What I Learned from Interviewing at 7 Entry-Level Backend Positions
From the second half of last year through this spring, I applied mainly to entry-level backend job postings and interviewed at 7 companies. The result was one final offer, with rejections from the rest. I'm writing this in case it helps others preparing the way I was.
1. CS questions really cover only the basics. But the depth of those "basics" varied by company. Startups threw out practical scenarios, while mid-sized companies asked more textbook-style questions.
2. More than half the questions were about projects. There wasn't a single thing on my resume they didn't ask about. Rather than "why did you choose this technology," they often asked "why didn't you use something else?"
3. For coding tests, if you're around the lower Gold tier, I passed most of them. But time is tight, so identifying problem types is important.
The biggest thing I felt was that saying "I don't know" when you don't know isn't as much of a penalty as you'd think. Pretending to know and getting caught by follow-up questions was far more damaging.
Good luck, everyone.
6 answers
If low Gold mostly passes… isn’t that a bit case-by-case? These days the bar for new grad backend coding tests has gone up, so you need to be upper Silver to mid Gold to be in a safe range.
The second point is the most painful. If you're not prepared for "Why didn't you use the alternatives?", you can really draw a blank; I practiced by writing up two rejected technology candidates at a time and answering as if presenting a comparison table, and it definitely helped.
I agree with #1, though somewhat... It’s true that startups throw real-world situations at you, but those situations are the kind you can’t solve without depth in CS, so it ultimately boils down to the fundamentals.
I agree with the conclusion, but "saying I don't know" isn't a cure-all—if you just say you don't know, you look unprepared. It's only when you say you don't know + how you'd look it up + related concepts that it becomes a plus rather than a minus. I couldn't do that and failed the second round twice ㅠ
No. 3 is seriously... For me, passing coding tests only got easier after I reached Gold.
It's really important to admit when you don't know something. From the interviewer's perspective, they're checking whether you're someone they can mentor and support. I once pretended to know and completely fell apart when they asked, "Then how does it work internally?" After that, I switched to being honest and working through it together, and the reactions were much better.