Maersk Interviews

Round 1 — HR + Resume Discussion

This was a short introductory round focused on getting to know me. We covered my resume walkthrough, background, current role, and skills. They also touched upon basic role expectations and asked some general HR behavioral questions. It felt like a light round primarily focused on fitment.

Round 2 — DSA (Coin Change – DP)

This was a pure coding round. The problem given was the classic Coin Change problem: counting the number of ways to make a sum using given coins. This is a well-known DP (unbounded knapsack) variant. They expected a bottom-up DP solution, thorough discussion of time and space complexity, and consideration for handling large input constraints. I found the difficulty to be Medium–Hard.

Round 3 — DSA (Coin Change – Min Coins)

Another dynamic programming round followed, but with a slight twist. The problem was to find the minimum number of coins needed to form the sum. This round delved deeper with follow-up questions on optimizing the DP solution, comparing top-down vs. bottom-up approaches, handling corner cases where no solution exists, and strategies for improving time complexity and optimizing memory. It was heavily DP-focused.

Round 4 — Managerial + Low-Level System Thinking

This round was a mix. It started with a deep dive into my projects, covering what I built and my specific responsibilities. Then, I was given a Binary Tree problem: given a complete binary tree with nodes like 1, 2, 3,..., I had to find the height in O(log n) and find a particular element in O(log n). A challenging aspect was being asked to write working code in Go, a language I was not familiar with. This part tested my understanding of complete binary trees, mathematical representation (array index logic), and adaptability to new syntax. The round concluded with managerial questions about skills I learned recently (last 4 months), my knowledge of AI tools & concepts like RAG, GPT, LLMs, how I keep myself updated, and discussions on ownership and problem-solving mindset.

Final Outcome

Unfortunately, after completing all the rounds, HR ghosted me. I did not receive any final update, even after sending follow-ups.

I was interviewed for a Machine Learning Engineer role at Maersk, which was quite surprising as not many companies hire freshers for ML positions. The pre-placement talk was good, though I felt the HR's communication skills weren't up to the mark.

Technical Round

My technical round focused on questions based on my resume, basic ML concepts, and a detailed explanation of my favorite Neural Network Architecture. I chose CNN and explained it thoroughly, answering all cross-questions to the interviewer's satisfaction. I was also asked about my approach to basic ML problems during development. Additionally, a LeetCode Medium sliding window question was given, which I found solvable.

Overall, I was very satisfied with my technical round experience.

Managerial Round

Unfortunately, the managerial round could not have gone any worse. The interviewer was unprofessional, munching on snacks and soft drinks while talking to me. I was asked two trivial questions:

1. Estimate the number of AC units sold in India per year.
2. A probability question involving ants on the corners of a triangle.

I answered both, but the interviewer didn't seem satisfied. Midway through my explanation, he rudely asked me to leave. He didn't even glance at my resume once. This felt very unprofessional.

HR Round

As expected, I wasn't selected for the HR round. Interestingly, all the final shortlisted candidates were interviewed by the same "snack eater" manager. I really wanted this role due to Maersk's significant reliance on ML as the world's largest supply chain/shipping company, but it seems it wasn't meant for me.