Interviews in the tech industry are just as highly competitive as they are lucrative. Just having technical skills isn’t enough. Giving interviews well is a separate and crucial skill that can make or break your career. We at Interview Kickstart recognize that and prepare you to thrive in an interview environment.
In this post, Marvin Gersho answers questions about how Interview Kickstart's structured and thorough approach helped him crack a FAANG interview.
- How was your experience with the classes at Interview Kickstart?
- What’s your review of the mock interviews at Interview Kickstart?
- How did you find the services during the support period at Interview Kickstart?
- How did your experience with Interview Kickstart help your career?
- Is Interview Kickstart worth the money? Would you recommend this program to others? Let’s jump right in!
How was your experience with the classes at Interview Kickstart?
My experience with Interview Kickstart is that the classes that have been put together were very well organized. I like the fact that they offered more than one instructor, so you can see video clips of alternate instructors in case you prefer a different style of instruction.
They had a systematic approach to the algorithm questions, which focused on fluency in dealing with classes of problems as opposed to memorizing solutions to specific algorithms, so I think that it was a very good approach.
Watch his full review here:
What’s your review of the mock interviews at Interview Kickstart?
I think that it was really good. The fact that they give 15 mock interviews (and not everybody uses all the mock interviews). I ended up using 9 out of 15, but I think it's invaluable to be interviewed by people who work for the companies that you're targeting.
I had mock interviews with instructors from Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, plus some others. And this gives you the mindset that you need to go into these companies because these are the kind of interviews that you would actually get from these companies. You can practice algorithm, system design, and behavioral interviews.
For me, system design was the one that I needed to focus on more, so I did more of those, but someone else might focus more on algorithms, so that part was really excellent.
How did you find the services during the support period at Interview Kickstart?
In general, I thought that the services post completion of the course and the six months of support was excellent. The staff was committed toward my success. They really wanted to interact with me and find ways to help me be successful.
And granted, during the COVID period, that was harder, so I thought it was nice that they extended the support period an extra two months. That included:
- Guidance from a technical perspective in terms of resume building
- Strategy for applying to different companies
- Strategy for negotiating with different companies
I did not end up needing the additional 2 months, but I think that that was a really good gesture on their part to give eight months of support. They really ran the gamut and provided very thorough support.
It did seem like the people genuinely wanted me to be successful, so I would say that in addition to the curriculum of the course, what cannot be underestimated is the support period — both the mock interviews and the staff support from a career and technical perspective were really good in my case.
How did your experience with Interview Kickstart help your career?
I ended up getting a job at AWS Amazon as a Solutions Architect. I had not really anticipated that path going in, but I did do 6 system design mock interviews with Interview Kickstart. In addition, when I wanted extra help, the designer of the system design curriculum met with me and spent an hour discussing strategies and things I could do to improve further.
Interview Kickstart went above and beyond the material and the mock interviews to do what it took for me to be successful. And obviously, it worked! Amazon is a pretty competitive company, and I landed the Senior Solutions Architect position, which made use of a lot of the system design.
Is Interview Kickstart worth the cost? Would you recommend this program to others?
I recommend this program for senior software developers; I also recommend it for managers. I think the focus for managers is going to be a little bit different in terms of the part of the program. And I understand that they're going to be coming up with a customized version for managers which will address that too, but as a software development manager, I found that the program was quite useful.
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