Monzo

Senior Backend Engineer Interview Experience

September 1, 2023

Neutral ExperienceNo Offer

Process

I applied via LinkedIn. It was the usual fill-in-the-form stuff, attaching your CV, and so on. Unfortunately, I was rejected at this step without a screening call. I give them kudos for responding reasonably quickly (three days), but they didn't say why I was rejected, which is annoying as I honestly thought my CV would merit at least a conversation.

Questions

None as I didn't get to that stage.

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Interview Statistics

The following metrics were computed from 10 interview experiences for the Monzo Senior Backend Engineer role.

Success Rate

20%

Pass Rate

Monzo's interview process for their Senior Backend Engineer roles is very selective, failing most engineers who go through it.

Experience Rating

Positive30%

Neutral30%

Negative40%

Candidates reported having negative feelings for Monzo's Senior Backend Engineer interview process.

Monzo Work Experiences

Engaging work, smart management, high growth

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

Pros: - Processes and tooling emphasise empowering and trusting people. - Teams are given a good amount of autonomy. - There is a thoughtful culture. - The company has smart senior management. - You can definitely keep to 40h/week here if you're disciplined about your boundaries, with no crunch time pressure.

Cons: - Can be exhausting - More and more siloes are developing as the company grows - It's pretty depressing to see working conditions in customer support. The pressures are going up and up, you can see tensions rising (most visibly with people unionising, but also with long ranting posts in our #leavers Slack channel). Monzo is great so long as you're not in customer support.

Engaging work, smart management, high growth

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

Pros: - Processes and tooling emphasise empowering and trusting people. - Teams are given a good amount of autonomy. - There is a thoughtful culture. - The company has smart senior management. - You can definitely keep to 40h/week here if you're disciplined about your boundaries, with no crunch time pressure.

Cons: - Can be exhausting - More and more siloes are developing as the company grows - It's pretty depressing to see working conditions in customer support. The pressures are going up and up, you can see tensions rising (most visibly with people unionising, but also with long ranting posts in our #leavers Slack channel). Monzo is great so long as you're not in customer support.

Great place to work

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

Pros: Teams are empowered to organize themselves, so my experience might not reflect others. I consider this a pro. My team: - High trust - Flexible - Smart people. I've never felt like the smartest person in the room Code base/tooling is well supported. It's very easy to be a product engineer due to lots of the work done by the platform team.

Cons: Work can vary from super interesting -> downright boring, depending on the team. This seems to be a function of both 1) an established company and 2) the banking industry. Some things are used by millions of people a day, and that's super rewarding, then some things are not.

Great place to work

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

Pros: Teams are empowered to organize themselves, so my experience might not reflect others. I consider this a pro. My team: - High trust - Flexible - Smart people. I've never felt like the smartest person in the room Code base/tooling is well supported. It's very easy to be a product engineer due to lots of the work done by the platform team.

Cons: Work can vary from super interesting -> downright boring, depending on the team. This seems to be a function of both 1) an established company and 2) the banking industry. Some things are used by millions of people a day, and that's super rewarding, then some things are not.

Simply loving it

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

January 5, 2024

Pros: - Transparent leadership - Challenging and interesting work - Flexibility in working hours and location

Cons: - Management sometimes lacks technical expertise. - It is difficult to socialise with your team frequently due to remote peers. - Pay is not the best on the market.

Simply loving it

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

January 5, 2024

Pros: - Transparent leadership - Challenging and interesting work - Flexibility in working hours and location

Cons: - Management sometimes lacks technical expertise. - It is difficult to socialise with your team frequently due to remote peers. - Pay is not the best on the market.

Engaging work, smart management, high growth

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

Pros: - Processes and tooling emphasise empowering and trusting people. - Teams are given a good amount of autonomy. - There is a thoughtful culture. - The company has smart senior management. - You can definitely keep to 40h/week here if you're disciplined about your boundaries, with no crunch time pressure.

Cons: - Can be exhausting - More and more siloes are developing as the company grows - It's pretty depressing to see working conditions in customer support. The pressures are going up and up, you can see tensions rising (most visibly with people unionising, but also with long ranting posts in our #leavers Slack channel). Monzo is great so long as you're not in customer support.

4.0
Engaging work, smart management, high growth
Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee
London, England
August 6, 2023
Pros: - Processes and tooling emphasise empowering and trusting people. - Teams are given a good amount of autonomy. - There is a thoughtful culture. - The company has smart senior management. - You can definitely keep to 40h/week here if you're disciplined about your boundaries, with no crunch time pressure.
Cons: - Can be exhausting - More and more siloes are developing as the company grows - It's pretty depressing to see working conditions in customer support. The pressures are going up and up, you can see tensions rising (most visibly with people unionising, but also with long ranting posts in our #leavers Slack channel). Monzo is great so long as you're not in customer support.

Great place to work

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

Pros: Teams are empowered to organize themselves, so my experience might not reflect others. I consider this a pro. My team: - High trust - Flexible - Smart people. I've never felt like the smartest person in the room Code base/tooling is well supported. It's very easy to be a product engineer due to lots of the work done by the platform team.

Cons: Work can vary from super interesting -> downright boring, depending on the team. This seems to be a function of both 1) an established company and 2) the banking industry. Some things are used by millions of people a day, and that's super rewarding, then some things are not.

5.0
Great place to work
Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee
London, England
March 5, 2025
Pros: Teams are empowered to organize themselves, so my experience might not reflect others. I consider this a pro. My team: - High trust - Flexible - Smart people. I've never felt like the smartest person in the room Code base/tooling is well supported. It's very easy to be a product engineer due to lots of the work done by the platform team.
Cons: Work can vary from super interesting -> downright boring, depending on the team. This seems to be a function of both 1) an established company and 2) the banking industry. Some things are used by millions of people a day, and that's super rewarding, then some things are not.

Simply loving it

Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee

London, England

January 5, 2024

Pros: - Transparent leadership - Challenging and interesting work - Flexibility in working hours and location

Cons: - Management sometimes lacks technical expertise. - It is difficult to socialise with your team frequently due to remote peers. - Pay is not the best on the market.

5.0
Simply loving it
Senior Backend Engineer • Current Employee
London, England
January 5, 2024
Pros: - Transparent leadership - Challenging and interesting work - Flexibility in working hours and location
Cons: - Management sometimes lacks technical expertise. - It is difficult to socialise with your team frequently due to remote peers. - Pay is not the best on the market.

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