Confluent Staff Engineer: Time Based Key-Value Store screen, Metrics Monitoring design and two tough coding rounds

I applied online and about a week later the recruiter reached out to schedule a call. The initial call was with the recruiter who asked about my motivations for joining and they also explained more about the company and what to expect in the interview process.

The next round was a technical screen where I was asked a LLD question very similar to Time Based Key-Value Store that also had some follow up questions as well so be ready for them.

After I passed that it was the virtual onsite which consisted of 4 rounds.

1. This was a behavioral interview where they asked standard questions about my past projects and experience.

2. This was a HLD of a Metrics Monitoring & Alerting System which was pretty tough but the interviewer was nice and it felt more collaborative than a normal interview.

3. Next was a coding interview very similar to this question where I had to use an adjacency list and max heap to complete the question and also they wanted me to explain the time and space complexities.

4. The last was another coding interview which was a function signature matcher. It was a tough problem but after back and forth with the interviewer we were able to get to the optimal solution in the end.

After a week I heard back with the good news and then was matched with a team a few days later. The interview process was great and I'm really looking forward to starting.

I prepared for interviews for a solid two months before interviewing and I really felt like I needed it otherwise I doubt I would have got the offer.