I received an email from an Amazon internal recruiter regarding a test engineering position. There is not much on my resume that indicates any QA background so I wrote back to the recruiter explaining my lack of experience and asking how they had identified me as a candidate. She responded that someone elsewhere in the company had come across my resume and asked if I would like to set up a phone screen.
The first phone screen was pretty much all technical questions, no discussion of my background or the specifics of the position. I was asked a couple of object-oriented programming and data structures questions. I was asked to write two functions in the language of my choice. The first time, the interviewer asked me to use pen and paper and read the results back to him over the phone. The second time, he said I could use a text editor and email him the results.
About an hour after completing the phone screen the interviewer called me back and asked to set up a second call with a different interviewer. They were flexible about working with my schedule. For the second call, we started by talking about the job description and the nature of the work involved. I learned a little more about the product that group works with and why they were hiring for the position. The rest of the interview was more detailed technical questions. I was asked to solve a problem in pseudo-code, discuss the algorithmic complexity, then implement the solution in the language of my choice and send the results over email.
A week later I received an email from the recruiter saying that they had decided to pursue other candidates.
Everyone I interacted with throughout the process was very polite and pleasant to talk to, and overall it was a good experience. There were no trick questions or grilling during the phone screens. The interview questions were more academic, which I appreciated, but it was a little challenging as I have been out of school for several years now. It does seem like Amazon is casting a very wide net for candidates. I don't live anywhere near Seattle, had little related experience for the position, and the first phone screen especially was very generic. I was never able to find out how they identified me or get really detailed information about what the position would be like.
