Menlo Innovations Interview Questions
& Process

There was a mass interview first, then a day of pairing with another developer. This was followed by a final interview. I felt that the pairing stage wasn't ideal for those just starting their careers.

First, you do an Extreme Interview (XI) with a bunch of other people at the same time where you collaborate on easy tasks and show off your kindergarten skills. If you do well, you might get invited back for a 1-day interview where you work as an employee for 8 hours to see the day-to-day and ask questions while the team checks you out. After that, you might get invited back for a 3-week interview where you actually work for 3 weeks as your interview.

They usually do the Xtreme Interview, which is a group thing where Menlo people watch how candidates work together (like kindergarten skills) and solve problems. No real tech stuff here. All the observers rank candidates based on how they acted. Then, if they need people, some candidates get asked back for a One-Day Interview. Here, you'll pair up with two Menlo folks for the day, working on a made-up project, a real client project, or something for Menlo. There's also lunch with other Menlo people, pretty casual, no real interview part. After that, there's a 3-week 'interview' to see if you and Menlo are a good fit culture-wise and if you're getting the hang of paired programming. You'll pair program with different Menlo people and maybe work on different projects. Based on how you do, you might get an offer or a rejection before the 3 weeks are up. You get paid hourly for both the 1-day and 3-week parts. Sometimes people can skip parts because of who they know or past work, or if scheduling is tough - but don't count on it, lots of people don't have issues. Also, summer students don't do this interview process, but getting those jobs usually means you know someone at the company.

Okay, get ready, this is a strange one. Menlo has this thing they call Extreme Interviewing. You'll show up with about 50 other people applying for different roles and get paired up to do a 20-minute activity together. You'll do 3 activities with 3 different people while current staff watch you. They're focused on personality traits, not so much technical skill, and they actually tell you this. If the staff likes what they see, you get invited for a one-day paid work trial where they look at you more closely. Your future teammates will take you to lunch, and you can ask them more personal stuff if you want. Then, they might invite you for a one-to-three-week 'interview' – it's more like a trial period for both sides to check out your technical skills and how you fit in culturally. This is also paid. You'll get regular feedback throughout all of this. Afterwards, they'll offer you a position and level based on what the team thinks is right. No negotiation, but if you think you deserve more and can prove it, they're open to reviewing and bumping you up anytime. They offered one guy a lower salary than he expected because of his tech skills, but told him they'd review his level weekly if he wanted and would increase it as he showed progress. It's a pretty interesting process, I think, and takes away a lot of the usual interview stress and uncertainty.