Recruiter Screen (30 mins) The recruiter reached out to schedule a quick introductory call. We talked about my background, recent projects, and what kind of front-end work I enjoy. They also explained DigitalOcean’s culture, the team structure, and what they’re looking for in a front-end engineer. It felt friendly and transparent — more of a conversation than a screening. Technical Interview / Discussion (1 hour) Instead of a typical coding test, it was more of an open conversation with one of the engineers. We discussed: My past front-end projects and design decisions. How I approach component architecture and state management in React. Some general web performance and accessibility topics. A few “what would you do if…” type scenarios (e.g., scaling UI components, handling API data efficiently). It didn’t feel like a high-pressure technical test — more like a peer-to-peer discussion to understand how I think and collaborate. The interviewer was engaging, curious, and clearly experienced.