Post a Salary or Review

Advanced

eBay Staff Software Engineer Interview Questions & Reviews

Post an Interview

Web: www.ebay.com | HQ: San Jose, CA

Connections

Interview questions and reviews posted anonymously by interview candidates.

Difficulty Rating [?] Based on 3 ratings

3.0

“Average” Interview

Interview Experience [?] Based on 3 ratings

Positive	67%
Neutral	0%
Negative	33%

eBay has 27,218 connections on Glassdoor

See Who You Know

Hide Filters

1–3 of 3 eBay Interviews

Sort by

4.0

Difficult Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Received and Accepted Offer

Interviewed Jul 2011 in San Jose, CA (took 4+ weeks)

I was approached by a recruiter who found me on LinkedIn, who passed me to an internal recruiter once I expressed interest in the position and the company. I had a brief 30-minute phone screen with the hiring manager, who asked me some fairly light technical questions before ending the call. I received an invitation to interview onsite from the internal recruiter shortly after the phone screen.

I ended up coming onsite about a week and a half later to interview. I was set to interview for 5 hours with 6 people, but it ended up being about 6 hours and 45 minutes with 7 people (I'm glad that I took the entire day off work). I had 7 1:1 interviews that lasted about 45 minutes each. They were very intense and I was grilled quite extensively on my technical expertise.

At the end, I wasn't sure how I did because there were a few questions that I felt that I could have answered better. However, I was impressed at the intelligence and deep knowledge of my interviewers, and got the impression that the company and team would be a place that I could learn and grow.

The end-to-end process from initial contact to offer seemed to take longer than at other companies, so don't be surprised at this.

Interview Questions

What would you change or improve about the eBay site?

Answer Question

How would you design a process to populate a set of tables in a database with data if you had no previous information about the tables or their columns?

Answer Question

Negotiation Details

A couple of days after interviewing, I received a call from the recruiter that they would be making me an offer to join the team with which I'd interviewed. However, they wanted to bring me in at a level that was lower than the role that I applied for, since I had little previous experience in the particular field. The compensation package was also slightly less than what I was making at my previous employer at that time.

I expressed that I was reluctant to accept the position under the terms presented; that I would feel more comfortable coming in at a higher level and salary. The recruiter passed me on to a Senior Director with whom I had not previously interviewed, and he and I had several conversations about the expectations of the higher role, career aspirations, etc. It was nerve-wracking but I appreciated the opportunity to plead my case to a senior executive and negotiate my future at the company. In the end, I ended up getting everything I wanted and took the final offer. Don't be afraid to ask for what you want and what you think is fair!

Other Details

I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview, a 1:1 Interview and a Background Check.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

2.0

Easy Interview

Overall Negative Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Feb 2009 in San Jose, CA (took 1 week)

I was not looking. The company recruiter found my profile from Linkedin and arranged a phone interview for me. However, the interviewer totally forgot about it and did not call me. The recruiter scheduled another time and I did not get call again -- this time, because the interviewer need take care of some urgent issue. The recruiter again made appointment and I eventually talked to the interviewer. However, it took only about 10 minutes, far less than the 30 minutes as originally scheduled. The questions he asked were quite simple tough. I never heard back from the recruiter. The interviewer was not professional and serious.

Interview Questions

How many years of Java experience do you have?

Answer Question

Other Details

I got the interview through a Recruiter and the interview consisted of a Phone Interview.

Helpful Interview?

Yes | No

Inappropriate?

3.0

Average Interview

Overall Positive Experience

Interviewed and No Offer

Interviewed Jan 2010 in San Jose, CA (took 1 week)

I had a phone interview first, then was called over for an on-site interview with the team. I had interviews with 5 people and the questions were mostly related to my back ground and related to what they were looking for in me (SOA, security). There were some java questions.