Dremio Software Engineer Interview Questions
& Process

HR called first. Then I spoke with the manager. After that, there were two technical interviews where I had to solve leetcode problems. Finally, I had a call with a Senior Engineer to talk about what they expect. Overall I liked how it went, and felt the interviews showed off what I'm good at.

The whole process had 5 interviews in total. It started with a recruiter screening, then two coding interviews, one for LeetCode and one for design. After that, there were two hiring manager interviews focused on behavioral questions. The recruiter was super responsive and got the interviews scheduled fast because I was on a tight deadline. They gave me some study materials and advice on how to prep for the different interviews. Everyone I talked to was really nice. It also seems like they customize the process, as I interviewed with a second hiring manager because they thought I might be a better fit for their team.

The interview process involved four rounds: an initial recruiter call, three phone interviews, and finally an on-site interview. I found I easily passed all the technical questions asked during both the phone and on-site stages. The C++ programming portions of the on-site interviews were completed ahead of schedule. One interviewer mentioned that many candidates struggle with the C++ problems they present. I had good conversations with everyone I spoke with, covering both my professional background and other subjects. Most interviewers seemed positive about me, including the hiring manager I met first. I felt confident about receiving an offer, but was ultimately rejected via email for not being a 'mutual fit.' I was informed beforehand that a unanimous vote was required to hire someone, which I see as a flawed system since no single person seems capable of making a hiring decision. This voting process puts a lot of pressure on the candidate to impress everyone, and some people might vote no for reasons like job security or envy, especially since I have a background as a lead or architect on many projects while the interviewers were typically regular employees. Communication was difficult with one interviewer who had a strong accent, making it hard to understand his questions, and we also had some disagreements on topics like computer security, which likely impacted his vote negatively, even though such philosophical differences shouldn't be relevant to hiring. Their product, which aggregates data and presents it uniformly, doesn't seem particularly advanced. The entire interview felt like a waste of time, as a candidate can be highly skilled and pass all technical challenges but still be rejected due to one person's personal issues. Dremio's hiring process lacks a mature decision-making structure, relying instead on a potentially biased unanimous vote, which leads to hiring average or below-average employees. A competent hiring manager should be able to synthesize feedback and make a sound decision.