Unfortunately, I had one of the worst interviewing experiences I've ever had with Asana. I've heard nothing but great things about working there, but my interview experience says otherwise.

First was a phone screen, with cameras off. This was odd, since they require cameras in the virtual onsites. The technical challenge was a LeetCode medium (leaning easier).

Then came the virtual onsites, which were seven hours long. This is overly long. Most of the interviewers seemed new to interviewing. I would ask about requirements or edge cases for a LeetCode problem, and they wouldn't know the answer, so their coach would unmute and provide the required information. The new interviewers also got several requirements wrong and answered my questions incorrectly, which needed to be corrected by both myself and the coaches.

They tell you there is both a "General Design" and a "General Systems Design" round. If the wording isn't confusing enough, the actual rounds were nothing like the vague descriptors they provided.

The final hour of the seven rounds, the round attempting to be system design, was an anti-pattern for standard system design rounds. The problem statement was vague, which is standard, but when the interviewers were asked for baseline requirements, they wouldn't provide any and appeared to be confusing themselves with their answers. I then asked if I could come up with the requirements myself, as that is typical for System Design when requirements aren't provided. They agreed that I should come up with the requirements and agreed to the said requirements. Then, as I began designing the architecture, they would come through with new requirements that directly opposed the requirements we had just agreed to. This continued to happen over the course of the initial 25 minutes – we were circling and stalling over and over, just to get the requirements set.

Reflecting on how bizarre this portion was, I almost wonder if the point of this round is to try to mimic a scenario where product/leadership goes back and forth on requirements, aggravating you to gauge how you handle and respond to said situation. I remained calm, but we didn't get anywhere with this round, despite System Design being one of my strongest interviewing suits, which was very frustrating for me.

Please consider sticking to the industry interview standard – just ask your candidate to design a social media app, Gmail, etc. I'm sure I'm not the only talented candidate who slipped through due to the bizarreness of this round.

Oh, they also require that you meet with a 45-minute virtual lunch buddy in the middle of the seven hours, instead of just giving you an hour break.

I received feedback, which I was grateful for, but it was overall a scarring experience, to be honest, and I still feel unease with the interviewers. I don't think I would have accepted the offer, had I received it, due to concerns about the skill level of the engineers employed.

Anti-pattern System Design Round