How I Got Into Capital One, out of 100 Applicants
Written by Dhruvaa Saravanan — computer science student at the University of Toronto with an interest in AI and high frequency trading.
Summary & Accomplishments
How did you get into Capital One?
There is always a?bit of luck?involved at every step of the job search. For example, at the very first stage where they have nothing but your resume, they have to?cut down 800+ applicants to around 100. As you can imagine, the odds are always stacked against you. Personally, I spent an incredible amount of time on my resume, making sure it was formatted in a specific way with all the right words, skills, etc. so that any automated tracking system (ATS) could parse my resume correctly. On top of that, getting in touch with recruiters was a game changer for me.
I received 300+ rejections before I got my opportunity at Capital One, so never give up!
With Capital One, in particular, you can really?show off your skills in the 2-week take-home project. There is quite a bit of freedom when it comes to how you complete this project, so I would definitely take the time to showcase your skill set. This is how
My advice is just to work on your resume and LinkedIn profile as much as possible. By this, I don’t just mean improving your resume layout, but including your personal projects will help you stand out amongst the hundreds of other applicants.
Here’s the resume that got me into Capital One:
What is the application/recruitment process like?
The application for my summer SWE internship opened in January of that year. The entire process lasted about a month and a ? after the applications closed. This first consisted of the resumé screen, where around?100 applicants were given 2 weeks to complete a task. I really enjoyed this because not only was the task relevant to Capital One, but it was an opportunity to show off my actual skills as a software engineer.
I definitely preferred this to the traditional arbitrary leetcode-style interviews. After the 2 weeks were over, successful applicants moved on to 2 final interviews,?1 technical and 1 behavioural. The technical interview involved (1) going through the task I completed within 2 weeks, where I was able to explain various parts of my code and (2) reviewing my resumé. The behavioural interview was similar to a typical interview. After that, I got the offer on a call from the recruiter!
What did you work on at Capital One?
I was part of the mobile app team, where I contributed to features shown on the iOS Capital One Canada mobile app. I primarily focused on the front-end side of the app, but Capital One does have a dedicated mobile back-end team. Prior to this,?I had no experience in mobile development. I actively sought out the opportunity to work in an area that I was more unfamiliar with and ended up coding in Swift for the 4-month duration.
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What was your favourite part about working at Capital One?
The people. Everyone I interacted with, from the company culture to the various teams, was incredibly friendly and?truly cared?about my well-being, growth, and enjoyment during my term at Capital One. From the very beginning, they were incredibly helpful whenever I asked them?one of my 1,000,000 questions. The team had organized events, both in-person and online, such as game lunches and taking the interns out to a Jays game! The office also had?free snacks?and I received a lot of nice?swag?from the events!
Everyone really cared about my personal growth and was always willing to help me out. My managers were incredibly helpful and we worked together on everything. Even as an intern, I was?treated like a new full-time member?of the team, and?had a real impact, which was very exciting. The pay was competitive and we had great perks too!
What’s your favourite or most embarrassing story of working at Capital One?
On my very first day of meeting my team members, my introduction meeting was scheduled relatively last minute, and I was waiting around for my next meeting without checking my calendar too closely. This ended up making me?15 minutes late to a 20-minute intro meeting?with my team. When I finally walked into the meeting, my face was red and I was so embarrassed. As you can imagine, from that day on, I had my calendar open 24/7.
I hope you enjoyed reading my story at Capital One. Good luck with your job search!
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