Amazon | SDE2 | WFH or Bangalore | Jul 2022 [Rejected]
Summary
I interviewed for an SDE-2 position at Amazon and faced multiple rounds covering problem-solving, system design, and leadership principles. Unfortunately, I was rejected after the hiring manager round.
Full Experience
I interviewed for an SDE-2 role at Amazon, a position I've been aspiring to achieve. My experience included three rigorous rounds: two focused on problem-solving and one with a Hiring Manager.
In the first problem-solving round, I was asked to tackle a coding problem involving the vertical order traversal of a binary tree. This was followed by a discussion where I was grilled on Amazon's Leadership Principles.
The second problem-solving round presented me with two dynamic programming challenges: the House Robber III problem and subsequently, the House Robber II problem. Similar to the first round, we also delved into more Leadership Principles discussions. I noticed that the data structures and algorithms questions were often framed within a story-mode context.
The third round was with the Hiring Manager. Here, the conversation started with my interests and the major components within distributed systems. The core task was to design a search aggregator service, requiring both High-Level Design (HLD) and Low-Level Design (LLD), with a strong emphasis on optimization. This round, unfortunately, didn't go as well as I had expected.
Ultimately, the verdict was a rejection. This marks my third rejection from Amazon, but I'm grinding hard every day to fulfill my dream of 'One Day to Day One'.
Interview Questions (5)
The interviewer inquired about my interest in distributed systems and asked me to elaborate on major components within distributed systems.
I was challenged to design a search aggregator service, including both High-Level Design (HLD) and Low-Level Design (LLD), focusing heavily on optimization strategies to handle scale and performance.