CircleCI Software Engineer Interview Questions
& Process

The interview process started with a recruiter introduction call, which went okay but the recruiter was unclear about salary and mixed up USD and CAD. Then I had a sync with the Hiring Manager, which went well. The next stage was an interview with Karat, which also went well. Finally, I had an interview with two engineers at CircleCI, which was a terrible experience. The main issue was the tech stack, which is functional programming focused. Despite me repeatedly telling the recruiter and HM from the first call that I don't have OOP experience, they assured me it didn't matter. However, the engineers in the final round asked about my functional programming experience. I mentioned I know Scala, but it's not fully functional. One engineer was quite rude when I asked for clarification on a question, basically telling me I was trying to sell myself. I couldn't see myself working with someone like that. The recruiter later informed me they were looking for someone with functional programming experience. While I respect the job requirements, I regret not being told upfront, as it cost me 7-10 days of prep and 5 hours of interviews.

CircleCI's hiring process was quite a journey. It kicked off with a recruiter call to outline expectations, and they hinted at a lengthy process. My first interview was with the hiring manager, where I was upfront about my skills and limitations. It was a good conversation, and they decided to move forward. Then came a technical coding interview handled by a third-party company. The problem they presented seemed unrelated to the job, which was a bit of a head-scratcher. About a month later, I had another interview with an SRE lead. This interview focused on technologies I had explicitly mentioned I lacked experience in, which was concerning. After a total of seven interviews, they ultimately rejected me, citing a lack of experience in the very same technologies I'd highlighted as unfamiliar from the start. It felt like a significant waste of my time. The disconnect in their hiring process made me wonder about the overall operational efficiency at CircleCI.

The interview process is super organized and everyone knows what they're doing. I liked how they scheduled it, not like a slow waterfall, but more like an initial screening, then a break, then 3 interviews at once with different people from different teams, and then the result. It was fast, and I got my offer in 3 weeks.