They asked about amplifiers and the details of the design. (How it works and what will happen if we change different transistor characteristics)
It was not that much hard or challenging
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
What is a single ended amplifier?Differential amplififer?
I applied online. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at SEP (Westfield, IN) in Oct 2025
Interview
The interviewing group (myself and 3 SEP employees) I was with seemed very disinterested and honestly bored with me. Be prepared to ask them a lot of questions and lead the interview yourself -- they hardly asked me anything about my experience / skills / interests. Ah, and don't be alarmed if one of them literally FALLS ASLEEP while you are showing them a project you're proud of. Totally normal behavior.
You spend the majority of the day at their office ~9am - 3pm
You get a full tour of their office, do a couple whiteboard problems, go to lunch with a few team members, and then finish by "teaching" them something or showing a project or some code you've written.
I felt pretty uncomfortable for a lot of the interview process. It really felt like they were going through the motions and had no interest in vetting me for the job opening. One person was on their phone during the interview, and like I mentioned earlier, another was falling in and out of sleep, even snoring at one point. Not even joking. I felt so embarrassed and wanted to walk out.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
The two whiteboard problems were:
- A palindrome problem with a twist
- A "well drilling" problem -- you design a program to manage groups of plots on a grid
I applied online. The process took 5 weeks. I interviewed at SEP (Westfield, IN) in Jun 2025
Interview
Rough agenda for the day:
Tour of the office – 45-60 minutes
First whiteboard exercise 30-45 minutes
Start second exercise – 15-45 minutes
Lunch – 60-90 minutes
Chat with another SEP person who is not an interview team member – 15-45 minutes (your discretion)
Wrap up second whiteboard problem (if needed) – up to 90 minutes
Choose your adventure – 20-30 minutes (we ask you to come prepared to talk for 10-15 minutes on ONE of the following, but we’ll likely have some questions)
Teach us something you have expertise with (technology, architecture, pattern, etc.)
Explain to us some of your existing code (personal code you've written on your own, open source you've contributed to, something not under NDA)
Talk us through your default workflow/process for a team, and how project constraints could impact them
Our intent is for this to be something you already have familiarity with and won't need to spend much time preparing for
Your audience will be 2-3 people