Salesforce Interview Experience

Hi! my name is Ankit Saurabh. I am fourth year dual degree student of CSE department. I had my CDC internship drive in September 2020. I am going to do my internship at Salesforce in summer 2021.

Preparation-

I started preparing for CDC internship from December 2019. I revised Algorithms and Data structure and solved a few basic questions on Hackerearth and initial topics from Interviewbit. But, after 6th semester begun, I stopped it as the courses in 6th semester demanded good amount of time and also it got disrupted due to Chicken Pox.

Towards March end, we had to leave Institute due to pandemic. I started giving contest on Codeforces and Codechef, but as I was not making much progress, I got a little frustrated. After that I spent about 2 months on projects on Android development and Java Development(as I was feeling a little under-confident on my skills). From July, I again started my preparation on Interviewbit. After completing Interviewbit up to level 7, I solved problems on Geeksforgeeks. I also revised Operating systems and OOPS during this time.

Coding Tests-

Except 2–3 initial tests, none of the coding tests were out of the box. I was slow in some of them as I had practised even less than 2 months. Moreover, I had solved only basic questions on Graphs(as in previous years graphs were asked in very few tests). But, this year almost every test had a question on Graphs. I realised this within a week and then worked on Graphs as well.

Salesforce interview —

Salesforce came on Day2(6th Sept) and my interview slot was at the beginning itself. I had a good sleep so I was quite fresh in the morning. Interview started at 9 AM. There were 5 rounds in total.

Round 1: Interview started on Meet and a shared hackerrank sheet. After introduction, he asked me questions on linked lists and trees. I was asked to write code on that shared page and then dry run it on examples (Take special notice of terminal cases in Linked list). Then he asked me a question on Dynamic Programming. After I code it he asked me to optimise its space complexity. I was explaining all the steps that I wrote as whenever I stopped explaining, he used to quickly ask why I code it in a particular way and not any other way.

Round 2: This round was also on Algorithms and Data structures. He asked me a question in which I had to do binary search first on rows and then on columns. Then he asked me questions on permutation of digits of number. He modified the constraints and asked to optimise after each code I wrote. Then he asked me questions on Prob Stats. In each question even after I used to answer correctly he used to frown and asked if I was sure. After the round got over, he told me that although I was answering correctly, I was solving in a haste without rechecking which might sometime lead to error. This was also the reason I used to get confused every time he raised doubt.

Round 3: First, the interviewer started by the explaining the job he was doing. Then, he asked about me, my family and my journey till here. He asked if there was any period where I felt low. Then, he went though my CV and asked about the internship and projects I did. Here, I would like to say, mention only those projects in which you have tried to put your honest effort. They don’t select on the number of projects but how much you have learnt through projects. Then he asked a few technical questions on projects and then the difficulties I faced and how I overcame it. After that he asked me a problem which I solved using graph and applying greedy approach. He asked why I chose the approach. Then we discussed if it is optimal solution. We also discussed a few other solutions to the same problem and why they were not optimum. Then, he asked me if had any questions and then explained me about the work I would be doing if I get selected. This whole round felt like a normal conversation.

Round 4: This round was taken by the hiring manager. She started by appreciating my smile and then went on to ask what I expect from the Internship. Then she explained the impact of projects done by earlier interns.Till now, I got a little exhausted as I had no break in between and I did not give satisfactory answers to some questions.

Round 5: After a 10 minutes break, this round started. This was the round I was grilled the most. The interviewer asked a combination of tough puzzles and questions related to the work culture I prefer. He gave me a lot of situation and asked what have I done in similar situations I have faced earlier. The puzzles were tricky, which I was able to solve after a lot of hints.

After this round hiring manager informed me that I am selected!!

Important Takeaways-

1. Whenever interviewer ask if you have any question at the end, always ask whatever you want to know from them.
2. Think loud during interview. I had my interview spanning from 9 to 12 with very small break in between. If I was not having conversation with them, I would have certainly got bored(and probably they too). More importantly, interviewers gets to understand your thought process clearly.
3. If you are sophomore, don’t feel under confident and lost by thinking everyone knows more than you and you don’t belong here. I had similar feelings in my 2nd year. Due to which I started my 5th semester from the point where everyone start their 3rd(from learning point of view). There is enough time and its okay if you are lagging behind your friends at some point of time.
4. Focus on learning. Cg, projects are important only when you have gained skills from them.
5. Have a group with which you can improve your coding. In fact, having good friends always help(special mention to Ritik and Rohit for constant support). I learnt a lot even through both my lab partners in 6th sem by seeing how they used to understand the problem properly first and then approach towards solution.
6. Ask people who have already had this experience. I took help from my few seniors of CodeClub. Each of their advice were very helpful.

At the end I would like to give special thanks to my parents as in this time of pandemic they were really supportive and encouraging!!