Stride Consulting Interview Questions
& Process

The first interview was with the recruiter. They mentioned an assignment would be the next step before a second interview, which was a physical meeting with the founder. Things started feeling off when the interviewer made a political comment about Elon Musk, which seemed unprofessional. Alarm bells truly rang when the assignment was revealed to be a very detailed lead generation plan. Although there was no time limit, candidates were advised it usually takes about 72 hours. This left a bad impression, and I questioned if the job posting was legitimate. Beware of companies asking for such detailed plans during the interview process; this is usually something created after being hired. The good companies, in my experience, wouldn't ask for this. I ended up withdrawing my candidacy.

I sent in my resume and answered some written questions about consulting, XP, and pair programming. Got a call the same day to set up a phone screen. The phone screen was about my past experience, my thoughts on test driven development, and what kind of job I wanted. After that, I had to do a take-home coding test. I had a week, but it didn't take that long. After I sent in my code, they got back to me in two days about a video call for an architecture interview. It was with two developer consultants where I had to explain architectural decisions I'd made before. We also talked about CI strategies and TDD. The on-site part started with a pair programming session using the code from the take-home. Then, a panel interview where we discussed XP, agile, what a consultant does, and general questions about my background. I had lunch with some team members and asked them questions. Finally, they made me an offer.

The interview had a few parts: a take-home coding challenge that was pretty simple and you could use any language, a casual lunch with a Stride engineer to chat about the company and day-to-day work, and then an all-day onsite. The onsite started with a recruiter chat, followed by a 2-hour pair programming session. After that, there were four 20-minute sessions with short breaks, where we went over the take-home exercise more. Then lunch with an employee, a chat with the President, and finally a chat with the COO. The cool thing is, if you get through all this, you might get an offer the same day.

You start with a phone screen with HR to chat about your interests and make sure they fit with Strides. Then, you'll get a code challenge to complete within about a week, but they're cool if you communicate any delays. While your code is being looked at, you can grab coffee with a current developer consultant to ask questions and hear about the job. If your code challenge is good, you'll have an all-day onsite interview. They send you a detailed schedule beforehand so there are no surprises. It includes a pair programming session, lunch, and then a focused interview. You have to pass each part (except lunch) to move on, so you won't be stuck for the whole day if things aren't going well. If you pass all the steps, you'll get an offer the same day. It's pretty efficient.