Communication is key to passing your FAANG interview.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Involve the interviewer as if they are your coworker.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Before you code, read the problem statement out loud.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If you’re unsure how the input leads to the output, you don’t understand the problem. Ask the interviewer for clarification.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Give an input test case and expected output.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ask the interviewer if it’s correct. If it is, you won’t misinterpret the question.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Solving the right problem is essential!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Talk about the algorithm you’re going to use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mention out loud what you’re thinking.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Clarify if it’s a brute force method or why it’s optimal or not in terms of space and time complexity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ask your interviewer if they want you to code that solution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They’ll let you know if they want a better approach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While you’re coding, explain what each line of code is doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mention what part of the algorithm you’re currently addressing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If your algorithm needs binary search, reference the part of your algorithm you’re at as you’re coding that portion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After completing a portion of the code, confirm with the interviewer if they understand what you wrote so far.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If they don’t confirm or say anything, dry run your code with a sample test case.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If there’s a mistake, you’ll catch it here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If they don’t understand what you wrote, you likely wrote overly complicated code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Talk about optimizations and bottlenecks as you go.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There was already agreement on the algorithm you would write, so you don’t need to optimize on the spot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mention as you’re coding if any portion is suboptimal, and let them know you’ll come back to it afterward.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You don’t have to code the perfect solution on the first iteration.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Start your solution with the heavy part of the algorithm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Point out what you’re going to code later \u2014 for instance, an isCellValid function.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It’s not over when you finish writing the algorithm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We don’t know if it works or not with the test cases we wrote.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
We don’t know what the interviewer wants you to do now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
So ask instead of assuming what you should be doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ask the interviewer if they prefer you to dry run your code against the example inputs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Dry run your code against the example inputs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Go through your code and reference again what portion of the algorithm your code is covering line by line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yes, line by line.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As you’re going through, talk about the state of the output as you go along.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Exactly how a debugger shows you the state of all variables.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
And you iterate line by line, watching the variables.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If anything is unexpected, mention you’re going to fix it and work on it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The rest of the code is invalid if you’ve made a mistake, and you don’t need to discuss it further.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Repeat until you’ve fixed all your bugs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Do this for all inputs given.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Or even better, try out some edge cases as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Optimize your code further.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
If there are bottlenecks in your code, point them out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Describe why the bottleneck is there and what you’re doing to optimize it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Talk aloud about what you’re thinking and why specific approaches do or don’t work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
When you come up with an improved solution, ask the interviewer if they’re happy with that approach.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
They’ll let you know if they want you to implement it or not.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
At this point, they’ll probably ask about space and running time analysis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The mistake everyone makes when asked about time and space complexities is just stating it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Don’t answer without showing your work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Iterate over the major components of your algorithm and compute and explain the time complexity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You can write a comment stating the time complexity for each significant chunk of code.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Add those together and formulate the final time complexity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
As for space, track your data structures, and figure out the total and extra space used.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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