didn’t The Secret Developer ask about the interview process at the beginning of their interview process?

” It takes a brave person to ask why where and what at the beginning of an interview process. As a junior, I was too scared.

Doesn’t that say it all about the whole process and the power imbalance in these tech interviews?”