I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Slack in Jun 2017
Interview
Contacted by a recruiter, had a phone call with them and received a technical exercise to complete within the week. The exercise was pretty open-ended and I wasn't told what I would be judged on beforehand, just that it should be high quality and a good user experience. I didn't move on to the next interview and was told that they would have liked to see a better visual design, though I didn't think I was applying for a design job.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
The technical exercise instructed me make a single-page app which read from an API, displayed the data on the page, and update the page without refreshing. The user should also be able to click on an entry and get an overlay with more details. The only technical limitation was to not use any frameworks.
I applied through an employee referral. I interviewed at Slack (Chicago, IL) in Nov 2023
Interview
This was generally one of the best interview experiences that I have ever gone through. The communication was stellar and quick. I always knew what to expect next.
The actually process was a phone screen, manager interview, take home coding challenge, and virtual onsite. This was really a gold standard process.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
You get your standard tell me about a time when questions, but they also include tell me about a time or how would you about the type of work that you will actually be doing.
I applied online. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at Slack (San Francisco, CA) in Mar 2018
Interview
First there was a phone screen, then then a take-home challenge. After that was approved, I met with a group from the specific team, and had 1:1s with key team members and management.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
For Prod Eng: Build an emoji grid in React, so users can drag and drop emojis, and make new ones. Uses canvas and basic React.
I applied online. I interviewed at Slack (San Francisco, CA)
Interview
Extremely slow and terrible process. Applied online, and was reached out to by possibly the most non-enthusiastic recruiter I have ever encountered. During our first brief chat, she failed to convey her passion for the product and depressed my morale for the role as well.
After the phone screen, I received a "coding challenge" which involved building a lightbox using JavaScript. Not only were the specs for this project lacking, there was a significant lack of feedback given from the recruiter based on early questions.
Slack needs to improve its recruiting pipeline and process, or it will recede into the shadows much like Yammer did, not matter what Mr Butterfield might say.
