I got a call from the Director who was in my BU in his previous and my current organization. I was referred by another employee who actually worked with me as a tester, I being the Microservices developer. The director informed me to be a little prepared for a short and single technical interview. I informed him upfront that I am not fullstack and he was okay and asked to prepare a little JS.
I did prepare. Now, I rate myself 7/10 in Java version 8 and higher. All those realtime interviews on YouTube, I find them so misleading because of the depth of knowledge I have. Plus, I am a cloud developer. I have the experience of moving an onsite complex application to cloud. This is my biodata. And, yes, I boast of it. Because I have earned it.
Now, coming to the interview.
I was surprised to see the same tester who referred me and some other senior person to be in the panel for my interview.
The surprise turned into shock immediately because how can a tester interview a developer. The other person had a list of questions with answers in a ppt. I mean, they didn't even know the single concept of string pool.
Questions- two-sum problem ( I never mentioned algorithms on my resume until I prepared them), but these sons came up showing off their knowledge.
I did get Java, SQL questions right and the 2-sum problem with n*2 complexity as well. Then, came the end, where I asked the basic question about what the work will be and what does the company do for my career growth.
Believe me, it was some acquired company whose folks they were ramping down, maybe, because it was internationally outside India and they might be paying them in USD(just guessing because there was no cloud work in the project, just maintenance). Regarding the growth part, the company does nothing. I had asked a fair amount of salary. Even if I was selected I would have not joined. I was in loss totally. It was my interview or questions that I didn't make it. Don't regret it.