I applied online. The process took 1+ week. I interviewed at Amazon (Vancouver, BC) in Oct 2013
Interview
A one-hour phone interview with collabedit sharing (a textedit window for typing source code). An interesting collaborative process for demonstrating things I knew about data structures (my interviewer knew other things). Questions tended to be about handling edge cases or corrupted data.
A one-day session at Amazon HQ with 6 interviewers, mostly on understanding of data systems; some detailed code expression for evolving a class through escalating requirements. Questions about previous problems (technical & social) and how I dealt with them.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
How did I deal with an intrasigent colleague. I gave the interviewer the choice of peer or superior, and answered the latter. Since the "solution" involved my changing teams then taking over the person's responsibilities, there was a definite awkward pause.
The recruitment process consisted of several stages:
Online coding – a one-hour session focused on solving programming problems and demonstrating practical coding skills.
Technical meeting – a two-hour in-depth discussion covering system design, problem-solving approach, and technical knowledge relevant to the role.
Soft skills meeting – a 90-minute conversation assessing communication skills, teamwork, and overall cultural fit.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
describe your current project, most interesting bug and feature.
the most important thing you are proud of.
slide-window algorithm, string parser
The technical round focused on a DSA problem about finding the closest points to the origin, where I was asked to explore multiple approaches like sorting, heaps, and quickselect. It felt straightforward, and I was ready for it thanks to the time I spent on PracHub brushing up on similar questions. The interview also included a behavioral section, but overall, I found the process to be very easy. Happy to say I received an offer, which I gladly accepted!
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
K Closest Points to Origin - given an array of points on the 2D plane and an integer k, return the k closest points to the origin (0,0). Walk through sort-by-distance O(n log n), heap-based O(n log k), and quickselect O(n) average; discuss when to prefer each based on the relationship between n and k.
Tough interview.
The Process: Automated Online Assessment (OA) with 2 coding questions and a system simulation, followed by a 4-round virtual Loop. Every single round started with 20 minutes of intense, behavioral behavioral questions diving into Amazon's Leadership Principles, followed by 25 minutes of technical coding or system design.
Amazon interviews are a test of mental endurance because you have to switch from deep behavioral storytelling straight into complex coding which can be so difficult. I used Apex Interviewer to practice the cognitive context switch. Running through their live-coding workspace helped me ensure my technical communication and architectural structures remained sharp and automatic, even after spending the first half of the interview defending my past project metrics. I fed the practice AI questions I extracted from glassdoor and gothamloop.
In the end, the offer was way lower than I hoped.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Design the backend inventory tracking and placement service for a global fulfillment network, ensuring strict transactional consistency across multiple regional warehouses during peak shopping events.
