More information about Umar F.

* Good feedback on how to approach preparing for interviews * Good questions that helped to identify the points I can improve upon * Managed the time of the session well for the goals I had in mind Thanks Umar :)

Very thoughtful and knowledgeable, helped me knock my interview out of the park

Last year I was interviewing at Google but was rejected after the first technical phone screen. A few months later a recruiter contacted me saying that I was a “near miss” and asked if I’d like to interview again. So I bought some credits and started preparing again—but I almost wish I hadn’t booked a session on here, because it was pretty disheartening. Umar showed up about 10 minutes late to our meeting and it was clear that he hadn’t read through my comments or looked at my portfolio beforehand. After a brief introduction (during which I was asked to repeat some of the info that I had provided on the form), he asked an algorithm question. I can’t remember what it was exactly but I think it had to do with tree traversal. I got partway through (maybe about 20 minutes into the problem), but wasn’t doing very well, and he stepped in to help. He explained how he would have wanted me to solve the problem, and that was helpful. Then he gave me some pretty brutal feedback, which was quite demoralizing for me as someone who is self-taught and suffers from impostor syndrome. He called me a “complete beginner” and said that if I wanted to interview at Google, I would need to do practice problems 40 hours a week for at least 6 months in order to be up to their level. While I admit that I did poorly in the session, Google had said that I was a near miss and had asked me to interview again, so I think he was being tougher on me than he needed to be. He seemed pretty fixated on the fact that my degree isn’t in STEM, too. I kind of got the feeling that he was done with me after only about 45 minutes, even though I had paid for the hour. In a last attempt to get my money’s worth, I asked him to give me a list of things to focus on for my upcoming interview, and he did do that, which I found valuable. However, overall I found the session to do more harm than good. He seemed very knowledgeable but lacked tact, which is important when coaching.