Orchard Software Engineer Interview Questions
& Process

The technical interviews were practical and realistic, focusing on problems you'd actually encounter on the job, not obscure algorithm challenges. I interviewed with the CTO, who was quite off-putting. He was late, ate on camera, seemed disengaged, and even took a phone call during our meeting. He was absent for about 10 minutes of the hour-long interview and seemed to be interviewing for another role. His aloof demeanor makes me question working there, though everyone else I spoke with (recruiters, engineers, product managers, technical managers) were great people I'd like to work with.

Recruiter call, then a virtual technical screen, followed by an on-site where there were reverse interviews so you could ask tons of questions and meet the team, and then a chat with the CTO. I had an awesome time interviewing with Orchard. Emily (the tech recruiter) was super communicative and honest, and seemed genuinely interested in me, the company, and finding a good fit. She set a great tone for the other interviews, which were all really great too. My interviewers were really empathetic and engaged, and they really worked well with me on the pair programming questions. Talking with Elijah (CTO) was also super helpful; he was open about his vision for the company and showed really encouraging leadership qualities.

Applied online. The first round involved two Hackerrank problems, one on strings and one on dynamic programming. The second round consisted of three interviews: a behavioral interview with the CTO, a technical interview with a developer, and a design interview with a developer. I received an offer and the opportunity for reverse interviews based on my interests. Overall, the LeetCode problems are classic data structures and algorithms with a twist. It doesn't seem like a traditional software engineer role. Culture fit feels very important, and engineering plays a large role in product innovation. The company is experiencing hyper-growth, so it feels like a great time to join and have the chance to make a real impact. Throughout the interview process, I could tell that everyone enjoyed their work and it was a very collaborative and welcoming place. I turned down two other offers for this one, one from another startup and one from FAANG.