How to prepare for an interview at Google, AWS, Bolt, Revolut, Olx and Dropbox

Shares his experience and advice Andrii Lobanov

So you've got an interview lined up with a global company.

Congratulations!?

This is your chance to show them what you've got.

But global companies have a different set of priorities than your average local business. They're looking for candidates with a certain set of skills that transcend any one office or culture.?

As you prepare for your interview, keep in mind that global companies want to see that you've got a few key attributes before they'll bring you on board.

They want people who are adaptable, culturally aware, good communicators, and able to thrive in ambiguity. If you can demonstrate these qualities, you'll have a good shot at getting an offer and launching your career in a global company.

But if not, keep practicing - the skills and experiences they're looking for can take time to develop. With hard work and an open mind, you'll get there.

Global companies seek candidates with a growth mindset. They want to see that you embrace challenges and view them as opportunities to learn.

Demonstrate how you’ve developed new skills and taken on more responsibility over time.

Show how you learn from mistakes and failures.

They also look for cultural intelligence. This means recognizing that people from different cultures may have different communication styles, values and ways of interacting.

Explain how you build rapport and trust with people from a range of backgrounds.

Discuss a time you bridged a cultural gap or learned from someone with a different cultural perspective.

So that you better understand how interviews are conducted in the FAANG company, a Ukrainian engineer will share his real experience.

This is my thoughts and suggestions summary from my interviews for tier 1 and tier 2 companies in Poland, Warsaw.

Last year I started my interview journey in Google, AWS, Bolt, Revolut, OLX and Dropbox. That time my position was Frontend engineer, but I had some past backend and full stack experience, so, I’ve focused more on the full-stack opportunities.

I’ll try to give a sort of preparation steps which I’ve used myself and which leaded me to an offer in AWS.

The interesting thing, that while all companies have different values and demands, the interview process is more/less similar everywhere.

Basically, there are 3 main types of interview:

1) Algorithms interview - mostly it's a 45 min call where you'll be given an algorithm to solve, similar to LeetCode (https://leetcode.com/) hard/medium task. Note, often the requirements won’t be fully given to you to test your ability to define them yourself. Also the algorithms is? the most challenging section in my opinion.

2) System design - You’ll be given a technical problem and be asked how you would implement that. You’ll need to define requirements and provide an architecture, which aligns with your requirements. Then you’ll need to defend your solution against the interviewer (explaining how corner cases would be handled, what you will do with scaling and so on). At this round, you aren’t expected to provide the code in most cases.

3) Behavioral interview - Behavioral interview was tend to detect, if you are a right fit for the company culture. It differs from company to company and has different “weight”. Basic advice here is that you’ll need to make win-win decision even in conflict situation.

So, now the question, where could I practice this?

For the algorithms section, there is leetcode, for sure. After you’ll have 100 medium, you could try starting your interview rounds

Also, there is free platform for the mock interviews called Pramp (https://www.pramp.com/#/).

The system is built in such a way that it selects a random peer for you and then you are playing the role of an interviewer for your peer. Then you’ll switch. After a peer writes a feedback about you, and you’ll write a feedback about your peer. The number of questions in pramp is around 20-30 and I suggest doing all of those tasks before your interviews.

For the system design section, pramp could be used as well. As preparation, I really suggest reading “Designing Data-Intensive Application” by Martin Kleppman.

And to give basic ideas, how the System Design may look like, here is the playlist from Gaurav Sen https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMCXHnjXnTnvo6alSjVkgxV-VH6EPyvoX

The behavioral section differs from company to company, but the general suggestion is to make a win-win answer and use the star method to describe them. More about it there (https://youtu.be/SfhSuL5ANwc).

The Pramp also have behavioral round but I’m not sure about it’s quality

Now a little more about the interview structure in FAANG:

In common case it looks like this: There might me an optional round, where you’ll be sent a link to company algorithm test? with a timer (typically HackerRank or CodeSignal).

Then comes the phone screen (which is typically a 45 min interview with an algorithm). Here will be an interviewer and you’ll suppose to work with him as a team.

Then, in case of success, comes an on-site round, which normally consists of 5 interviews 45 hours each. There is a possibility to do it in one day or separate to two days (3 in first day and 2 in a second, or vice-versa).

After this you’ll wait for the offer ??

So there you have it. Some key things global companies are looking for in candidates during interviews.?

With preparation and by demonstrating your ability to thrive in a global environment, you'll maximize your chances of success in the interview process at international companies.

Best of luck!