Inside the interview: How this Software Engineer joined the Google Research team

This post is part of Google’s “Inside the Interview” series, where current Google employees share their stories about interviewing at Google. Because our hiring process is constantly evolving, the experiences below may not fully reflect what the current interview process looks like.

Meet Samrat

I am a Software Engineer at Google Research, working on Natural Language Understanding research. I did my Bachelor’s degree at IIT Hyderabad in Computer Science, then worked in financial technology for 2 years as a Software Engineer. I wanted to learn more, so I left my job to attend grad school at Columbia University for my Master’s in Computer Science. This is where I learned more about Machine Learning and NLP (Natural Language Understanding). I rejoined my previous employer again as a Machine Learning Scientist where I worked to develop AI technologies that help with Customer Service for 2 more years. Now I aim to explore the boundaries of AI understanding here at Google.

Getting the interview

A recruiter reached out to me via email asking if I was interested in interviewing for Google in late 2021, and of course, I agreed. Working for Google has been a dream since I was in high school. First I had a conversation with a recruiter to gauge my interest and learn more about the open role. From there, I started the interview process beginning with a phone round for ML Design.

Preparing for the interview

I felt a lot of pressure when preparing for the interview, because this was not my first Google interview. During my first interview in 2019, I thought I had fumbled in the coding during the phone round and failed to communicate my thoughts effectively. So, I decided to put in a lot of effort in preparation. I took a full month before I appeared for the phone interview.

I knew my phone round was ML design, so I prepared by reading a lot of corporate design blogs (including the Google AI blog 😀). 

After the phone round, I had three Algorithms/Coding rounds, one Machine Learning Round and one round during the interviews focused on communication and problem-solving.

For my Algorithm rounds, I prepared using onLine code practicing websites. I completed nearly 260 practice coding problems.

For Machine Learning rounds, I prepared by studying theory from my grad school notes and by practicing implementing the learning algorithms from scratch. I put special focus on Decision Trees, Logistic Regression, Neural nets and Naive Bayes Classification.

The interviews

I was quite nervous going into the phone interview as I didn’t perform well in 2019. But this time around, things were different, I practiced a lot to convey my thoughts more effectively. My phone interview was ML design and I was presented with an open ended problem to throw my ideas at. I got to discuss all my ideas with the interviewer. The interviewer took the time to understand them and asked insightful follow up questions to further the discussion. I felt like I got really lucky, as I got to show my best side in the first round itself. (Thanks to my recruiter for setting it up!) I got positive feedback for my phone round and then I eased up a little.

For algorithm rounds, interviewers took the time to set up a scenario where we would need a code solution. They walked me step by step through the problem. Then I got to provide a code solution in my style in my choice of coding language. Then the interviewers followed up with some variations on the problem to see how my solution generalizes to those scenarios. The interviewers were super helpful and on every turn they helped me talk out points and ideas that eventually contributed to the solution.

For the machine learning round, I was asked a theory question related to a practical real life problem in the first half. And then I was asked to code a small machine learning module related to the practical problem we discussed theory for.

There was also a round focused on work style and leadership, where I was asked a bunch of scenarios, hypothetical and real, presenting me with a choice of actions. I got to discuss my thought process behind every decision.

After the interview

After I was done with my technical interviews, I went through the team matching process, where I got to talk to different hiring managers about their teams, projects and needs. Based on the mutual preference, I got to pick my current team! 

After the team matching, I had a final interview focused on work style and leadership. Happily, that passed by in a breeze. I received an offer after that.

Since I had multiple competing offers from other tech companies, I negotiated for a week and then picked Google.

I had my first recruiter call mid December 2021 and I signed my offer letter in the first week of April 2022. The whole process took me about four months.

Additional Advice

I was really nervous since, in my opinion, I had tanked the first opportunity I had with Google. But I would say, keep a clear mind and communicate your thought process well to the interviewers. They are on your side. The real difference I found between my two attempts was my communication skills and surprisingly not my coding or machine learning skills.