O processo levou 4 meses. Fiz uma entrevista na empresa Microsoft (Iaşi).
Entrevista
I interviewed for the position of "senior software engineer" AT MICROSOFT ROMANIA for 3 months from July to October 2024, during which I was evaluated 5 times based on technical skills and received positive feedback from the developers via the recruiter regarding my outstanding technical expertise.
In October 2024, I interviewed with the manager of the newly formed cloud team to whom I explained my desire to participate in the company's progress, and my dreams of becoming a technical leader. He didn't give a damn about my technical expertise even though Microsoft prides itself on promoting values and leaders and gender balance in the company. The reason was a conflict of interest with my company, although I explained in the interview that I would dedicate myself to Microsoft and radiate the company.
End of Oct. 2024, the recruiter found another -female this time- manager who didn't even want to talk to me.
Conclusions: my technical expertise didn't matter at all and when I asked the reason for the rejection, I didn't get an answer. I can only assume that the reasons were to not compete with their “political protégés”, also probably because I was american and seasoned female and among other languages, i also speak Japanese. So the technical feedback given by 5 experienced developers didn't matter at all. In USA, managers are very humble because in a true democracy, the team decision matters more than their decision. In romania is viceversa: the “people manager’s” animalistic instincts would have to “like” the candidate - as if this wouldn’t be a brainy job! - and the candidate’s technical experience and prowess absolutely doesn’t matter. Thus people are setup for the well-known “kiss-up-kick-down” mentality, not for the meritocracy. Old communist habits die hard in romania.
Perguntas de entrevista [1]
Pergunta 1
Code technical problems in the language of my choice.
Fiz uma entrevista na empresa Microsoft (Vancouver, BC).
Entrevista
HR screening, one technical interview with the hiring manager then three interview loop which covered two system design and one dsa round.
System design was intensive and challenging.
It took them 5 weeks to come back with an offer. Background check was completed in a week, got joining date after 3 days.
Perguntas de entrevista [1]
Pergunta 1
Design a system for a startup company that let users post various types of content and get a unique url which can be shared with others to access the content
Candidatei-me online. Fui entrevistado pela Microsoft (Bengaluru) em jun. de 2026
Entrevista
I got call via microsoft HR. She informed there will be 4 rounds of technical interviews all eliminator. Round 1 interview was a mid level graph question. The interviewer was actively involved, understood my logic, approach, challneged my assumeptions, did a dryrun at end, good experience. Round 2 inteviewer was extremely lazy and passive. It was a bad experience. He gave a problem statement of sliding window and disappeared. Wasn't intrested in hearing approach or even reading code. He came after 30 minutes , did a dry run and final output wasn't exactly correct. I identified a logical bug and started correcting it. He said there is no need , just finished the interview after that. The code i had written was optimal code but he didn't care to read that also. And there was still 20 minutes left. It gave me impression that interviewer in not at all interested in taking interview and they have been pushed my management. HR called next day to say i am not selected.