Postman SWE2 interview

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postman
SDE2 backend
June 7, 20254 reads

Summary

I interviewed for a SDE2 backend role at Postman, which included a machine coding round and a system design round. I successfully completed the machine coding round but was ultimately rejected after what I perceived as a poorly conducted system design round.

Full Experience

I interviewed for a SDE2 backend role at Postman

Round 1 (Machine Coding)

Design/implement a URL shortener. Solved it as I had previously practiced it. The interviewer was nice. Discussed about HTTP codes, collision etc. Went well.

Round 2 (System Design)

This was supposed to be a system design round. But the interviewer was a fool. He joined 5 mins late, didn't turn on the camera, left few mins early. Looked like he wasn't even interested to interview.

Now coming to the question, he asked me to design a comment system with support for annotation. We can have one level of replies for each comment. It's possible to tag users in the comment. Even though, it was a HLD round, he was focusing on very low level implementation detatils, APIs, algorithm for annotation etc.

I mean if you wanna test problem solving skills or LLD, then have a round specifically for it. System design interviews focus more on the system as a whole, focussing on design choices, scalability, availibilty, performance etc.

The interviewer was not collaboratve, hardly spoke anything. It was me trying all the time to make the discussion interactive. One of the worst interviwer I ever spoke to.

There was no Round 3 as expected, since I was rejected in the so called system design round. Round 3 would have the final HM round.

Interview Questions (2)

Q1
Design a URL Shortener
Data Structures & AlgorithmsMedium

Design/implement a URL shortener. Discussed about HTTP codes, collision etc.

Q2
Design a Comment System with Annotation
System DesignHard

Design a comment system with support for annotation. We can have one level of replies for each comment. It's possible to tag users in the comment. The interviewer focused on very low level implementation details, APIs, and algorithms for annotation.

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