I applied online. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Autotrader (Manchester City Centre, England) in Oct 2017
Interview
Initial phone screen, then one onsite full day of interviews. First onsite interview was a pair programming exercise, then they'll let you know if they'd like to continue the day depending on how you performed in that first interview. Then if successful, you'll proceed onto the competency/values based interview, where the format was questions like "tell me about a time where...", all revolving around their company values. Then you'll have some lunch and be invited to spend some time with one of their 'squads', which is great and very original. All companies should really allow every interviewer to spend time with their prospective new team so that they can really see if they'd like to work there! After this, you'll have a final chat with a more senior leader in the company.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
All competency questions revolving around their values; Be Humble, Be Reliable, Be Curious, Be Inspirational, Be Determined.
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 1 day. I interviewed at Autotrader (Manchester, England) in Jul 2015
Interview
Interview process was very slick and well organized. The day is split into several sections: a pair programming exercise, tour of office (which is fantastic), technical interview with developers, pairing/observing a member of a team and an interview with a senior manager.
The pair programming exercise involves pairing with one developer on a task with a second developer observing on another monitor. You get offered the choice between IntelliJ or Eclipse and the project is set up for the task; you just have to implement the methods and classes. I didn't finish the task but was told beforehand I was not expected to and the exercise was more to observe my methodology.
In the technical interview the developers have a list of pre-set questions which they have to ask at least a few of. The questions ranged from what is SOLID, to describing the architecture of a webapp.
The interview with a senior manager gives you the opportunity to discuss more about the company ethics and values, as well as your long term goals.
Overall the day was an excellent experience for me and Auto Trader seem to care greatly about the quality of their recruitment process. The company is using some cool technology as well as hosting meetups in their office, so their really is a chance for a developer to learn a lot here.
