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Software Development Engineer Interview Experience - Seattle, Washington

November 1, 2016
Positive ExperienceGot Offer

Process

I was contacted by a recruiter, and she set up a short phone interview. The recruiter was kind, very prompt, and answered any questions I had.

I then had an online round where I had to code a problem and answer a technical solution. I had to write down the answers in the link they provided. You cannot copy-paste anything, and the code needs to be really good (well-indented, a good solution, get it as close to compilable as possible, etc.). It was a medium-level question on leetcode.com.

I was invited for an onsite interview. This was a hiring event, and many people were interviewed on the same day. We were all given different cubicles, and the interviewers came to our rooms. The interviews were shorter than Microsoft's standard interviews, which meant that we had to get to the solution faster. (The HR there indirectly told us the same thing: don't waste time; try to answer questions correctly as soon as possible).

There were four interviews, and they were all taken by manager or director-level people. They were all very kind, and all of them mentioned that they wished they had more time. The questions were not too hard, but they were definitely not easy either. Again, they were all medium-level questions (one hard-level question) on leetcode.com.

You get a lot of points for asking good questions, making correct use of the hints they give you, and figuring out the bugs in your code (if you don't get the solution straight away).

I got a call two days later saying that I got the job, and I've accepted the offer.

Questions

I've signed an NDA, so I can't really say. However, I've mentioned leetcode.com twice, so that should point you in the correct direction.

There are a lot of other sites too, like:

  • Careercup
  • HackerRank

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Interview Statistics

The following metrics were computed from 83 interview experiences for the Microsoft Software Development Engineer role in Seattle, Washington.

Success Rate

23%
Pass Rate

Microsoft's interview process for their Software Development Engineer roles in Seattle, Washington is very selective, failing most engineers who go through it.

Experience Rating

Positive54%
Neutral31%
Negative14%

Candidates reported having very good feelings for Microsoft's Software Development Engineer interview process in Seattle, Washington.

Microsoft Work Experiences