I applied through an employee referral. The process took 3 months. I interviewed at Amazon (Seattle, WA) in Jul 2016
Interview
I had a employee referral and recruiters that contacted me from LinkedIn.
1. Recruiter Call - asked about my background and design process and job ID they think that will fit me. They are looking to see if there is a fit for the role and is mostly taking notes.
2. Two phone screenings with UX Designers from the respective teams asking about my design process mainly. Make sure you can answer how you can validate your design, your process and your work examples.
ON-SITE INTERVIEWS
3. Presentation (60mins) - the recruiter will give you a Portfolio Presentation Guideline. It will tell you to go into more breadth but I went with into depth of 3 of my most recent work. Make sure you explain clearly the problems you are solving, how you did it and what was the outcome. It was fairly easy mind you I did a lot of preparations in making sure it was clear, concise and presentable. Amazon is a very narrative and data driven company so if you could add a good story and have data, that's always a plus. The questions they asked at the end was more clarifications and why did you do this and that.
4. Lunch (60mins) - very casual and can talk about anything. I had lunch with a hiring manager and can ask him anything. Not sure if it goes on record (doesn't seem like it because he didn't take notes) but have fun, ask lots of questions and remain professional.
5. 1:1 (45 - 60 min each) - this is the most formal process. They all had some kind of work sheets and took lots of notes. They asked all behavioral questions and are looking for Amazon Leadership Principles examples from you.
6. Design Challenge (part of the 1:1) - I had a Senior UX Designer give me a real problem to solve. This was one of the easiest interview for me and can be for you too if you have a process. I started off by asking a lot of questions and trying to find out what the problem is, business goals, users and technical limitations. Once I have those information, I also have a list of assumptions if any and user stories. I didn't get time to draw but I wrote them down and thought out aloud and tried to work with the interviewer as if we were working together. Towards the end I was asked to explain how I know my design is done.
I didn't know how I went as most don't show expression but I could tell my presentation gave them a very good first impression.
I was given offers 2 days after my interview and accepted.
I submitted my application through Amazon Jobs for a Senior User Experience role. About a week later, I got an email from a recruiter asking to schedule a phone call. During the call, we talked about the role, my background, and my interest in Amazon. She explained the interview process, which would include an online assessment and four virtual interviews focusing on coding, system design, and behavioral questions based on Amazon’s Leadership Principles.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
“Tell me about a time when you had to simplify a complex process or system. How did you identify the complexity, what actions did you take, and what was the outcome?”
I applied through an employee referral. The process took 4 months. I interviewed at Amazon (Seattle, WA) in Aug 2022
Interview
Through employee referral, I initially interviewed for a Senior UX Role and the first two rounds took quite a while (2 months) due to manager vacations. By the time they were ready to schedule long interview, it conflicted with a big trip of my own. Even though I was told they would wait, the role was filled while I was away - which is logical but they didn't need to set up a false expectation, not to mention time wasted trying to schedule and then reschedule the big interview.
A month later I had a split panel interview for two roles in a remote interview process with five people. It started with a portfolio review and then I had five 1:1 meetings including a whiteboard challenge.
Only 3 people attended my portfolio review and one them left half way through. I prepared about 50-60 examples for the LP related questions in STAR format but the questions I was asked were not quite what I had prepared and I found them difficult to answer. You need to give each interviewer different examples even if it's the same question.
The recruiter called 2 days later to inform me that they would not be making an offer at this time. She couldn't get me off the phone fast enough and was quite insensitive. I was told to try again in 2 years so I would have a chance to "sharpen my skills". No feedback was given.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Tell me about a time you helped someone on your team who didn't fit in or was falling behind?
Tell me about a time the team disagreed with your design but you knew you were right.
The process was a little bit on the ridiculous side of things. Initially began with the Hiring Mngr, then proceeded to a panel portfolio review, then numerous break out sessions. I believe I met with 9 people in total which apparently needed full agreement to make an offer. At least one was a "bar raiser". I found that the formulation of their questions were incredibly difficult to understand (even as someone who speaks native English and well accomplished in my career. In addition the questions are situational questions where you need to recall a time when something happened, respond in a STAR format, and understand which of their 14 principles they want you to formulate your response for. It was absolutely crazy despite being in what seemed to be full alignment with the hiring manager.
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