I applied online. The process took 3 weeks.

• 45-minute screen with an Engineering Manager: A pleasant call to discuss an overview of the team, process, tech stack, and product.
• 2 to 3-hour take-home to build a packing and inventory managing API: It was to be written in Python and Flask. Most time was spent writing and testing the method to pack the order into as few packages as possible based on the weight limit of the zip package.
• 45-minute presentation of the take-home with an engineer: A relaxed chat over the details of the take-home solution, tradeoffs, and improvements. He answered more questions about the team and life at Zipline.
• 15-minute call with a recruiter to prepare for the onsite: The recruiter was a no-show for this phone meeting. Perhaps he would have told me to emphasize my customer obsession.
• 4x45-minute interviews for the onsite: A behavioral and verbal system design with the Engineering Manager of another team; a behavioral interview with 2 people in the manufacturing department; a coding interview with an engineer; an interview with the team Engineering Manager with some verbal system design and problem-solving of actual problems. For the most part, it was a pleasant experience.
• 30-minute live demo presentation and Q&A of an operations site in Ghana: A very impressive live demo of the packing, preparation, launch, and return of zip drones. I was able to ask questions during and after the demo.
• 15-minute rejection and feedback call with the recruiter: The recruiter did show up to this phone meeting. It was a patronizing call, but I grinned through it. I received feedback that I was strong technically and interpersonally and "very talented", but my customer obsession wasn't quite there. I asked them to define that, and they said that it was related to an obsession with the customer. I was encouraged to reapply in 6 months to give time to work on the feedback. I'm not sure I will since I doubt my customer obsession will be any better in the future. It was clearly an indirect and information-less call where an email would have been just fine.

Overall, it's a company with very intelligent people and a really cool product supported by very awesome tech innovations. On the critical side, the company seemed very Kool-Aid drinking. There were anecdotes about competing with Amazon, but not enough emphasis on how they will grow in that direction, instead reiterating on the, yes, noble mission of delivering meds in Africa. There is a very apparent lack of process here, which I think they should remedy, especially as they interface more with stricter regulatory bodies.

Design a temporary system to be used in the management and scheduling of propeller replacements, which currently are only usable up to fifty flights, until the engineering team can finish and incorporate the replacements that last much longer. Here is a list of all the issues in our backlog. Please prioritize them and talk about how you would approach solving them.