Phone Screens (part 4)

In part 1 of this series on phone screens, I talked about how phone screens fit into the programming interview process and defined the three types of phone screens that it’s possible to receive during first round interviews. In part 2, I presented a flow diagram which illustrated the many different ways that companies can conduct phone screens. In parts 3, 4 and 5, I’m going to give specific examples from my technical interview experience on how certain companies perform their first round phone screens.

Apple

Out of all the companies that I interviewed with, I had the most phone screen experience with Apple. I interviewed mainly with iPod and iPhone quality assurance / development teams and also spoke with some OSX and iChat teams. Typically I was contacted via e-mail by an Apple recruiter who set up time to speak with an engineer or occasionally a hiring manager (I don’t ever recall having a recruiter screen with Apple). The hiring manager interviews were usually brief and seemed to serve the purpose of making sure that I was interested in the position and fit its requirements. The engineer interviews were very technical and most of the time tested my C++ / C coding skills (Objective-C is the main language used at Apple.). In development interviews it’s possible to receive tough algorithm questions. Though I never received an invitation to interview on-site with Apple, it was apparent that it would take at least one or two successful engineer interviews before being considered.

One thing that really surprised me about my phone screen experience with Apple was the fact that I was given take home assignments from my interviewers on two different occasions. Both assignments contained coding questions to be completed in C. Apple was the only company to do this throughout my interview experience.

Paypal

I had one phone screen experience with Paypal for a software development position at a local office. I was given an intense evaluated recruiter screen and then a tough engineer screen with one interviewer and multiple others listening in. During the engineer screen I was asked to talk about all of the school projects I had listed on my resume, was given knowledge based questions on UNIX and commonly used programming languages, and was given one coding question. I passed the interview and was invited to interview on-site. This was one of the more tough screening processes I went through for a local office.

Sun Microsystems

In the only phone screen experience I had with Sun Microsystems, an engineer called me to interview me on the spot for a low level development position on a SPARC team. This was the only instance where someone called me to conduct an interview without first scheduling it. If this ever happens to you, you should never take the interview on the spot and should always reschedule it so that you'll have some time to prepare and will be able to take the call in a comfortable environment. The interview was recorded to be played back for the hiring manager and consisted of elementary hardware and operating system questions. I did not hear back from Sun after this interview.

Click here for Phone Screens (part 5)

What's Next?