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Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

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Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#21

Post by askafriend »

ajeet_dhaliwal wrote: post #18
askafriend wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't just any job. This is a $250-450k per year job for an engineer working on multi-billion-user scale systems/products at one of the most successful companies in the world. Everybody and their mother wants to work at companies like Google, Facebook, Netflix, or similar. So while the preparation and interview processes can be brutal, they filter out all the people who aren't 100% serious or committed. There ar…

Every Google engineer makes a minimum of $250k? Glassdoor doesn’t suggest this. Do you know this to be true?

Yes, if you're in the Bay Area and work for Google as a mid level engineer your total compensation is at least $250k a year. Closer to 200k a year for new grads fresh out of School who have 0 experience.

Look at my other reply. This is incredibly common at the top companies in the Bay Area or any other major city (Seattle, NYC, etc).

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#22

Post by askafriend »

wutbrodo wrote: post #16
slackingoff2017 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sad what you have to do to have a chance at getting a job these days. Is there any proof that this gets better employees? I haven't seen a shred of real scientific evidence. Is it anything more than corporate hazing? You have to think that for each person hired probably 100 others spent months of their life preparing for the interview. What a massive waste of human effort.

> Is there any proof that this gets better employees? I haven't seen a shred of real scientific evidence. Is it anything more than corporate hazing? Hiring is super hard, and anyone who tells you they have a surefire, simply-articulable description of what interview characteristics guarantee a good employee is lying to you. So given that unrealistically high bar, sure, there's no guarantee that this "works". But it d…

That's an interesting set of experiences to draw from. Thanks for sharing!

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#23

Post by zerr »

askafriend wrote: post #20
zerr wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did you get such numbers? H1B data and Glassdoors show significantly less.

Those numbers are wrong and outdated. Every mid level engineer at Google is pulling near 250k at least in total compensation and up to $450k depending on experience and expertise. By total compensation I mean Base + Stock + Yearly Bonus + Signing Bonus. And that's not even factoring in the stock growth. Keep in mind the stock is as good as cash since it's very liquid. Yes people make this much money. Yes they make it…

H1B data is official and updated - including this year. But for Bay Area, yes, 250K sounds realistic. I can't imagine someone wanted to move there for less.

> I know the salary ranges at nearly all major valley companies

Can you comment on Netflix? They say that they significantly outbid Google or FB... So e.g. 500-600K is the norm there?

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#24

Post by zerr »

askafriend wrote: post #13
slackingoff2017 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty sad what you have to do to have a chance at getting a job these days. Is there any proof that this gets better employees? I haven't seen a shred of real scientific evidence. Is it anything more than corporate hazing? You have to think that for each person hired probably 100 others spent months of their life preparing for the interview. What a massive waste of human effort.

This isn't just any job. This is a $250-450k per year job for an engineer working on multi-billion-user scale systems/products at one of the most successful companies in the world. Everybody and their mother wants to work at companies like Google, Facebook, Netflix, or similar. So while the preparation and interview processes can be brutal, they filter out all the people who aren't 100% serious or committed. There ar…

> I don't see people gawking at MIT's admission standards. MIT turns down ridiculously talented and accomplished students all the time.

Well, MIT or any other university has a limited number of free seats which is not true for Google I believe - I don't think they have a problem with the desk space for engineers, also considering their open space hell, or at least the desk space (limit) is not the reason of not hiring someone, I hope :)

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#25

Post by askafriend »

zerr wrote: post #23
askafriend wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those numbers are wrong and outdated. Every mid level engineer at Google is pulling near 250k at least in total compensation and up to $450k depending on experience and expertise. By total compensation I mean Base + Stock + Yearly Bonus + Signing Bonus. And that's not even factoring in the stock growth. Keep in mind the stock is as good as cash since it's very liquid. Yes people make this much money. Yes they make it…

H1B data is official and updated - including this year. But for Bay Area, yes, 250K sounds realistic. I can't imagine someone wanted to move there for less. > I know the salary ranges at nearly all major valley companies Can you comment on Netflix? They say that they significantly outbid Google or FB... So e.g. 500-600K is the norm there?

I’m not sure about H1B status or how that impacts comp.

Netflix does outbid Google and Facebook routinely in one key component: base cash salary. I think you can request a portion of this in stock but the default is cash.

So you’d get $350k handed to you straight cash versus the traditional approach of base + stock + other variable components like bonuses, performance based comp and refresher stock. The 500-600k numbers you’re suggesting are not realistic for an average mid level engineer though.

But in general, Netflix’s comp philosophy is a complete outlier in the Silicon Valley ecosystem. Might be more common in hedge fund or quant roles but I don’t know much about that world.

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#26

Post by ajeet_dhaliwal »

askafriend wrote: post #21
ajeet_dhaliwal wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Every Google engineer makes a minimum of $250k? Glassdoor doesn’t suggest this. Do you know this to be true?

Yes, if you're in the Bay Area and work for Google as a mid level engineer your total compensation is at least $250k a year. Closer to 200k a year for new grads fresh out of School who have 0 experience. Look at my other reply. This is incredibly common at the top companies in the Bay Area or any other major city (Seattle, NYC, etc).

He hasn’t said what city or even country this is in. We can’t just assume it’s a $250k + salary give the job could be in the UK, Germany, Canada and knows where else where salaries are lower in general for software engineers.

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#27

Post by askafriend »

ajeet_dhaliwal wrote: post #26
askafriend wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, if you're in the Bay Area and work for Google as a mid level engineer your total compensation is at least $250k a year. Closer to 200k a year for new grads fresh out of School who have 0 experience. Look at my other reply. This is incredibly common at the top companies in the Bay Area or any other major city (Seattle, NYC, etc).

He hasn’t said what city or even country this is in. We can’t just assume it’s a $250k + salary give the job could be in the UK, Germany, Canada and knows where else where salaries are lower in general for software engineers.

You're absolutely right. However a lot of the engineering is concentrated in a few major centers so there's a good chance he's near a major city like LA/SF/NYC/Seattle/etc

Even if the office is in a low cost of living city, the effect is similar with Google paying at the high end of the cost-adjusted band.

The point was more to illustrate that it's not just any average job and they can do things that work for them that don't work for a lot of other businesses.

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#28

Post by askafriend »

zerr wrote: post #24
askafriend wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't just any job. This is a $250-450k per year job for an engineer working on multi-billion-user scale systems/products at one of the most successful companies in the world. Everybody and their mother wants to work at companies like Google, Facebook, Netflix, or similar. So while the preparation and interview processes can be brutal, they filter out all the people who aren't 100% serious or committed. There ar…

> I don't see people gawking at MIT's admission standards. MIT turns down ridiculously talented and accomplished students all the time. Well, MIT or any other university has a limited number of free seats which is not true for Google I believe - I don't think they have a problem with the desk space for engineers, also considering their open space hell, or at least the desk space (limit) is not the reason of not hirin…

Fair point. There's nothing that indicates that they're having any trouble filling seats though. Maybe they could hire faster but I don't think hiring is the bottleneck for their business. They probably would rather go slowly and carefully at their size anyway. I also don't really see any reason why they're not in a great hiring position as an employer already - especially compared to their industry peers.

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#29

Post by Spoom »

askafriend wrote: post #12
tempThrowAwayG wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok. That hurt but thanks for the honest response. Would it make sense to post pone the interview?

If you can postpone the interview, that would help for sure. Maybe kick it out another week or two (not sure if the recruiter will let you). In the meantime, fire up Leetcode and do as many Medium difficulty questions as you can until your eyes bleed. And I mean really learn them - don't just do them through rote memorization - cramming won't work. You have to learn to recognize the different problem solving techniqu…

FYI they will no longer consider you after three rejections now.

Re: Ask HN: I have an interview with Google in a week. What should I prepare?

#30

Post by Spoom »

askafriend wrote: post #2

Sorry to say that if you haven't been prepping with various Algorithms, Data Structures, and Systems Design questions every single day for weeks, maybe months ahead of time - you're probably screwed unless you get lucky. You're doing the equivalent of going in cold for the SAT if you're just now asking for this advice...

Interviewed at Google, this is spot on. You need to know arrays, trees, graphs, stacks, queues, at least two sorts (I suggest mergesort and quicksort), dynamic programming, greedy optimization, and big O cold at an absolute minimum. I'm sure I'm missing some stuff. They tell you all this in the "secret" onsite prep website.
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