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      5thColumn

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      Software Engineer Interview

      16 May 2016
      Anonymous interview candidate
      Chicago, IL
      No offer
      Negative experience
      Average interview

      Application

      I applied online. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at 5thColumn (Chicago, IL) in May 2016

      Interview

      It started with a standard phone screen and interview. It took two weeks to get a response, and then I had what I thought was a second or final interview over lunch but turned out to be a group interview with a bunch of people who had never met anyone from the company before. I had been invited because I was supposed to meet the CEO, but he never showed up. Classy. The person from the company went around to talk to everyone about the opportunity, telling me he was saving me for last. After everyone else had left, he told me that I didn't even really need to be there because the CEO didn't show up. Then the coding challenge was given. I had applied for a front end JS job, but was given a python challenge in addition to a JS challenge and a design challenge that looked suspiciously like a real problem they might be facing. All of this was due within 24 hours, which is only reasonable if you have absolutely nothing to do the day that it is sent. I have a policy of not working for free so I expressed my concerns over the process and after being insulted as a response, decided to remove myself from the process.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      How to design an event parser when given multiple inputs in different formats. Literally what their company does.
      Answer question
      1

      Other Software Engineer interview reviews for 5thColumn

      Software Developer Interview

      5 Jan 2018
      Anonymous interview candidate
      Chicago, IL
      No offer
      Negative experience
      Difficult interview

      Application

      I applied online. The process took 1 week. I interviewed at 5thColumn (Chicago, IL) in Apr 2017

      Interview

      Got past the first round of interviews which was basically a phone screening. After this that is where the fun started. Gave me a take home project (Absolutely love it when tech companies play teacher and give take home assignments). I spent an entire afternoon working on this project only to go in the next day to have them tell me about every little detail wrong with my code from spacing to minor little things in the way I documented methods (Do I get some credit for turning in working code?). I was there for 3+ hours and I had a marathon of interviews in one afternoon. All of this for nothing.

      Interview questions [1]

      Question 1

      What's the difference between TCP and UDP?
      Answer question

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