J'ai postulé en ligne. Le processus a pris 3 semaines. J'ai passé un entretien chez Amazon (Seattle, WA) en mars 2016
Entretien
Talked to five people at their downtown Seattle office. Starting at 9 a.m. the first three were engineers who each asked algorithm questions to be coded (not outlined, coded) on a whiteboard in about 45 minutes each. The problems would be moderately challenging to do at a computer and I found them to be difficult to do while being watched, while taking about the code, and while writing on a whiteboard.
The next two were with personality interviews with management - lunch with the hiring manager and then 40 minutes with the manager's manager.
There were no software design questions, only basic algorithm stuff, which was a surprise given that the position was for a senior software engineer.
Questions d'entretien [1]
Question 1
I don't have the exact question, but the problem was essentially to write code to convert text to variable length bit encoding similar to Huffman coding. Determine frequency of occurrence for each letter in the text assign it a bit code so that more frequent characters get shorter bit codes.
The recruitment process consisted of several stages:
Online coding – a one-hour session focused on solving programming problems and demonstrating practical coding skills.
Technical meeting – a two-hour in-depth discussion covering system design, problem-solving approach, and technical knowledge relevant to the role.
Soft skills meeting – a 90-minute conversation assessing communication skills, teamwork, and overall cultural fit.
Questions d'entretien [1]
Question 1
describe your current project, most interesting bug and feature.
the most important thing you are proud of.
slide-window algorithm, string parser
The technical round focused on a DSA problem about finding the closest points to the origin, where I was asked to explore multiple approaches like sorting, heaps, and quickselect. It felt straightforward, and I was ready for it thanks to the time I spent on PracHub brushing up on similar questions. The interview also included a behavioral section, but overall, I found the process to be very easy. Happy to say I received an offer, which I gladly accepted!
Questions d'entretien [1]
Question 1
K Closest Points to Origin - given an array of points on the 2D plane and an integer k, return the k closest points to the origin (0,0). Walk through sort-by-distance O(n log n), heap-based O(n log k), and quickselect O(n) average; discuss when to prefer each based on the relationship between n and k.
Tough interview.
The Process: Automated Online Assessment (OA) with 2 coding questions and a system simulation, followed by a 4-round virtual Loop. Every single round started with 20 minutes of intense, behavioral behavioral questions diving into Amazon's Leadership Principles, followed by 25 minutes of technical coding or system design.
Amazon interviews are a test of mental endurance because you have to switch from deep behavioral storytelling straight into complex coding which can be so difficult. I used Apex Interviewer to practice the cognitive context switch. Running through their live-coding workspace helped me ensure my technical communication and architectural structures remained sharp and automatic, even after spending the first half of the interview defending my past project metrics. I fed the practice AI questions I extracted from glassdoor and gothamloop.
In the end, the offer was way lower than I hoped.
Questions d'entretien [1]
Question 1
Design the backend inventory tracking and placement service for a global fulfillment network, ensuring strict transactional consistency across multiple regional warehouses during peak shopping events.