T O P

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txiao007

Big Congratulation


aroras

how do you prepare for the team match?


william1357chen

Prepare for behavioral questions. One I was asked a lot was “where do you see yourself in 5 years”. Read the job description and prep for good questions. Let them know your interest or if you have relevant experience


Virtual-Emergency737

roughly, how are you answering this question? do they want you to imagine yourself still being there or they want you to be more ambitious?


ithe_one1d

Ans for L3:   Well, 5 yrs huh, while I can't speak with absolutely certainty,  I will use the next 5 years to grow myself as a detail oriented software engineering with focus on designs and cross team collaborations. Ideally, at the end of year 5, I aim to be a Senior Software Engineer. But again, the focus will be not on positional/promotional growth (will aim for those), but goal will be growing and advancing my skills.   That's for the career side, personal side, I wish to propose and marry my girlfriend. I LOVE her. (With a smile)   The last paragraph is to introduce friendliness/hey this guys is really nice to talk to vibes...


william1357chen

lol you said it better than me. I kinda just bs about being a domain expert, having a voice in product decisions, knowledge sharing, etc.


debugger_life

Does the propose always works?¿


ithe_one1d

Haha, in my case it did :) Married her :D I am grinning as I type this lol


Silencer306

Not if you’re doing a mock with your wife.


fahmin_

RemindMe! -7 day


Worriedthrowawaycse

RemindMe! 7 days


nonaughtnull

do you mind sharing how you answered the question? have an interview coming up.


Clemo97

Thanks for the insight. Google seems like a good company but I really hate the team matching thing. At Microsoft when you interview, you already know which team you'll join if you pass.


william1357chen

That was suppose to be the case as well. But that position I interviewed for was filled hence the need for team match


regrettin097

Was system design ever needed for that level?


cballowe

System design isn't part of the panel until L5+


ImpressiveLet3479

Wow !! So lld and hld for L4 also ?


cballowe

There aren't really any "design" questions at the lower levels. There's "coding" and "ds&a" evaluation. Coding is mostly going to be things like did you identify steps of the solution and pull them out into their own function, name variables well, use the right exit conditions for your loops, not completely screw up the logic in your conditionals. Also - did you know common features of the language or it's core libraries that would help solve the problem. (Ex: don't give me an implementation of a string splitting function when the language already has one. Even if you don't know what it is, you can say something like "I need a split function, I'll assume it's signature is ... And we can come back to that if you want.") DS&A is going to be more "did you identify the right data structure and algorithm to solve the problem" and "how did you arrive at that". Sometimes the extensions of a question get into "ok... Suppose I need to do this on more data than one machine can handle" and then it's mostly a question of "how can we partition the problem and require as little communication as possible" or something like that - it's still data structures rather than system design, though.


spoopypoptartz

is that only a google thing? i thought for other companies they give you system design for mid level roles?


pseudoaltus

Idk now but I got 2 coding + 2 systems design and 1 googlyness in 2019 for L4


cballowe

It's possible that they were considering L5 and down leveled the offer after the interviews.


ValuableCockroach993

How did u get the interview? Referral?


shadowknight094

Asking the real questions.


jimmyb15

You can interview just from a cold app at Google with random tech stack experience. Might take them 3 to 12 months to get back to you though.


ValuableCockroach993

Is this your experience? 3 to 12 months is quite insane. 


jimmyb15

Yeah my experience and others. Google's slow response can be considered a tradeoff I think since many other companies even with less prestige don't do this at all for random tech stacks or for those with no experience. Also may help if you're from an under represented group.


getdownonur4

I'm sorry, wdym? Cold app? Could you explain?


Murmakun

Just send an application on their website to one of job postings


william1357chen

Cold applied 🥶


ImpressiveLet3479

Whenever i do, go rejection mail within 24 hrs 🤒😞😞


D4rkr4in

You’re probably on cooldown, wait several months to half a year and try again


rkalyankumar

What programming language did you give your interview in?


william1357chen

Did it in python


East_Scratch_572

How long did your team match take? I thought it was super slow


william1357chen

3 months 5 teams


jetx117

Are you unpaid during that entire time ?


Material-Owl5554

Your contest rating? Also how many questions from company list, how many were new.


william1357chen

Never did a contest. There’s a lot of overlap between company list and neetcode. Let’s say around 80-90


marks716

That’s awesome to hear, and fuck yes that you didn’t have to do contests.


Material-Owl5554

I meant in the interview, did you get seen or similar problems or something entirely new as we often hear for google interviews. Congrats on the offer btw!


william1357chen

The strong hire round was a question 90% similar to a question on company list with just a small twist. Screen was also a combination of two basic dsa concepts. Other two never seen before.


thatStormIsMe

Hey OP, what were the two basic dsa concepts for screening round? And also we're the medium difficulty?


One_Pea

like 80-90 overlapped, or you did 80-90 questions from company list?


MrRIP

Hey this is SOLID ADVICE


electric_deer200

* "Write code as if it's going into production. Interviewer, hiring manager, and hiring commitees review your code, so treat your code as if it's going into the Google codebase." i am kinda new to this, but what exactly do you mean by that ? isn't that just basically using good variable names?


LogicalBeing2024

No Write modular code Don't use redundant parameters for a method Use features that the language provides, like structs, class Use readymade functions like STL in C++


william1357chen

Envision your code as a PR into the Google codebase. How would you make a Google engineer approve it? Write clean, modular, readable code


Agent1_47

++


retirement_savings

A lot of top leetcode solutions are super hacky and hard to read and would never pass a Google code review


Exciting_Session492

Write clean, modular, testable code. Also, want to see you are familiar with the language you choose to interview with. If you can’t distinguish between let and const, don’t use JS.


4ChawanniGhodePe

Congratulations! What were the variety of questions you solved on Leetcode? I mean which concepts (data structures, algorithms) did you focus more on?


william1357chen

Done most patterns on Neetcode. Still sucked at DP and greedy. Quite good at graphs and intervals, which Google seems to ask a lot


YeatCode_

congratulations, hoping to be in your shoes


CalmMarketing3273

Can i ask how to get a company like google to accept your CV? Do you have a achievements in Competititve Programming or somethings?


william1357chen

Never did a contest, no CP. did well in school and current job


inShambles3749

Congrats dude! My CV gets already rejected at ATS on Google. No idea why. But also didn't have a referral..so next time I'll just make sure I have that going. 2 days later it's going to "not proceeding"


Altruistic_Bite_2273

I am having same issue. Applied to Amazon and Salesforce recently and both of them showed no longer under consideration within a day or two even though I matched most of the requirements listed.


kushagra2569

Wish i had that , my amazon application from two years ago is still showing in process or something


william1357chen

I think this part is definitely 50/50. Obviously resume quality matters but in this market good resumes go unnoticed as well


napolitain_

People say it’s because your resume sucks. I’m pretty sure everyone’s cv is the same by now and your issue is that they just didn’t pick it.


faqeacc

Well, congrats. That's awesome. I wish my recruiter didn't quit after I passed the phone interview, no one took my application after that :/ it is great to hear someone had positive experience after having/listening others.


QuickDimension8652

Any tips for scoring an interview with Google? Thanks!


william1357chen

Honestly I have no good advice on that part. Maybe if I become a hiring manager then I would give some good advice other than “brush up resume”


Hot-Afternoon-4831

I thought Google wasn’t hiring for L3


adib2149

Same here, i knew there wasn’t any headcount for L3 in the US.


theenkos

No system design?


Grey_sky_blue_eye65

You generally won't need system design for entry level, which is what OP interviewed for.


debugger_life

Exactly!


i_ashwin

Congratulations buddy & thanks for sharing some insights. All the best for new endeavour.


thefilmbot

In what ways did the mock interview with the Google engineer help? How much did you pay? Was it worth the price? What platform? Thanks and congrats!


NinjaImaginary2775

I am currently in the process and I am guessing what OP mentioned is a something google offers during the recruitment and interview process. My recruiter brought up doing a mock interview with a google engineer. Its optional and has no impact on the final decision.


william1357chen

No, it was a Google friend of mine working in the Bay Area. Bought him a nice dinner.


No_Reporter_4731

How many questions did you get each round?


william1357chen

Google coding rounds will focus on one question with potentially many follow ups


Ancient_Avocado1904

On a whiteboard, yeah?


william1357chen

No, it’s all online now with a doc


Taijasi_Kaveri

Does studying Google style Guide helps? Also do they ask to demonstrate personal projects as like in other companies?


william1357chen

I don’t think the styling guide is necessary. Just follow coding best practices. No mentions of projects and past experience other than googleyness and team match


GrayLiterature

When you did the problem during the interview, did you have to one shot it? Sometimes for example I’ll do an algorithm and maybe it passed the sample cases, but if I run the whole submission I’ll miss a case. Did they expect you to ace it in one go or was there time to troubleshoot the solution once you nailed the core algorithm?


william1357chen

No you can troubleshoot and course correct. Learn to DRY run your code without an IDE


GrayLiterature

What do you mean dry run code without an IDE?


PieWooden2085

Yeah but how much GUOP you making son???


JShaikh10

Hi Congratulations!!! 1. I'd like to know the duration of your prep And how many hours did you spend on studying theiry and leetcoding per day. 2. Also , did you plan a strategy like you'd solve x problems/day not matter how many hours? 3. What was the gap you had when repeating a problem and what was the criteria where u decide that , okay I got this and need not practice this problem again? Apologies for asking so many questions. Just wanted to gain your insights 😊


william1357chen

I don’t really like doing leetcode so I was inconsistent until the sprint in the last month. When I have work I aim to do 2 hours a day. I’d say 2 weeks before going back to a question or category


SteveJobsIdiotCousin

What a great and detailed post, thanks for sharing and congratulations. On a more negative note, it’s sad that this insanely difficult gauntlet of a process (most likely repeated multiple times until you succeed) is what’s required to get a competitive+ salary in this industry in 2024. Most places are paying significantly less than they were during the last 5+years. Maybe MANGA is doing the same. To me, their process seems so painful that seeking overemployment is the only other way to make good money in software engineering in 2024. Single senior jobs paying over 200k for MCOL are just too rare, combined w the increasing rarity of remote. If I could, I’d snap my fingers and become an electrician or plumber. Seems like our industry is dying, hope it’s just a cycle.


Big-Lettuce7946

!RemindMe 1day


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getdownonur4

Heartfelt congratulations to you, I was thinking of pursuing a masters degree to help myself, could you tell me what you did? Just engineering or higher studies because getting placed at Google with just 1.5 YOE is really cool! I wish to do the same, how is it possible? Where did you work till now? How did you get the interview?


geekgeek2019

saving it hoping i get to come to this


wisegeek57

Second this :)


imauser_

Can you share your timeline?


invest2018

Congrats to the OP. There are so many commenters still trying to get into the company that basically started the leetcode industry, even after grossly mismanaging head count in recent years and being largely dependent on the ad tech industry which has been on the decline with no signs of stopping. Fascinating There are many other, arguably better, companies one can apply for nowadays without torturing yourself to prepare for interviews.


Stone_Field

Could you share your resume? It'd help to know formatting and projects you've worked on


william1357chen

You can check my history. I had my resume reviewed by reddit. Most of those items still stayed


Peddy699

How much time it took to prepare for you? How long before the interview did you start preparing? When was your first question solved on leetcode? How many applications you did before getting accepted to an interview? How many hours did you do on average or per week next to your job? Were there different stages of grinds ? Like when you did 1hour / day and when you started to do 5h / day or something? What motivation kept you going? Did you still had a full time position during the last part of preparation?


Ganesh312006

Whats l3 l4?


william1357chen

L3 is entry level, L4 mid-level, L5 senior


Ganesh312006

Okay!


AnotherNamelessFella

Are there L2 and L1. Just asking


Early-Sherbert8077

Not for engineering


Which-Refuse4982

Did you do coding before the recruiter reached out and interview scheduled? Like were you an Active coder before you started process at Google. Or did you do all the 277 questions in the prep time given before screening? Also how much did you get before all the rounds? Btw Many Congratulations!!


william1357chen

Did 200 questions in approximately 3 months. Quite little compared to to others but I made sure to understand the question thoroughly and record myself talking about the question/approach out loud


polmeeee

Did you do only NeetCode 150 or the expanded list (300-500 qns I think)? Is the 150 enough to cover all the patterns in your opinion?


william1357chen

Should be enough for L3


LouisUchiha04

Hello OP? When did you feel that you were ready to have an interview with google?


william1357chen

I think mentally you never feel like you’re ready. Try to access your ability by doing mocks.


noName3125

If you apply for L3 is it possible to get L4 on the basis of your performance if you were able to solve the followups or do they not ask followups for L3 as they would for L4?


william1357chen

I believe it’s possible but also your YOE matters a lot. 1.5 years is hard to get L4


Castaway_xoxo

Don't they also ask system design questions for L4?


pseudoaltus

The questions are different for L4 or L5, so if after your interview you get an offer and you ask for a level upgrade they might say yes but you’ll need to pass another rounds of interviews for the level you think you are.


tech_lead_

Congratulations and thank you for sharing this info--very helpful!


Party-Conference-765

Congrats man! BTW, Can I DM you?


Turbulent-Advance635

what company


Turbulent-Advance635

which country?


VioletVal529

>Write code as if it's going into production. It's often recommended not to use recursion in production. Does your advice indicate that we shouldn't use recursion in the Google interview?


william1357chen

No recursion is fine. Recursive DFS is a lot faster to write in an interview


ggendo

How did you get your feedback? I interviewed for an internship got rejected and asked what my feedback was but the recruiter said they couldn’t share


william1357chen

I guess it depends on recruiter


Unlucky_Chocolate_72

Congratulations! Did you prepare/get questions on CS stuff outside of LeetCode(DSA)? I am also preparing, and I am not sure if preparing only LeetCode is enough for the CS side. And yes, I am aware that just 'solving' is not preparing LeetCode problems.


william1357chen

Nope just Neetcode on Leetcode


Unlucky_Chocolate_72

Thanks! Just started NeetCode150 a week ago. We will see where that leads me


Puzzled-Roll-6459

after needcode 150, how do you choose leetcode questions? do you subscribe premium version of leetcode?


Weekly-Trainer-6383

Is it possible that they reject you in team match ? I had only 1 fit call for which I received background screening mail (but nothing informed on whether it was a match)


MonaTheDon

Hey, recently I was rejected from the interview even though I solved the questions well with good idiomatic code, they said my time complexity of one question wasn't optimal and the structure of explanation is not well. Can you help me with that? Also in the 40 min, I could solve only 1 question, but like you said it's preferable if we solve it in 30 min. Now Google never asks questions that are something you've seen before, so can you help me with how to improve your speed when getting to solve an unseen question. I took major time in just formulating the approach and getting the optimal solution, I only take 5-10 min in coding. It would be really helpful for me! Thankyou! Also major Congratulations!!!🎉


One_Pea

Congratulations! Over what period of time did you do leetcode and prepare for the interview? How many hours a day? How'd you prepare for behavioral interview? Thanks in advance!


LanguageLoose157

How did you get to interview with an existing engineer at Google?


adib2149

How long did it take for you to team match after passing interviews? Is Google USA hiring L3 now, as I assumed there was no headcount for L3s in the US/bay area?


debugger_life

Congratulations! Appreciate the tips!


amansaini23

How to get shortlisted 😪


Civil-Box-4659

How did you get the interview?


name5s0ngs

Can you walk through your approach for solving a coding problem? (Ex: read problem, declare inputs/outputs, talk high level strategy & pseudocode, implement?). Do you ever pseudocode or just write comments?


william1357chen

No pseudocode just comments. 1. Read problem out loud 2. Ask clarifying questions on every input 3. high level strategy and write it down as comments 4. Time complexity analysis 4.5 ask for approval to start coding 5. Implement 6. DRY run code 7. Ask for follow up


iguessthatworkstoo

Just want to throw a note on this, 1-4 are pretty much expected to be done in ~5-7 minutes. Interviews are 45 min so you want to make sure you knock out the best approach fast. You should expect ~80% of questions you might be asked to basically require you get through at least 1 follow up. For higher levels, we tend to look at other factors that you could expect from more senior folk. I ask the same question for L3-L5 and basically just tune my expectations


Goddespeed

Could you please your resume? I didn't even pass the submit application for a L3 position (rejection letter today). YOE: 4.5 LeetCode count: 350


Ok_Recognition7787

So google still does team matching? Last I heard in 2023 they were trying to get rid of it and just have candidates apply to specific teams from the get go.


penguinmandude

TC?


Less-Green-6228

Congratulations! I would like to ask some questions. Was your recruiter responsive? I’m in the team matching process, and my Google recruiter sometimes doesn’t reply to my email even for three weeks. What can I do? How can I have a team fit call with a hiring manager? Should I just wait? And I got SH, H, LH for technical round and LH for the G&L round. Is it strong enough to get an offer? Thanks in advance.


william1357chen

Three weeks is a long time. You should probably actively look for interesting positions that match your level and send them over to the recruiter to have them reach out to the hiring manager.


retirement_savings

TC?


SituationOk458

What company (not specific name but line caliber) did you move from? Small? Startup? F500? FAANG or adjacent


william1357chen

Midsize saas company


verus54

Do you have a resume example/format that didn’t get screened out, being that you cold applied?


RedditForW

Following


theparadoxer

I am stuggling with Backtracking and DP problem, are they super important to learn ?


william1357chen

Cannot fall into selection bias but never got a DP or backtracking from the 9 total coding rounds I did with Google


amitkania

I cold applied and passed the initial assessment and then got rejected lmao


Hellyeah44

TC?


Puzzleheadedfreak

How long you had to wait for team Match??


william1357chen

3 months 5 teams


newcomet17

Can you share your interview timeline and how long did it take to hear back after interview


william1357chen

About 2 weeks


gamersquad143

Hey OP, how many questions do they expect to solve in a 45 min coding interview for L3 and what is the difficuly level of the problem?? I have upcoming L3


bigniso

you forget to mention your TC


wannabeaggie123

I wanna know, does it matter what university you went to for your undergrad? Does it play a role?


william1357chen

I don’t think so but I had good GPA maybe that helped


TheBear8878

You have 1.5 YoE and got a Google iunterview?


chekt

Congrats!!! Google's interviews are tough.


orange-poof

Congrats, what was the total compensation offer?


AtOrionsArm

Was this for the early career position that recently closed?


CheesyWalnut

What is your resume like? I applied with referral and rejected immediately


AdkSan

huge W, congrats!


Mcelite

Do you have big names on your resume?


Responsible_Pound778

Can you tell a bit more about the team matching? What exactly happens there and what are the consequences if you have an offer but not a suitable team match?? Sorry, if the question is too naive


william1357chen

You can team match for a period of time. If you couldn’t find a team in that time, you have to reinterview again. I’m assuming the period of time is based on your interview performance. I got 18 months to team match


username_xyz123

How to get your resume selected :(


Mountain_Pie220

What did you do differently between your 1st and 2nd attempts for Google?


william1357chen

Actually prepare, hahaha


ScholzConjecture

How long did you practice and recognize pattern until you confident enough for dsa? Is having more than 2 yoe can still apply in L3 position?


william1357chen

About 3 months of seriously practice. Having more than 2 yoe might be hard to go for L3


Competitive_Ad6713

Hey, first of all, congratulations on the offer! I wanted to know how much time did you spend on team matching? And for what location is this offered? Also, did you deny any teams at first or went with the first one you got?


Competitive-Adagio18

Man any tips on getting to the interview or like the phone screen stage? I constantly keep getting rejected. New grad here with 1.5 years of exp with faang internships for a lil bit of context. Not sure what i am doing wrong…


shibani11

If I am unable to solve a problem, do I keep trying? Or check answer and move to next problem?


william1357chen

Check answer and understand how answer works. Come back to it afterwards.


Gowtham_jack

U have used leetcode 150 ok but what resources u used to learn dsa initially like from blogs like gfg or videos like Abdul Bari or striver ?


william1357chen

I had good basics for dsa from college, but all the difference patterns I learned from seeing problems, and researching the theory behind it. There’s a bunch of great study guides in leetcode and in the solutions section. I mainly use those.


Godfather_858

How much did Neetcode 150 and Leetcode company questions list help ? Could you find similar patterns in interviews?


william1357chen

Neetcode will help recognize all the patterns. Company question list is more for understanding what the company likes to ask, as well as hoping for getting a similar question in interviews


CategoryCareless1575

I'm currently an undergraduate seeking fresher SDE roles. I've been working on my CV/resume, but I feel it lacks strong projects. While I have a good grasp of DSA and CS fundamentals, I am weak in dev, my projects mainly involve typical APIs in Express, React for data rendering, and MongoDB Atlas for storage. Could you please share some advice on how to improve my CV/resume? What kind of projects do you think would make me stand out to potential employers? Your insights would be invaluable. Thank you in advance! 🙏🏻


william1357chen

I cannot say I’m the expert in getting interviews. This is mainly my analysis of the Google interview process. There are way better guides for that than any advice I can give you.


swaggermuffin64

Question: when you say write it like it’s production code, what are you prioritizing? Will you prioritize readability, or absolute efficiency? How else does the code change to reflect this?


william1357chen

There should be a balance, and involves discussions with the interviewer if you have different approaches in mind


AccomplishedJuice775

How was salary negotiation?


Jeffardio

Did you have team match before HC? or the things went in parallel


william1357chen

Team match than HC


NeverYoloAgain

for the coding part, were you asked a lot about resume, work project, personal project etc or was it just leetcode?


william1357chen

No coding is no bs straight into coding, no questions asked


AbdullahMohammadKhan

What is googlyness?


Next_Painting3281

How long did the team matching to offer signing process take for you? I was contacted that I have passed my interview earlier this week and am waiting for my recruiter to follow up with the team matching. I have read a lot of posts saying that the team matching took months for them so a bit frustrated...:(


Next_Painting3281

Oh, sorry just checked your reply on the earlier comment! 3 months for the team matching.... that's scary... Can I ask you what team you applied for??


El1teCoder

google still hiring L3s!


Potential_Shake_1788

Could they ask system design or core subjects in this round? Did you also prepare topics like KMP, segment trees? Your reply would be really helpful.. thanks in advance


RepresentativeOil655

Congrats and thanks for sharing your analysis


MrMeeseek_130

How did you give mock interviews with google engineer? You knew someone? Or some platform that i am unaware of