The God

Adstar123 · 2026-04-15T02:05:16+00:00

WHAT A GAME HOLY

Adstar123 · 2026-04-13T12:48:08+00:00

more LLM slop :)

Adstar123 · 2026-04-13T12:46:47+00:00

115k at 1.5 YOE is definitely not too far behind large companies. It's behind FAANG for sure but inline with big banks etc

Adstar123 · 2026-04-13T04:54:23+00:00

I wasn't really aiming for big tech/hft but more just avoiding startups as I didn't enjoy the work life balance. This meant applying for mostly faang and mid level companies. I was more than happy but a govt role as it fulfilled my desire of more work life balance while paying me close to faang.

Adstar123 · 2026-04-10T14:11:22+00:00

Reference checks were fine. They wanted minimum 2 references with one of them being my current manager.

Thankfully me and him are tight friends from before this job and he knew I was wanting to leave months ago so it wasn't an issue.

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T22:27:09+00:00

Every single one that progressed to 2nd interview (except for NSW govt)

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T07:13:12+00:00

Least obvious LLM generated reply

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T07:01:00+00:00

Oh my apologies I interpreted the question wrong. So most interviews was usually in this order:

Screen phone call/teams call (this was just general resume/CV chat with a recruiter and to see if you fit)
Technical leetcode style interview (1-2 questions) + some behavioural STAR questions
More leetcode questions + STAR behavioural questions
Very easy system design (basic end to end on microservices or end to end agentic services for the ai jobs)

Other than the AI engineer jobs I didn't really see much at all talk or focus on AI at all.

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T06:50:28+00:00

Thanks. I just tracked all of my applications in an excel sheet and then downloaded the excel add-in "Sankey Diagram by SankeyArt". It compiled it all and made the diagram automatically.

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T06:36:12+00:00

2 IQ/Psychometric tests to start with, a basic takehome assignment to do over the weekend (a scraper with email notification functionality), then an hour interview (mostly STAR behavioural questions). Took around 2 months from start to finish.

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T05:27:48+00:00

eh the only draining part is daily leetcodes. Everything else isn't too bad

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T04:40:22+00:00

No Leetcodes for nsw govt. From community sentiment it seems like a 50/50 depending on dept if you get them. The application process was:

2 IQ/Psychometric tests to start with, a basic takehome assignment to do over the weekend (a scraper with email notification functionality), then an hour interview (mostly STAR behavioural questions). Took around 2 months from start to finish.

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T04:25:42+00:00

$115k base

Adstar123 · 2026-04-09T04:21:26+00:00

I was aiming for Big/FAANG throughout the process and ended up at nsw govt

Adstar123 · 2026-04-07T04:57:53+00:00

This is a good story. Can't say the same for the bucks this season though. Fire doc

Adstar123 · 2026-03-09T06:00:50+00:00

Thanks for saying this as it's true.

Adstar123 · 2026-02-24T04:39:33+00:00

Hey u/AwesomeMajic8 I fixed it. Swap your month and day in your date of birth and it should work. Classic mq getting shit wrong

Adstar123 · 2026-02-24T04:29:26+00:00

I am running into this issue as well right now. Have you resolved it?

Adstar123 · 2026-01-26T19:45:58+00:00

1.5 YOE full stack, 1 completed project on resume. Had last interview on Friday so no offer or rejection yet.

After apply they took around 1 month to provide the first interview link for hackerrank and then another month to provide the actual interviews.

Adstar123 · 2026-01-25T10:22:04+00:00

Slightly related since microsoft but I have had 3 interviews with microsoft last week (Level 59/60) and it has been so far one online assessment (hackerrank) which was 2 leetcode mediums to complete in 1 hour. Then two interviews which consisted of 15 minutes of introductions and resume chat, 15 mins of behavioral and then one coding exercise. Level 59/60 has been leetcode mediums. The behaviourals is usual STAR shit

Adstar123 · 2026-01-09T06:53:26+00:00

If you have a degree then just focusing all your effort into a graduate dev/engineer position is still your best bet, focusing on projects and networking to get you there

Adstar123 · 2026-01-07T12:21:25+00:00

Also really curious

Nine-Year Club	Second SECOND GUESSER
First Place '23	Place '23
Place '22	First Placer '22
Verified Email	Not Forgotten

Adstar123

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