Microsoft Hiring Process for Freshers

Fresh Steps Shared by Ved Prakash

How to apply?

Well, there are 3 ways to apply for a role at Microsoft, it took me more than 12 months (since the first time I applied on their career portal) just to get a call from Microsoft. Below are the ways to apply.

1. Career portal of Microsoft

2. Referral

3. Approaching the recruiter on LinkedIn

Interview Structure:-

For SDE II @ Microsoft there can be 4 to 7 rounds as classified below:-

1. DataStructure and Algorithm / Problem Solving:- 2–4 rounds

2. Low-level / High-level design:- 2–3 round.

3. Hiring Manager round:- 1 round.

Recruiter call to schedule the interview:-

After getting the reply from the recruiter she called me on my phone where she asked me few questions regarding my past experience and the reason for job change and then she scheduled my first 2 on-site interviews on the same day. She said rest of the rounds will be scheduled if the feedback of these rounds is positive.

Due to the current pandemic situation, all rounds were virtual.

On-site round-1 (DSA, Problem-solving, 60 min):-

The interviewer was very friendly and humble and he was working in Microsoft since last 5 years as he said. He made me completely comfortable within the starting 5 mins of the interview as I was a bit nervous because all the rounds were eliminatory rounds and I don’t want to lose the opportunity as I got this chance after continuously applying for 12 months and Microsoft was my dream company since the beginning.

After introducing each other, interviewer started with one coding question, the exact questions I can not share (NDA), but the difficulty level was medium. I proposed the brute-force solution with O(n2) time complexity but the interviewer was expecting O(n) solution. After doing some brainstorming I was able to come up with a deque-based approach with O(n) time complexity. Interviewer asked me to write the code for deque-based approach.

Then the interviewer asked another coding question which was basically a bit manipulation question. I proposed a couple of approaches and once the interviewer was satisfied with my solution then he asked me to write the code for it.

On-site round-2 (DSA, Problem-solving, 60 mins):-

This interviewer was with Microsoft since last 7 years and was very polite. Started with the interviewer’s introduction then I introduced myself. As I did well in my round-1 so I was feeling bit confident.

He asked 2 coding questions in total, the difficulty level of question 1 was easy- medium and for 2nd it was medium. 1st one was related to String problem that can be solved easily by the sliding window concept. 2nd was related to Tree data structure which can be solved by both BFS or DFS.

I didn’t take much time to answer the 1st question and wrote the code within 15 mins of the interview. The 2nd took some time but as I saved some time in the 1st question hence I was able to write the code for the 2nd one as well within 1 Hr.

On-site round-3(High-Level Design, 60 mins):-

Interviewer was very cool and friendly. Started with the interviewer’s introduction, he said he is working with Microsoft since last 12 years.

He asked one High-level design question and we had a very good discussion on it for the next 50 mins. It was not a typical coding round where I have to write the code, rather it was a technical discussion where I talked about the different components of System design including Load balancers, cashing mechanism, different services, and key APIs, and the persistence layer of the system, I used an online whiteboard to draw different diagram and component.

I followed the 80: 20 rule for this interview round which means 80% of the time I was talking and 20 % of the time interviewer was talking. So majorly I was driving the conversation. Most of the time interviewer seemed satisfied with me and we had a healthy technical discussion.

On-site round-4(Low-Level Design, DSA, 60 mins):-

This interviewer was very strict. Started with the interviewer’s introduction, he said he is working with Microsoft since last 10 years.

He asked a low-level design question, where I discussed the class diagram, the relationship between the different classes, interfaces, and objects in the whole problem, in this problem the interviewer was judging me on my object-oriented programming skills.

After this, the interviewer asked one coding question with easy-medium difficulty. The question was from the LinkedList data structure. I was able to come up with the solution after few mins and wrote the code for that.

On-site round-5(Hiring Manager, 60 mins):-

The interview was taken by one of the Principal Group Engineering Manager at Microsoft, she was working in Microsoft since last 18 years. She was very polite and I was very comfortable with her during the interview.

After the introduction, we had in depth discussion on my current company’s project and the technical challenges I have faced so far in my current Job, she asked lots of cross questions and grilled me a lot on my current project, asked one puzzle. she also asked lots of behavioral and non-technical questions, I used the STAR technique to answer these questions.

Verdict:- As I did well in all of my interviews, I was anticipating positive feedback, but still was nervous, after few days, my recruiter called me and confirmed my selection for SDE II role. I got very happy and excited that I will be going to work in my dream company.

PS:- Prior to that I also cleared PayPal SE2, Paytm SSE, and Oracle SDE 2, will try to share those interview experience as well. Also, I will try to share my preparation journey for these companies.

Hope this helps you. Best of luck.

Thanks!