Dstillery Software Engineer interview questions

I was contacted by a recruiter on linked in and was told that dstillery was looking for a senior software engineer. I told them I am junior level but would like to try and was told by the recruiter that he'll toss my resume in anyhow. I got contacted by one of the senior engineers in dstillery and set up an interview that lasted an hour. I was questioned about the work I had on my resume regarding why I used what I used in the project. After my explanations, when my ways don't seem optimal, I was asked what I would have done differently. I thought it was a very informative and engaging interview and really helped me learn what I should focus on in the future. After the technical part of the interview, the interviewer told me that they will not be progressing with me because they wanted someone in a more senior role with more experience and actually explained to me what those experiences are, which was nice. The interviewer also voluntarily gave me feedback on my performance and was very encouraging. I was given material that I can read into. The whole process was really nice and smooth with a great recruiter and a great interviewer. The recruiter stayed in contact with me the whole time to ensure that the process went smoothly. The interviewer was engaging and helpful.

Unprofessional, poorly handled, lots of red flags. Recommend avoiding this company. Applied after seeing the hacker news who is hiring advertisement. My expectations about the job were distributed systems and machine learning work. Completed the take home task that was well designed, got a good response from the guy handling the process and was put through to the next round, an on-site. The on-site was weird. Despite requesting information about the structure of the day beforehand I got none. None of my interviewers had seen my take home exam or apparently read a review of it and had not even skimmed my CV before seeing me. The actual questions were a few standard algorithms questions, then a lot of very specific questions about Java software engineering. This was upsetting as little emphasis had been put on this at least point. It basically felt like a J2EE certification exam I hadn't studied for. I wanted to walk out halfway through and tell them that we were wasting each others' time. Not a great experience, and could have easily been avoided with 2-3 mins of screening questions on the phone. One interviewer was not all that friendly and didn't seem happy to be there with me. On my way out had an counter with a c-level exec in the lift. He was asked to greet me. He didn't turn around and grunted hello. Not a warm reception from many people there. To my surprise was told I would proceed to the next round, scheduling a chat with the CEO and CTO. Then to my surprise a week later was told that I would have to wait until the end of August with no clear explanation. No follow up after this. I sent two emails requesting a follow-up with no response. Super unprofessional. Last correspondence was me telling them I accepted another offer. No response. Pretty bad vibe overall. Inconsistencies in the requirements of the role. Unprofessional hiring process. Speaks of a pretty bad culture inside the company. Apply and find out for yourself, or just stay away :)