Microsoft | SDE1 | Hyderabad | July 2022 [Offer]

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SDE IhyderabadOffer
August 11, 202218 reads

Summary

I successfully received an offer for the SDE1 role at Microsoft in Hyderabad after a series of online assessments and technical rounds. My preparation involved 2 months of focused DSA and core subjects, complemented by competitive programming experience.

Full Experience

Interview Experience

My interview process for the SDE1 role at Microsoft in Hyderabad consisted of one Online Assessment (OA), two Technical Interviews, and one As Appropriate (AA) Interview, all conducted on MS Teams.

1. Online Assessment (90 mins)

The Online Assessment included two coding problems:

  • One question involved counting subarrays with a given arithmetic mean.
  • Another problem required finding the minimum swaps to bring all 'red balls' together.

2. Technical Round 1 (45 mins)

After a brief introduction, the interviewer directly moved to a DSA question: 'Kth Smallest Element in a BST.' I was asked to dry run my solution with up to 6 different examples, and the discussion went deep into the implementation structure of a Binary Search Tree (BST). The entire round was conducted on Notepad with screen sharing, and the interviewer seemed satisfied with my approach and explanation.

3. Technical Round 2 (45 mins)

This round began with an introduction and a thorough discussion of my resume. The interviewer delved into the hackathons I had mentioned, asking me to explain a specific hackathon project. I also had to describe methods to introduce new features into another one of my projects, and my answers were well-received.

In the last 20 minutes, I was given a DSA question: 'Min Cost Path in Grid.' I explained various approaches to solve it, and then the interviewer asked me to code the Dijkstra approach. I focused on writing clean and modular code, which highly satisfied the interviewer.

4. AA (As Appropriate) Round (50 mins)

This round was conducted by an interviewer with 15 years of experience who preferred resume-based questions over DSA. I provided a detailed explanation of my main project and described its entire database structure. Since I had listed Cloud Computing as a technical elective, I was asked 5 different situational questions on the topic, including how I would vaguely describe moving my entire application to a cloud service like Azure. The interviewer was highly supportive and assisted me whenever I got stuck.

Towards the end, I faced basic HR questions like 'Why Microsoft?' and 'Which Microsoft products do you like and why?'

Interview Questions (7)

Q1
Subarrays with Given Arithmetic Mean
Data Structures & Algorithms

I was presented with a problem to count the number of subarrays within a given array that have a specific arithmetic mean K.

Q2
Minimum Swaps to Bring Red Balls Together
Data Structures & Algorithms

The second problem in the OA asked me to determine the minimum number of swaps required to group all 'red balls' together in an array or sequence.

Q3
Kth Smallest Element in a BST
Data Structures & AlgorithmsMedium

I was asked to find the kth smallest element in a Binary Search Tree (BST). I had to explain my approach, dry run it with up to 6 different examples, and discuss in detail the implementation structure of the BST.

Q4
Minimum Path Cost in a Grid
Data Structures & AlgorithmsMedium

I was given a Data Structures and Algorithms (DSA) question on finding the minimum cost path in a grid. I was asked to explain various different approaches to solve this question, and then specifically code the Dijkstra approach.

Q5
Project Discussion and Database Structure
Other

I was asked to provide a detailed explanation of one of my projects, including a thorough description of its entire database structure.

Q6
Cloud Computing Situational Questions (Azure)
System Design

Since I mentioned Cloud Computing in my resume, I faced 5 different situational questions. These included vaguely describing how I would move my entire application to a cloud service like Azure. The interviewer was very supportive and helped me when I got stuck.

Q7
Behavioral: Why Microsoft and Product Preferences
Behavioral

I was asked standard HR and behavioral questions, specifically 'Why do you want to work at Microsoft?' and 'Which Microsoft products do you like, and why?'

Preparation Tips

My preparation involved around two months of serious dedication to Data Structures & Algorithms (DSA) and core computer science subjects. I also leveraged my prior experience in Competitive Programming. My LeetCode stats before the interview were 163 Easy, 379 Medium, and 226 Hard problems solved.

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