Had a phone screen and went straight to onsite because I had other strong offers already on the table. The onsite was 4 1-hour technical interviews. Some tested me on straight algo programming problems, others asked me more system design questions.
Like with most other companies, all interviews are introduced as "conversations" where you work together with the interviewers towards a solution. I found this to be true for the most part besides one notable exception.
My last interviewer for the day seemed like he was having a bad day or something. He clearly didn't want to be there, and seemed to express obvious dislike towards me. His question was: "Tell me how you would make Google Maps, and what technical decision-making you would go through?"
That question is straightforward enough as far as system design questions go. The problem here is how that question process went. Generally in these kinds of interviews, you don't want to make assumptions, and you'll ask several clarifying questions to help tackle the problem in a focused way. The interviewer refused to answer my questions, and spent most of the interview on his phone, apparently texting. When I finished with the system design part, he asked me to "Implement part of Google Maps with actual code". I asked for clarifying questions about this part, because Google Maps is a giant undertaking, and his exact words were "I'm not here to try to help you pass this interview". Cool.
When my recruiter got back to me, she said she had the good news that I made it to the stage of Google deciding what kind of offer they would want to get me, and that I was going to preallocated to the Daydream team, which was the team I had expressed interest in.
A couple of weeks later, I got a phone call saying that I was actually not being given an offer. When I asked why, she said one of my interviewers came back with strong negative feedback, and made a case to the reviewing panel that I should not get hired, and that feedback overruled the otherwise glowing feedback I had from my other three interviewers. I told her about my experience with the Google Maps guy, but she said her hands were tied, and I believed her because I know large companies don't tend to give their recruiters much say in hiring decisions.
Idk. I get it. There are going to be bad interviewers at every company, especially a corporate monolith like Google where plenty will slip through the cracks. Just unfortunate that I had to be on the receiving end of one of them, and that one bad person in the whole process can derail your potential offer.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Tell me how you would make Google Maps, and what technical decision-making you would go through?
Had 5 rounds of interview - 2 Coding, 2 design and 1 googliness interview. As per me, 4 rounds are stellar and 1 round was average. After 2 weeks of interview, HR mentioned packet will be submitted to HC and collected salary and other details. The most concerning part happened after this. The HR kept me waiting for 3 months without giving an Yes or No. They said my packet is on hold. After 3 months, they rejected on a phone call and no written reply is provided. Worst candidate experience.
It was very good the questions were very easy and it was a very smooth process . Very good recruiters compared to other companies. I had a great time interviewing for the google.