I applied through a recruiter. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at NODAL EXCHANGE in Oct 2024
Interview
Ultimately I was ghosted and never officially heard back from this company.
A recruiter reached out to me to chat on LinkedIn. I was interviewing with several companies and this is the only recruiter where the recruiter didn’t set up an official time to do a recruiter screen and instead just tried to call me randomly for the next 3 days or would tell me he would call me then didn’t.
Eventually he said the hiring manager was interested and we set up a technical interview. He gave me a list of times to choose from and I said any of the times provided on a certain day worked for me and he proceeded to schedule my interview for a time he didn’t initially provide.
The technical was very technical and difficult. I also felt like the interviewer was condescending at times. She asked me what the time complexity is of retrieving an item in a hashmap. I make an educated guess because I didn’t have this memorized. She then asks me what the time complexity is if the item doesn't exist. Throughout this line of questioning she sounds so skeptical and I feel like an idiot because I thought I was incorrect. She then segues to asking about my undergrad career and how she hopes they taught me about data structures in my computer science program. Afterwards I look up those time complexities and I found out I wasn’t wrong so I don’t know why she questioned my education and made it sound like I had no idea what I was talking about. In that technical interview, there was live coding that wasn't leetcode style.
After the technical, I followed up after 1.5 weeks because I didn’t hear back and the recruiter said they wanted to meet me for another interview and sent me times they had available. After, sending back my availability he never got back to me.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
What is the time complexity of retrieving an item from a hashmap?
1. Basic phone call screen with HR
2. Problem solving interview (2 questions)
3. OOPs, Java, & System Design interview all in one. (2x)
I had a great experience. Interviewers were approachable and showed interest in the process. Entire process took about 4 weeks.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
If there were n teams in a tournament, how many games would there be in the tournament?
I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at NODAL EXCHANGE in Jan 2022
Interview
A third party recruiter found my resume on Dice.com and called me. She asked me some basic phone screening questions. Then, I was told to apply directly on their website and also give the recruiter a brief note on why I would be a good fit for the position. I did my best to relate my work experience to the job description.
The next step was a phone conversation with someone in talent acquisitions. The conversation was mostly about my motivations for looking for a new position. Overall, it felt like another phone screening and was probably just done as a formality.
The next step was to do an online assessment. It was mainly IQ and SAT type questions. Which pattern doesn't belong, which word best fits the blank in this sentence, some math questions, etc. I believe it was 50 questions in 15 minutes. The average candidate answers something like 24 questions correctly. No calculator allowed. They can't prove whether or not you used a calculator but you won't have time to use it anyway.
After that, there was a video interview with the CTO/CIO. Most of the interview was talking through the solutions to difficult brain teasers. More stuff to test your IQ. At the end, he asked if I had any questions about the company. I expected him to talk more about the company and ask behavioral type questions but he ended the interview rather abruptly. The whole thing was scheduled for an hour but lasted 30-40 minutes which was what the recruiter predicted.
Unfortunately, I didn't perform well enough to move forward. I was also told it was difficult to engage me in conversation when talking about the brain teasers.
