There are many Sr. System Analyst utilizing various technologies, the one I went for is a Microsft.NET role
***Make sure what you have on your resume is TRUE and Correct, they use a background check service that really CHECKS! Your degrees, the length of each employment, where you've worked, etc. Make sure your resume is telling the truth***
Four stage interview process
(1 HR, 1 Technical Phone, 1 Technical Phone w. Coding on the spot, 1 In-Person)
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1 - HR called and asked basic question such as "What is CLR?"
2 - Intense technical interview, some of the questions are really in-depth question that really tested on the understanding from basic to advanced C#, Asp.net, JavaScript, to SQL, to Protocols, to Design Pattern, to IIS, to Load Balancer, to Inner Working mechanisms of CLR.
They are not "What is this? What is that?" type of question that ask you the definition of each, the interviewer gave many scenarios.
"If this happens, what would you do?",
"Why use this method (or design pattern) in opposed to others?";
"If Blah-Blah-Blah breaks, how you go by pinpointing the problem and fixing it?";
"If this (whatever it was I forgot) is not available, what alternative tech/method you choose to use to do what you need and why"
TOTAL TIME: This interview lasted 45-60 minutes
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3 - Technical Review that used Microsft Lync (latest live meeting type of software)
This inteview has further in-depth tech question that really tested on some design pattern knowledge and understandings of software development methodalogies.
Some computer science, Big-O, Big-Theta, Big-Omega questions, search, sort algorithm questions, etc.
(Lucky that my college research was focused in Algorithms and in solving non-polynomial problems that I needed to determine these all the time, if I get tested on some you-will-never-use CS stuff, I sure would flung it)
After the technicals, they tested my People (Soft) Skills, team management, people management skills, for example.
"If your team member has disagreements, or fights, what would you do?"
"If your team member does not follow your instructions, what would you do?"
Total time so far: 25 minutes into interview.
Finally, coding on the spot using the "Whiteboard" feature of Microsoft Lync; the interviewer has many coding questions to select from, the ones I got are:
Q1 - Write a method that takes 2 parameters (lower, upper bound) that returns all Primes between these 2 ranges.
Q2 - Write a method that takes an unsorted list of integers, return the integer that has the highest number of occurences.
As you type in the whiteboard (live meeting) window, The interview can see every key stroke you type, but you are allowed to ask the interview nicely that you need a couple of mins to sketch something on paper before typing (which I did).
The interviewer said that usually they give 3 coding questions, but he's good with 2.
Time spent on coding: 10 minutes.
TOTAL TIME: This interview lasted 35 minutes.
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4 - In Person with the hiring manager.
Only 1 tech question. "In what scenario that using using LINQ is not a good idea?"
My response was LINQ is great, quick and easy to access, query, retrieve data, however, the weakness comes in when you need to insert or save something into database.
Via LINQ, first there are more lines of coding, then writing a stored proc that does Insert/Update, second, in a multi-thread environment like the web server, like multi-thread application. Commands are not passed over to the database until you call Submit in C#/VB code, concurrency issues, etc. etc.
And eventually the insert/update responsbilities are on SQL server anyway, why not directly write a stored proc for insert/update and call it as a method in C#/VB.
He nodded his head with a smile, but I dont know if my opinion is what hes looking for =D
After that, no more tech questions, he asked me questions on design pattern, pros and cons on a couple of methodologies and more People skill questions.
EX: "if a customer got angry and started screaming/firing at you, how would you handle that?"
Then the remainder of the interview is him explaining ATS (Avanade Technology Solutions), job duties, etc.
TOTAL TIME: 1 Hour
