Meta Screening Round E6 Level -Accepted

I had a screening interview with Meta for a Senior/Staff level position. My experience is detailed below to assist others.

Behavioral Round I was initially anxious about the behavioral questions, but they were straightforward. The interviewer directly asked questions focused on cross-team collaboration and managing high-stress projects, assessing suitability for an E6 or E5 level. The complexity or scale of past work wasn't a primary focus.

Questions included:

1. Describe a project involving cross-organizational collaboration.
   • What was your role?
   • Did you participate in technical planning or product roadmapping?
2. How have you handled personal or team conflicts?

Coding Round

• Moving Average from Data Stream Before coding, we discussed input data types, average precision, window size, and error/overflow handling. I initially made an error but corrected it during test case analysis.
• Random Pick with Weight This problem involved selecting a random user from a multi-city user base with known city populations (e.g., 5 million in New York, 7 million in San Francisco, 8 million in Chicago). The probability of selecting any individual should be equal. The goal was to determine the city of the randomly selected user. I initially suggested a prefix sum solution with linear search, then considered binary search. The interviewer asked about an O(1) solution, leading to a discussion on storing city IDs in a compressed format and creating an array representing each person. We discussed limitations, including the number of people and cities. The interviewer agreed that binary search on the prefix sum was the most practical solution in most cases. I implemented the binary search code and addressed edge cases. I made a minor error but quickly corrected it.

After Interview I asked questions about recent Meta initiatives, data collection/scalability, and the Meta Horizon OS user base. This led to a discussion lasting 15-20 minutes, covering various aspects of Meta's culture, meetings, and the evolution of Meta Horizon OS.

Final Comments and Learnings I made minor errors in simple problems but successfully resolved them. It's important to discuss the problem before coding. A good conversation allows the interviewer to help you refine your approach and address errors. While I planned to use CoderPad on my iPad, technical issues arose during the interview. Preparation and mock interviews are highly recommended.

Response From Recruiter The recruiter responded the next day, indicating they were moving forward. Feedback included that the coding was good but not exceptional, and that the behavioral round could have been more structured. The recruiter suggested preparing and rehearsing answers for general behavioral questions.