1. Had 2 cancellations just to schedule the first round
2. Interview confirmation email was vague on what to expect stating the interview round to be leetcode style OR system design.
3. Ended up having neither of those. The interviewer asked general questions about my experience which is fine but the whole process just seems all over the place.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Experience related questions on challenges I faced and leadership
Pretty standard interview, some programming problems and a system design interview. The interviews were enjoyable, with an engaged interviewing team and fun problems. The role was filled before I completed the interviews.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
System design challenge focused on designing a "URL shortener" application
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at StackAdapt in Oct 2025
Interview
The first round was both a leetcode medium AND a systems design, both expected to be done in an hour. This is frankly ridiculous and insulting to experienced developers. If you're not grinding leetcode, it's really difficult to get a complete working AND optimized solution. I was pretty impressed with myself I got SOMETHING that worked, knowing full well it wasn't optimal.
The systems design wasn't appropriate for a software engineering role, it was more appropriate for a devops/SRE role. And there was only 1/2 hour or so to do it.