I applied through an employee referral. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Google (Mountain View, CA) in Jul 2012
Interview
Asked a friend to send resume to recruiting. Got contacted by recruiter in a few weeks. First phone interview was ok, interviewer asked a combination of normal questions and brain teaser questions. Google is the only company I know asking brain teaser questions (how many beach balls can be fit into a room, really!). Passed that. Second interview within 2 weeks. This time more technical, which I passed. Then an onsite interview where I talked to a hiring manager, 3 other people on the team. Out of these 4, 2 were fairly easy focusing more on why you want to work here, how you solve problem etc. 1 were fairly difficult focusing on a specific problem. I got close to the root cause but took a while. 1 were really difficult (because I have not worked in that area) but I think I eventually arrived at a solution but may have taken too long or required too much prompting. In the end I didn't get the job because the team were looking for more technical depth outside of my core expertise area, which is OK. The interview process was well managed, recruiter was great to work with. Only grip I have is they ask you brain teaser question which has nothing to do with doing the job, and they spend a lot of time grilling you in areas you have told them you have little to no experience.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
How do you build an algorithm to check for two files with identical content in the most efficient way
I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Google
Interview
Recruiter reached out to me, we had an initial conversation, then I had to take this online behavioural assessment which was a requirement to get to the first round, which is the manager round. Once I passed that, I was scheduled for my first round with the manager.
Yes, this role is technical, but don’t be like me, who focused all their energy on perfecting technical knowledge of GCP.
Your first round will be a bunch of scenario based customer facing questions. Focus on understanding enough to talk fluently about network design in GCP, VPC, Subnet, PSA, PSC. And how to manage customer expectations
Onprem to cloud connection solutions, vpn, interconnect.
Good luck and I hope you experience the joy of landing this role that I hoped for.
I applied through a recruiter. The process took 4 weeks. I interviewed at Google in Dec 2025
Interview
The recruiting process was managed by Randstad on behalf of Google HR and it was a horrible experience. So much so that I'll never apply to Google again. Four interviews total; initial role-related knowledge, general cognitive ability, role-related knowledge 2 & googleyness/leadership. The last three interviews involved questions completely out of left field which had nothing to do with the actual role. I’ve been hired by and worked at Amazon Web Services before so I know how to handle difficult interviews, but this experience was a total joke…a complete waste of 3.5 hrs.
I applied through an employee referral. I interviewed at Google
Interview
The first round interview was with someone on the team based in a different state. They asked a range of technical scenarios to gauge my understanding of the relevant technologies required for the role on the Google cloud team
