Zscaler Interview Questions
& Process

The interviewer was late, didn't introduce themselves properly. When I asked for more details about them at the end, they didn't offer any. During the coding question, they took a 5-minute personal call off-camera, and did it again later. I had questions during their absences but had to wait. When they returned, I asked verbally twice, but they didn't respond until I asked if they could hear me. It seemed like their attention was elsewhere the whole time. It was the most unprofessional interview I've ever had in 30 years.

The interview process went well. Meetings were scheduled and the interviewer was punctual. An HR representative initiated the process with a call to inquire about my years of experience, current position, current salary, and salary expectations, before scheduling the first round. After the first round, I had to follow up, and they later informed me that they had proceeded with another candidate.

The first chat was with the recruiter and it went well, she was really nice and easy to talk to. We went over the job description and my background. They asked me about Kubernetes, and I said I didn't have experience but it seemed okay. This was for a Program Manager role dealing with Federal Contracts. I feel like PMs in the federal space don't usually do the technical work, it seemed like an administrative PM job from the description. The next interview was 45 minutes with the team's Director. He was incredibly rude, kept interrupting me and talking over me. He talked down to me. I have 23 years of experience and am at a senior level. He was looking for something completely different than the job posting, wanting a very senior Kubernetes expert to do the technical work, which isn't typical for a Fedramp contract PM. He wasn't interested in my experience or the job as posted. I ended the interview early because this isn't a place I'd want to work.

The interview process started with a recruiter screen, followed by a call with the hiring manager, and then a technical interview with a Principal SE. After that, there was a week of silence, and then I got rejected via voicemail for not being technical enough. On the plus side, the technical interviewer knew the products well and the territory looked like it had real potential. But there were some red flags, like the recruiter and hiring manager giving different reasons for the opening, and the hiring manager mentioning an 'advanced candidate in process' while promising a 'fair evaluation.' Communication was poor; after the technical interview, I heard nothing for a week, and the recruiter's voicemail about not being 'technical enough' lacked specific feedback. The technical assessment felt questionable, covering basic DNS and HTTP versions instead of actual sales engineering scenarios, despite my extensive experience. They emphasized training and tribal knowledge but then rejected candidates for not knowing their product details. I wouldn't recommend interviewing here unless you're desperate, as the lack of transparency and poor communication might indicate bigger organizational problems.