It’s getting close to the end of the quarter (about a month!) and it’s crazy to think that I’m almost done with the program. Next month I will be graduating and starting an internship immediately. The process of applying for jobs in tech is very different from anything I have experienced before. So for anyone wondering what it looks like, here’s what I’ve encountered.
For non-programming jobs, the interviews I’ve had have always been more to gauge my personality and how good of a fit I would be with the work environment. Software engineering interviews are so different from that. While I still have had tech interviews where the interviewer was interested in getting to know my personality, that has been an extra interview. To even get to that point I have had to do coding screenings where I am given problems and have to code on the stop. The first one of these is usually not face-to-face, instead you do it online and have a time-limit. It is essentially just an exam (make sure you know data structures very well). I have also had to code out loud in an interview. I spoke with the interviewer over Teams and he gave me problems and I had to explain how I would solve everything verbally and give my full train of thought on why I was choosing those solutions. This included the time and space complexity of my solutions, which is much harder when you don’t even have code to look at.
So how can you feel ready to be successful in these interviews? Well I’m no expert, but here’s my main two main suggestions so far:
- Leetcode. Leetcode. Leetcode.
- A lot of the questions asked follow a similar format to questions you’ll find on Leetcode. While the questions likely won’t be exactly the same as something you’ve seen before, the more problems you solve on Leetcode the more patterns you start to notice. A lot of questions break down into having decent knowledge of data structures and Leetcode problems help you to see many applications of those underlying data structures. I also would advise you to check other solutions once you’ve reached your own. Writing code that functions is great, but why not check if there’s a better solution? One that is more efficient or uses less memory. This also helps you to learn how to juggle time and space complexity.
- Cracking the Coding Interview
- This book is great. Cracking the Coding Interview by Gayle Laakmann McDowell is a must use resource to anyone applying for programming jobs. It goes in depth about many different data structures and then gives related coding problems (with solutions so you can check your work). This book also gives advice on applying to some of the big tech companies. Overall, this is probably the best book I’ve found and I highly recommend it.
Coding interviews can be stressful, so my biggest piece of advice is to prepare. Make sure you walk into the interview (or the online screening) confident that you know what you’re doing.
