My technical screening algorithm problem was challenging enough, and I enjoyed the time spent solving it. At first, I had a solution with high time complexity, but I finally arrived at the best approach.

The interviewer told me that it was the solution they were looking for. However, I got stuck on the coding part at the last moment, so I was not selected to proceed further.

I always thought that how you arrive at a solution matters more than the exact code, but that is not true with Google. They require perfect code within a very short 30-minute timeframe.

I guess they often miss very innovative and different kinds of software engineers by judging in this way.