CHAOTIC and extremely unprofessional interview.
Firstly, I am working as a Computer Vision Engineer in the east coast and was just looking out for new opportunities on the West Coast.
Applied online sometime in late Aug, 2018. Initial, phone screen in Sept, followed by 1 round of online coding and 1 day on-site interview at SFO Office.
PHONE SCREEN: Basic HR questions followed by location preference (I did not mind Cali or Seattle) and was directed to give some online coding interview using Hackerrank (within 1 week).
ONLINE CODING:
Tried to attempt this over the following weekend. Had some issues with the link (it expired before 7 days deadline). Waited until the following Monday to follow-up with the recruiter who apologized for the confusion and offered another link. Some basic coding questions using DS and Algos.
FOLLOW-UP CALL:
After the online coding challenge, the recruiter called me again to finalize the date of onsite interview and the team preference. I specifically mentioned, I was looking out for only roles in the field on Computer Vision and Machine Learning, but location never an issue. She noted my preference and offered to call me at a later time. Subsequently she called me back on 17th Sept. 2018 and finalized for an onsite interview on 28th Sept,2018 at SFO Office.
THE MAYHEM:
Although the interview was finalized on 28th Sept, I did not hear back from her until the 25th about logistics. I receive call on 25th saying the interview stands cancelled (postponed by 2 weeks with next batch) since the HM is unable to attend. Then she calls me again in about 3 hours and offers to continue for 28th since HM decided to turn up. I had a hurricane that week and requested them to postpone it by 2 weeks (if possible) and she finally agreed. Finaly onsite was scheduled on 05th Oct. 2018.
ON-SITE INTERVIEW:
The final onsite consisted on 4 rounds, 1 hour each.
1 Round was with an Engineer about Linked Lists and I performed well. 2nd Round was with 2 people (i believe Some Senior Engineers) who forgot to turn up to office and decided to do an on-line interview. The interviewer from Round 1 just put me on Conference Call with a laptop and left the room. There was severe technical glitch with the laptop and it almost took them 40 minutes to provide me a spare one. So I nothing really happened in this round.
3 Round was with the Hiring Manager from the "Glue Team". He started off with some Database Questions and finally asked me about my projects. We never struck chords together.
4 Round with an Engineer, whiteboarding questions and some questions about project.
Final Email:
They just sent a email saying I was rejected !!! They neither questioned me about my expertise, nor was i setup for interview with the correct Hiring Manager.
Final Advice:
Amazon Interviews can be extremely Chaotic, be prepared for that. Revisit the fundamentals of CS, you are mainly interviewed on that. There are about 6-15 amazon principles, and you are mostly tested on those.
Pros: You are given prior training by the recruiter itself (what to expect and some training material)
Cons: Extremely Chaotic, can me bad interview experience. Expect to get rejects even with no good reasons