Recruiter reached me on LinkedIn.
I finished up a series of online interviews – three for coding and one for system engineering. The first coding interview went well, but the next two were a bit of a mix - ended up with a 'soft no' and a 'soft yes'. The system engineering interview was a 'soft no' as well.
In the system engineering interview, they pointed out I wasn't clear enough initially in explaining the architecture, I remember vividly how I explained the system, I believe firmly I performed good (not perfect) even if the interviewer’s subjective unfair feedback was a soft no. He acknowledged in the feedback my understanding of consistency and reliability. At one point, the interviewer asked if we could ditch the rabbitmq component to simplify the system. I couldn't give a definite answer right then, but I suggested it's theoretically possible to remove it. The interviewer seemed okay with me not giving a straight answer. At the end he wished me luck for my other interviews. From the feedback I get, he didn’t like I was not able to give definitive answer on that question. And by the way, after thinking about it after the interview, removing the rabbitma was not a good idea anyway, as it has to be replaced by an infinite while loop that query the db every one to two seconds, in addition with rabbitmq, there is an added value of the abstraction to have multiple queues per one DB. In my estimations, to get a soft yes u r expected to be perfect, be at ur very best and stay focused. To get a yes, u r expected to talk about amazing system such the ones u could find in whitepapers where u were able to even manage system kernel to optimise throughput/ performance.
The technical coding questions in the second and third interviews were more about everyday problems, not the typical LeetCode stuff. In the second coding interview, I started off on the wrong foot, but managed to pivot and find a solution that covered even the edge cases. Despite this, it was a 'soft no'. The interviewer in his feedback complained he had to add assert statements to show edge cases. I admit that day I was not at my best and the solution I gave was not creative, but despite me adapting and coming up with a working solution, he gave a soft no.
After each interview, they asked me to rate it on a scale of 0 to 10, which was odd to do before getting their feedback.
The recruiter was decent, gave clear feedback. Since I got 'soft no's and not outright rejections, they said I could try again in six months. It kind of felt like they were looking for the perfect candidate. Since I was also working on the days of the interviews, I wasn't at my absolute best.
Right after each interview, they wanted me to rate it from 0 to 10. Kinda strange, doing that before getting their feedback.
The recruiter was okay, explained the feedback well. Said I could reapply in six months since I got ‘soft no’s, not outright rejections. Seems they think I’ve got potential. The whole thing was a bit of a rollercoaster – some parts good, some confusing. Just feels like they’re on the hunt for someone super perfect.
