Qiong Michaels

I am a senior software engineer, and ex-Googler, with a proven track record of making significant and self-directed contributions to challenging and complex large-scale enterprise backend API services and infrastructure components.

This journey has equipped me with versatile skills in full-stack development, cloud computing, CI/CD pipeline configuration, infrastructure automation, identify/access managment, SSL/TLS Security, implementing monitoring solutions, handling log analysis, system administration, network automation and more.

I am passionate about coding and highly proficient in Python and OOP programming, with a solid understanding of algorithms and data structures. Additionally, I have practical experience in architecture and system design.

Pleasure to collaborate with, and work alongside skilled and professional peers.

Cheers!

********************************** FAANG Interview **********************************

The overall coding interview duration is 45 minutes, however at least 5 minutes must be spent before the interview questions and 5 minutes afterward for the candidate to ask questions. So the actual coding time is 35 minutes or less, depending on how your luck goes. Correct me if I'm wrong. The candidate will have a maximum of 17 minutes and 30 seconds to finish the questions only if the introduction and post questions take no more than 10 minutes. I timed myself to just type out an optimal solution for a medium level question without thinking and without making any mistakes. It takes me about 5 minutes, but if the question is partly written, the candidate is more likely have to ask the interviewer to elaborate and clarify it, which could add at least a few minutes. Let's assume 3 minutes is the minimum; if the interviewer asks you to describe your thoughts and solution while you're coding, that's at least another 3 minutes talk. So this means you have a maximum of 6 minutes to think about your solution, this also includes reviewing any errors you made after you write your solution. Forget about processing from brutal force to best solution. Just write down the best solution as fast as you can.

If your interview situation is as mentioned above, or even better (they will need to bend a rule for you), and you have excellent coding abilities, you should be able to come up with the best solution, write it down, review it, and debug it in 11 minutes or less, You might get your dream job with a great salary. However, if you look carefully, you'll notice that many aspects are outside your control, and they have a significant impact on whether you win or lose. It's like winning the lottery: more than half of your chances depend on luck and how much they like you. Here's why:

1. The introductory talk could be longer or shorter. It's not up to you.

2. Each solution for each question could more/less than 5 minutes of typing without thinking and making any mistakes.Medium-level Leetcode problems may be appropriate, but tbh I doubt answers for most hard leetcode problems require less than 5 minutes of typing. What questions you get depends on your luck. I mean, if the solutions to two questions take more than 10 minutes of typing, you're practically out of luck, it's difficult to finish on time by anyone.

3. If questions are half written down without even a few samples of input and output, you'll need time to ask for all the details. Add that to your luck.

4.There isn't time to explain the solution to the interviewer. If you get the correct answer and have to explain it to the interviewer and walk through it before you can solve the next problem, you won't have time to solve the following one. Take a look at the time of actions listed above and calculate it yourself. You might be out of luck!

5. Hopefully, you have an intervewer who is articulate and speaks at a good pace , getting straight to the point without misunderstanding you. Misunderstanding each other in a heated moment like this might freeze or fry your brain. Good luck! : )

Do the interviews with FAANG if :

* You want to beat your ego *

I used to work at Google. The first thing I heard from the tech lead was that they didn't care about algorithms or data structures. They forgot about it after they left school. I also confirmed this with my FAANG interviewers. Their projects do not make extensive use of the algo/data structures for which you are being tested. Do not get me wrong. Set aside algo/data structures, it's an useful test for your coding skills, as being able to code out the problem in almost unreasonable amount of time requires excellent coding skills. If you pass it, you may have better coding skills than many other engineers in other companies that are less demanding in the coding interview. Because, if you pass, you may have set a new benchmark. Yay! I have interviewed for L4/SDEIII at Google, Principal at Amazon and E6 Meta.

The interview with Meta the second time was awful and extremely unprofessional. They lied to me. I had an interview with them three months ago and have yet to pass the waiting period. A recruiter contacted me, asking if I wanted to be interviewed again. I told her on the phone that I had an interview three months ago and was still waiting. She mentioned that the interviewer was impressed with my performance in the last interview, so they wanted to give me another chance. I accepted the invitation and postponed everything I was doing for weeks, including moving, applying for other jobs, in order to focus solely on studying for the interview, and even had a mock interview with them.(The mock interivew was fantastic. As with my previous interview three months ago, the interviewer for the mock interview was incredibly experienced and knowledgeable. I learned a lot about the coding interview for this round.) Then a few days before the interview, they told me I'm not illegible after I told them I would like to apply to a L5/E5 that could make it easier for me to pass the interview.Because I was tested twice during their interviews, I was able to solve at least one problem; unlike L6/E6, L5/E5 may only have one or two to solve. If the interviewer asks less questions after I have given the correct answer, and I explain my optimal solution to the first problem more quickly, as well as walk through it quickly(you are not supposed to run the code to test it), I might have enough time to complete the second problem if I can solve it. It seemed they didn't want to give me a chance to pass. That is why they didn't place me on a appropriate level in the first place, and why they changed their minds and made my status illegible again when I informed them that I wanted to apply to L5/E5. They seemed to want me to choose either complete the harder one L6/E6 or wait 9 months to apply for a low-paying job that I am unlikely to be interested in. Because I chose to apply L5/E5, I lost the opportunity to be interviewed now.

Another thing to keep in mind is that they will request you to rate their recruiting process at the beginning, not at the end of the process and the rating form will expire even before your schedule your mock interview. Of course, every candidate will most likely give them a positive rating because the opportunity was provided. So did I. However, to me it turned out to be a complete waste of my time and money, which deserves zero star. Honestly, I felt like being scammed in some way and I probaby won't recommend to anyone to apply.

I'm not sure about Microsoft, Apple, Netflix, or Nvidia because I never received an interview invitation regardless of the level of SDE I applied for. lol. I feel burned out, and I honestly don't believe I'm their preferred person to hire. If they wanted to recruit me, they would have discussed a suitable position and compensation. The pay I sought for is far from their top tier, but rather around L4/5 for someone with strong coding abilities and 10+ years of IT experience. It is not unreasonable, but unfornately it has never worked out with any of their FTE positions.

* They like you for some reason(most important), not your skills/experience *

I hate to say this, but I bet it's true.

HR has a significant impact on the coding interview process. Because, as discussed above, the quality of your interviewer (speed, clarity, variety of questions, etc.) is critical to your success. The problem is that if your HR coordinator can choose which interviewer to interview you, obviously they can influence the outcome of the interview. The HR process is designed to facilitate the interview process but not to make business decisions or affect on the outcome of the interviews.

Similarly to how the interview questions must be carefully chosen, pre-approved, and confidential until the interview time arrives, the interviewer should be treated in the same way to ensure the process is not biased and modified away from the design. By automating the process with automated tools, it is possible that HR will not need to know the name of the interviewer and interviewee while requesting, arranging interviews and passing on the feedback.

Scams exist because of ambiguous and confusing rules/process. Perhaps by doing so, businesses will be able to effectively prevent frauds, bias, and corrupted interivews inside the fuzzy hiring process in the labor market, as well as tear down the wall formed by the flawed HR procedure. I believe there are many talented and skilled people in our countries, and our companies simply need to reform/improve the current hiring process to provide fair opportunities for all and save the labor market from being destroyed by favoritism, unfair competition, and a corrupted/manipulated hiring process.

FAANG jobs often do not involve considerable understanding of algorithms/data or Leetcode problem solving techniques. You are studying a different skill set only for the sake of passing the interview. If you pass, you could get the job if they like you. If you don't, they can hire someone else who did not pass the interview to do the same job. This gives an excuse not to hire someone with exceptional coding abilities who might fail the exam due to a lack of "the luck" discussed above, but they can still hire those with none or very limited knowledge of algorithms/data structures who doesn't have exceptional coding abilities as required in the interview and will almost certainly fail the coding test or workers of any quality to do the job through various types of hiring, as long as they are on the fav list/hiring agenda. However, the quality of the code could make a significant difference. That's where most bugs originate from. Because of faulty logic/design/architecture/configeration, the code frequently needs to be rewritten entirely, and the impact could be massive if the code is released and used elsewhere. Not to mention the security flaws/vulnerabilities that bugs produce.

* You can afford expensive Lottery tickets *

If you are young, time and money aren't a major concern. Then find FAANG companies that like you and can offer you a fair opportunity in the long interview process, then it can be worth spending months/years to study something you will not use much at work and look for a result.

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