Hey Vyndree....

[Talamarr]

Are you on the VS.Net team?

[Texic]

Unless it's changed since she posted this, no.



Neither of us works in Windows, you're safe. ;)

I'm in Windows Live and Suvega's in Windows Mobile.


Suvega & Vyndree's Setup (5boxing x 2) ('http://www.dual-boxing.com/forums/index.php?page=Thread&postID=11073#post11073')

[Talamarr]

Ah, thanks. There was a post in the General forums about multi-boxing from a level 70 draeni female paladin that said she was a tester at Microsoft for Visual Studio and it was a well written post with lots of quotes and stuff; very Vyndree MO. :D

[Wilbur]

Couldn't you have PMed this?

[Talamarr]

What? People use that?

[Anozireth]

I'm not sure Vyndree knows that we have PMs. I PMed her like a week ago and she hasn't even read it. :(

[Anozireth]

I just wanted to ask about her experience with getting a job at MS :S

[Anjuna]

Couldn't you have PMed this? http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3225/2314043560_476634f52b.jpg

<3 <3 I couldn't resist.

[Skuggomann]

What? People use that?

For your sake just be glad that i do it!

[Vyndree]

Are you on the VS.Net team?

It has indeed changed from Live, but I'm actually in the VSTO (Visual Studio Tools for Office) group. I can see if I can find you some contacts if you have a VS.Net issue though?

Anozireth -- I haven't forgotten about your PM, I just wanted a bit more time to sit down and type out something complete. :) I've been talking to Suvega since he actually does interviews on his team for advice.


I do get alot of PMs, though, and I prioritize forum posts over PMs since anyone can read forum posts -- only one person gets to read the PMs I send them. So for future reference on multiboxing requests -- you can usually get a faster response out of me if you post on the forums. In Anozireth's case, he was asking for personal advice so it's my fault I've been so tardy.

[Anozireth]

Well I had a phone interview for a contract position at MS today, and I got invited back for an in-person on Monday. :) I'm still not sure if I want to accept a contract position or try to find a FTE position though.

[Vyndree]

Well I had a phone interview for a contract position at MS today, and I got invited back for an in-person on Monday. :) I'm still not sure if I want to accept a contract position or try to find a FTE position though.

Alot of people do the contracting stuff to get their foot in the door. It is INCREDIBLY hard to get noticed straight out of college for a FTE position.

Usually what happens is, you get a contract job, you make yourself invaluable to the team, and they offer you a FTE position at the end of your contract.

[Anozireth]

It is INCREDIBLY hard to get noticed straight out of college for a FTE position.That's definitely the impression I've gotten from talking to people and reading blogs, but the college section of MS's careers website would sure have you believe otherwise. :) The fact that my school isn't on the list of schools to choose from when entering your degree information probably doesn't help my case either.

I do have some more questions if you don't mind, but I don't want to clog up the public forum with a personal conversation. Not to mention I already totally hijacked this thread. Sorry! :D

[Vyndree]

Well, the hard part is just getting your resume SEEN.

When I submitted my resume, I managed to get through to the phone interview (which is a feat unto itself) and never heard back.

A coworker of my father's had been wanting to get me an internship since high school but couldn't since he worked so closely with y dad -- he demanded that they get me an in-person interview and from what I understand had a very strong conversation with the phone interviewer.

I did two full loops with two groups within microsoft and didn't receive a single "no hire" from any of the people I interviewed with. And that's how I got my job. Somewhat atypical of the norm, but I imagine the phone interviewer wasn't in a good position, what with both teams during the in-person interview giving me job offers.


Suvega got interviewed during college by an on-campus recruiter. This is more typical. I'll let him tell his own story if he chooses but I believe he did the on-site interview as well.


Most of the people I know don't get FTE positions at microsoft straight out of college. Most are contractor-turned-FTE, or have a decent amount of experience prior to entering Microsoft. The interview loop can be killer -- they want to see how you think, not what you were trained to say. The most important part of a MS interview is to ask questions -- sometimes they'll purposely give you a vague interview question just to see if you'll clarify the requirements or not.

Here's some of the more interesting questions I've been asked:
How would you test a soda can?
There is a book in a library that you cannot find. The library has a card catalog and a ornery librarian who will only answer yes/no questions. Find the book.
(I can't recall the exact number for these... I've filled them with <#> as a placeholder)
Two men are outside of a house. They can see the house number. The first guy wants the second to guess his 3 daughters' ages.
He gives him two hints:
the sum of the daughters ages equals the house number
the product of the daughters' ages is <#>

The second man looks at the first and goes "Well, I have a couple of solutions but I think I'm going to need another hint"
The first man nods and says "Yes, yes you do need another hint. My older daughter's hair is red."

What is the house number?
(answer: There are two solutions based on the numbers that I've forgotten where there is a "twin". In essence, the product can be factored out such that there are only two options with a duplicate value.
The answer? The one with the "twins" as the younger. Since the "older" daughter's hair is red, that means the younger set of daughters is the twin)
Add together, get the house number.

That last one was my phone interview question.

[Anozireth]

Wow I think you were reading the questions I had been writing down to ask you! :P Pretty much everything you said answers something I had been wondering. I've got a few more if you don't mind though...

Is it normal/common for a team to offer a contractor a FTE position at the end of their contract, assuming they've done a great job? Or are the contractor positions short term because the work will be finished when the contract is up and the position is no longer needed? Do you see people pressured into consistently working overtime, even when a project is not near its ship date? I've heard some horror stories of contractors being treated very poorly, is there any truth to that? Would it hurt me to admit that I prefer to use non-MS products for some things, such as using Firefox for most of my Javascript debugging? (The debugger in the IE8 beta looks promising if I could get it to work right!) Do you have any job openings? :D
Thanks for taking the time to help me out, I really appreciate all the internal perspectives I can get. :thumbup:

[Vyndree]

Is it normal/common for a team to offer a contractor a FTE position at the end of their contract, assuming they've done a great job? Or are the contractor positions short term because the work will be finished when the contract is up and the position is no longer needed?

In the vast majority of cases, yes -- contractor positions often become full time. That being said, you have to be GOOD at your job to be offered a FT position -- sucky contractors don't stick around too long.

There are cases where there is short-term need but it's very easy to tell based on the job assignment. If you're contracting for any sort of design work, it usually is a hole that needs to be filled.


Do you see people pressured into consistently working overtime, even when a project is not near its ship date?

Full times? Absolutely. We're paid on salary, not per hour. Contractors? Typically never -- because they get paid overtime.

Some teams are worse than others. I was in Live search, and that was the worst work/life experience ever. They say MS has an emphasis on work/life balance but personally I haven't seen it until this new team I'm on. Personal advice: work on a shipped product. Online services means that "anything can be hotfix'ed and it'll be active within a couple hours" -- and they have the (incorrect) notion that everything that they don't test thoroughly thanks to this mentality can be hotfixed day or night... Which means you're on call 24/7.

Don't let me scare you, though, that was honestly a bad team due to their processes and their aloofness towards test. Other teams are much better. Just be careful what you choose.


I've heard some horror stories of contractors being treated very poorly, is there any truth to that?

Yes and no. Contractors are not treated any less at th workplace -- in fact most of my favorite co-workers prefer contracting over full time, and one just recently moved to full time.

I have heard that, at one point in time, contractors had the same benefits as fulltimes when it came to morale events, but then Microsoft was sued for not also giving contractors health benefits. As a result, contractors are forbidden from going to certain morale events to prevent that issue. That's the only time I've heard of them being treated "less" -- but they're also paid more on average, so....


Would it hurt me to admit that I prefer to use non-MS products for some things, such as using Firefox for most of my Javascript debugging? (The debugger in the IE8 beta looks promising if I could get it to work right!)

There are plenty of people who don't use non-MS products -- even using Firefox/google/ipods at the office. However, I wouldn't think that advertising this fact would gain you any brownie points, so I'd probably keep it to myself at the interview.

Employees are encouraged to "dogfood" MS products at work, for the most part. Particularly if it's an area you work in. So be prepared that you might be "politely encouraged" to use MS beta products.


Do you have any job openings? :D

Not on my team that I know of... :( I'll look around though -- college hire positions are typically hard to find... Usually they want experience.

[Anozireth]

Thanks a ton for all the answers. :thumbup: The question about non MS products came up because today in my phone interview I was asked how I debug Javascript. Not really any way to dodge that, so I figured it would be better to tell the truth. Besides, Firebug is just awesome!

I think I would definitely feel better about accepting a contractor position if I'm fortunate enough to be offered one now. The only real reservation I have is with the 100 day "vacation" after a year.

My finance's parents live about 3 blocks from the main campus, so I would drive by at least once a month all through college and it was a big motivator to think, "Hey, I could do that!" Hopefully I'll be "living the dream" soon. :)

[succulent]

I worked briefly at MS a few years ago, and I'd recommend as another thing to do is google for microsoft interview questions/techniques etc. There are quite a lot of weblogs etc that just talk about people's experiences getting jobs there. I found that a lot of the interview questions thrown at me were recycled from earlier interviews, particularly the puzzle-type questions (that I find are completely useless for interviewing engineers but that's a separate rant).

I was on one of the worst teams ever at MSFT. I quit after 1 year and 1 day. Your work experience will vary widely depending on who you work for, but that is likely just like any big company. I work at Apple now, on the best team evar, and it's a similar deal; knowing someone helps get you looked at, and the experience varies from team to team. That said we're just about to hire someone from a resume cold e-mailed to human resources, so that does happen. Just blow everyone away in the interview 8)

[Anozireth]

I have read more blogs than I can count in the last few days. :thumbsup:

[zanthor]

Interviewing at MS is without a doubt the hardest interview I've ever personally done. I didn't get far in the process, but thanks to having some friends on the inside I managed to experience part of it. My experience didn't line up quite right for the build lab position I was going for, but it was a really good experience either way.

I've got two friends who still work for MS, office testers I think, another who's been there as an FTE (office build) and again later as a contractor (vista terminal services). All have great things to say about how the interview process there works and at the very least makes you better at interviewing.

I have since become a hiring manager and am absolutely amazed at how poorly some people interview, I know some of the guys I've interviewed probably had leet mad skills, but you blow it so easily when sitting across the table from opportunity.

[Anozireth]

I have since become a hiring manager and am absolutely amazed at how poorly some people interview, I know some of the guys I've interviewed probably had leet mad skills, but you blow it so easily when sitting across the table from opportunity.This is what I'm afraid of. Put me to work and I know you'll never want to let me go, but I just can't think straight in a confrontational environment like an interview.

[Vyndree]

I have since become a hiring manager and am absolutely amazed at how poorly some people interview, I know some of the guys I've interviewed probably had leet mad skills, but you blow it so easily when sitting across the table from opportunity.This is what I'm afraid of. Put me to work and I know you'll never want to let me go, but I just can't think straight in a confrontational environment like an interview.

Just have fun with it. :)

I think part of the reason why I did so well in my initial interview is that I had been warned that they'd try to trick me and ask puzzle questions, and I thought of it like a game. I actually had fun. The less stressed you are, the better you can think and the easier it will be.

Just be yourself -- you're interviewing their team just as much as they're interviewing you -- and how will you know if it's a right fit if they don't get to see the real you?

I joked around in some of my interviews with the interviewer -- and as you walked through the exercises you always speak what you're thinking or why you chose to use a certain loop or algorithm. That way they know how you problem solve.

Take an open ended question and make it fun. For example: How do you test a soda can?

Well, at first you might think "well, duh. You flip a tab and see if it opens"

Well, what are the purposes of the soda can? For one, it holds a carbonated fluid. It's also dispensable from soda machines, so it has to conform to certain dimensions in order to fit. It has a few functions -- you have to be able to open it, which requires a opening mechanism. It would also be nice for it to be smashable, so that you can reduce its size when you want to dispose (recycle, anyone?) it. But while you want to make it smashable you might also want to test its durability -- too smashable and then it might not make it through the rigors of shipping and processing. What about shelf life? Do we need to test how well it holds carbonation? What about pressure -- how much pressure is inside the can? Should you test the marketability of the product? How well does the aluminum hold a printed ink so that we can put a label on it. How well does the can survive adverse conditions like being wet, or hot, or cold?

[succulent]

Interviewing at MS is without a doubt the hardest interview I've ever personally done.
I'd have to say Google was the hardest interview process I ever went through -- I don't have a math background, and about half the people grilling me were basically asking me to implement mathematical algorithms I'd be very familiar with if I had a degree in math. But I don't :) The MS interviews were a lot more predictable IMO if you do your homework.

I'd second everything Vyndree said, and it never hurts to practice. Interview at a lot of companies (isn't Amazon hiring too?), and have a friend grill you some time. The more you go through it the less it intimidates you.

[Anozireth]

Well I had my interview today. The position is for primarily front end web dev, so lots of CSS questions. The first interviewer stumped me bad on a CSS question, but I did well on the rest of his and I'm pretty sure I aced everything the second one asked, so fingers crossed. At the end, the second one asked when I'd be able to start so I figured that's a good sign. Just have to wait and see now. :thumbup:

[Millerman]

After reading the site for so long, I am surprised my first actual post will be a response to this!

Anyway, I'm a developer on the XNA Game Studio team, and as someone who is more often doing the interviewing than being the interviewee, I had to throw in a few of my thoughts! I personally rarely ask any of the "riddle" type questions anymore because (aside from them being a bit boring) I still think it's too easy to "fake" them. There are so many sites nowadays with riddle questions and how to solve them it, I always feel like it is more work to come up with a problem that is "unique" and not widely known than it is to give them something "real world". I also always avoid the "rewrite some various CRT function" questions for the same reasons (plus, who ever does that in practice nowadays)?

I ask every single person who I interview to solve an actual problem that I have encountered in the job they're interviewing for. I'm intentionally vague because (as was mentioned) I'm much more interested in how they think about the problem if they can solve it in the short time frame of an interview. As an example, someone recently interviewed with me to work on the underlying graphics framework, and my question to them was simply:

Our graphics system needs to support a maximum resolution of 1080p (19020x1080 with 32bit Color) which is approximately 8mb of data. The hardware only has support for 5mb of data and no compression support, how do you make it all fit? Same question, but now the hardware only has 2mb of of memory.

No riddles, a real problem, and on the surface (particularly under the stress of an interview) looks impossible to solve.

If there's time left over after that, I will always ask a question that really is impossible to solve in the way it's been asked (ie, sort a list with limitations that make the sort impossible). In all the cases, I really don't care if the person can actually solve (or realize it is unsolveable), but am extremely interested in how they come to the conclusions they reach. The journey is more interesting than the destination if you will.

Oh, and Vyndree, the product "number" of the three girls age is 36. I was actually asked that question during one of my first interviews! Oh how I hated that question. I've also been asked how to test a vending machine, how many cars are in the state/country (and how many gas stations), how to cross bridges in a specific amount of time with only 1 flashlight, and oh, my favorite, how to cross a lake of lava with two sticks without jumping.

Of course, my favorite question to ask (just after they've struggled with the first two questions) is always "Ok, so now imagine you are me, how would you rate how you've been doing so far?" It always seems to catch people off guard, and tells you a lot.

Anyway, good (post) luck on your interview!

[Vyndree]

Oh, and Vyndree, the product "number" of the three girls age is 36. I was actually asked that question during one of my first interviews!

Yeah, it's been about 2 years since someone asked me that riddle and I fuzzed out on what the number actually was. >.<

That was my phone interview question. :P

[Knytestorme]

Our graphics system needs to support a maximum resolution of 1080p (19020x1080 with 32bit Color) which is approximately 8mb of data. The hardware only has support for 5mb of data and no compression support, how do you make it all fit? Same question, but now the hardware only has 2mb of of memory.




Ohhhh, read the answer to this the other day.....think it was on Tom Miller's blog...hmmm ;)



On a more serious topic, since you can respond to that one as you like, what are the odds for an OS-based person to get even into the interview process if they apply for a position there? Am getting a little long in the tooth so figure if I want to get the job I'd love I should get serious about applying for it but also don't want to waste time if it's a majorly remote possibility based on location to even get a foot in the door.

[EDIT]

Yup, http://blogs.msdn.com/tmiller/archive/2008/02/29/i-just-tried-to-use-four-render-targets-on-my-xbox-360-and-it-failed.aspx though guess we'd need to actually understand the reasoning behind it to be able to answer the question rather than try to just regurgitate that post in the heat of the interview.

Also, think my fave question I've seen in some of the Channel9 videos about interviews there is the "Why is a manhole (cover) round" just because it's so inocuous a question but people would try to find a hidden message in the question since it seems so simple.

[Farleito]

Interviewing at MS is without a doubt the hardest interview I've ever personally done.

I could only wish my interviews were anything like MS interviews. I'd take trick questions over anything...

Try filling one of these out...SF86 ('http://www.opm.gov/Forms/pdf_fill/sf86.pdf')...and be asked the same question over and over and over while strapped up to a polygraph. As your fingers turn blue because the arm-cuff is too tight, you get scolded when you try to adjust yourself to get comfortable. This goes on for 4 hours. During my last one, the interviewer told me that it was not uncommon for men to cry (because I was bitching that I couldn't feel my fingers). I have to repeat this "interview" process every year. If there are any "abnormalities" in my responses, the entire process is started over, on another day. My credit is monitored every 3 months and when I apply for loans, I am always asked why I have these "strange" inquiries.

If I ever "fail" the interview... I lose my job (and maybe go to jail)....and all I do is write code (and a few other things). Oh, and if you try to lie about something... they visit your family/friends/enemies/ex girlfriends/old highschool teachers/neighbors and interview them. Yeah, that always goes over well... especially when you used to light dogshit on fire on your neighbors doorsteps when you were younger, or have jackass fraternity brothers who can't seem to forget things.

Be glad that your interview questions are as simple as "Why are man-hole covers round?" (Which, btw, are round so they don't fall down the hole!). They're fun! I had this job where I was asked "If you were any animal, what would you be? and why?" during the interview. Without a pause, I replied "A chameleon, because I can efficiently blend into any environment." Nailed the interview with that one answer. (They told me later)

If you're ever asked to rate yourself on a scale from 1-100.... you're 100. Don't sell yourself short. There is nobody better than you.

If you're asked a technical question and you don't know the answer, be honest. Most interviewers can detect the "bullshit" responses. It's okay to say "I don't know off of the top of my head, but I can figure it out." Flex your google skills. Most SW developers survive soley on google searching skills. Don't give the "what they expect to hear" responses. Be creative. Take that time as an opportunity to express your personality. People hire people that are fun to work with. If they are "super serious", you may want to take caution. Most interviewers enjoy a little humor (except the people I work with... they were born without a personality). They have to go back to work after that interview...uuggg. If you said something that was mildly humorous, it will stick with them and they will remember you.


I may not be able to articulate thoughts or ideas during an interview (I'm a bit nervous) but put me to work and I know you'll never want to let me go, but I just can't think straight in a confrontational environment like an interview.

Say that as your interview comes to a close.


Back to the man-hole cover question... answer it and follow it up, with the following fact (if you're applying for an engineering-type job)... They also weigh ~100 pounds so they don't get lifted by traffic.

Modern racing cars create so much vacuum due to their aerodynamics that they can lift a manhole cover off the ground. During races on city streets, the manhole covers must therefore be welded down to prevent injury. In 1990, during the Group C World Sportscar Championship race in Montreal, a racers car struck a manhole cover that was lifted by the ground effect of the car he was following, causing his car to catch fire.

If they didn't know that, they will share that fact with someone else...again remembering you.

[Millerman]

Ohhhh, read the answer to this the other day.....think it was on Tom Miller's blog...hmmm ;)



On a more serious topic, since you can respond to that one as you like, what are the odds for an OS-based person to get even into the interview process if they apply for a position there? Am getting a little long in the tooth so figure if I want to get the job I'd love I should get serious about applying for it but also don't want to waste time if it's a majorly remote possibility based on location to even get a foot in the door.

[EDIT]

Yup, http://blogs.msdn.com/tmiller/archive/2008/02/29/i-just-tried-to-use-four-render-targets-on-my-xbox-360-and-it-failed.aspx though guess we'd need to actually understand the reasoning behind it to be able to answer the question rather than try to just regurgitate that post in the heat of the interview.

Also, think my fave question I've seen in some of the Channel9 videos about interviews there is the "Why is a manhole (cover) round" just because it's so inocuous a question but people would try to find a hidden message in the question since it seems so simple.

Yeah, I wrote that post *after* I asked the question to the candidate though. =) I have much more interesting questions to ask now, that was a problem from three years ago! Today I'd ask a much simpler question like "How would enable game development on a Zune device?" :P

As for getting your foot in the door, Vyndree had the best advice you can get earlier in the thread, you have to somehow "stand out", and by "you" I mean "your resume". As you can imagine, we get thousands of resumes every day (pure speculation based on the number of resumes I see in my tiny group). Getting noticed is the hardest part IMO, once you've actually gotten to a real interview I think we do better of getting good people in, but I'm sure there are plenty of great people we've never talked to because the resume was lost in the pile of mediocrity.

[Anozireth]

Well I had another interview for a contract position today, and 5 minutes after I got home the recruiter called to offer me the job! :thumbsup: It's a cool team working on an interesting project, and the offer was more than I was expecting so I'm really excited! 8) Thanks for all the tips everyone!

[Griznah]

Big congrats on the pos. !