SENIOR SOFTWARE ENGINEER

Initial Interview
Guide

Welcome to your preparation guide for your initial interview at Facebook.

What You’ll Find Our engineers and recruiters have put this guide together so that you know
in This Guide
what to expect and how to prepare for your interview; it will help you to be
• Interview Overview
successful in your application for a senior engineering position at Facebook.
o Experience
o Agility
Interview Overview
o Motivation
• Recap & Focus Areas The structure of your initial interview
• Appendix / Resources
Facebook looks for engineers who have the intellectual capacity and technical expertise to
solve deep, challenging problems. In addition to technical expertise, we also expect Facebook
engineers to be compelling communicators and be able to discuss ideas across diverse teams
and a wide variety of stakeholders. This interview is designed for you to give us an
understanding of your senior engineering / technical leadership experience.

45-Minute Discussion
Your interview will be with a Facebook engineering leader and will cover the following topics:
• Experience
• Agility
• Motivation

For this role we are looking for engineers who are operating at a high level and with a large
scope. While this is not a people management role, please make sure to highlight your technical
leadership experience, such as:
• System design / architecture / setting technical direction
• Metric and goal setting
• Growing other people's careers through active technical mentorship
• Working cross-functionally to drive projects across a platform, organization, or team
(think feasibility conversations, documentation, etc.)
• Managing and aligning stakeholders
• Facilitating and leading technical discussions
• Designing and/or implementing a technical process, either within a team or more broadly
across a wider organization

1
We may ask you to:
• Discuss anything that is on your resume, including current projects and details
• Provide specific examples about what you have done in the past and discuss
the resulting impact
• Critique yourself and share what you have learned from a past situation
• Give a broad overview of a system that you have built and/or worked on. Your
interviewer may also dig deeper and ask you to explain some of the more
granular details of the system

Experience
How to prep for this section of your interview
This part of your discussion will focus on situational questions. For example, your interviewer will
ask questions like, “Can you provide an example of...?” or “Tell me about a time that…?”. Your
interviewer will seek to understand the types of roles you have held, the breadth and depth of
your responsibilities, and the complexity of the projects you’ve worked on; this is your opportunity
to showcase your expertise.

• Technical breadth and depth – At Facebook, we recognize the importance of collaboration

across multiple teams and individuals, so talk about how your work has spanned across
multiple teams and/or iterations.

• Technical leadership & project management skills – think about your role in the setup,
execution and delivery of a project. We’re looking to understand your involvement in all
stages of a project, from initial feasibility & scoping to production & maintenance.

• Growing those around you - We’re looking for examples of proactive technical mentorship,
appropriate task distribution, and an empathy-first approach to collaborating with others.

Example questions will be similar to the following:

• Can you tell me about your current project?
o Team size, scope, impact?
o Technical problems?
o Collaboration with other teams?
• Tell me about a difficult problem you faced and how you solved it.
• Do you set the team direction? How do you do this?
• How do you mentor engineers on this project?
• How much time do you spend hands on? How do you keep up to date?
• Can you tell me about the most successful project you've completed?
• How do you utilize data to:
o Explain technical concepts
o Provide feedback to others
o Prioritize tasks

2
Agility
How to prep for this section of your interview
This part of your discussion will focus on behavioral or situational questions. For example,
your interviewer will ask questions like, “Can you provide an example of...?” or “Tell me about a
time that…?”. Your interviewer will seek to understand how you approach personal growth
and development, as measured through your capability and willingness to absorb knowledge
from your experience, and use these lessons to become even more effective in new and
different situations.

Example questions will be similar to the following:

• Describe a situation when you made a mistake, and what you

learned from it.
• Can you tell me about a project you worked on that was failing and
you turned around?
• Describe a time when you had to apply your existing experience in a
new and different situation.
• Can you tell me about how you've grown people in your team?
• What's a problem you discovered which wasn't already being
worked on?
• What's an example of a product / business decision you disagreed
with?
• What's an example of upward feedback that you've given to your
manager?
• What are your personal gaps and growth areas?
• What was the toughest feedback you have received?

Motivation
How to prep for this section of your interview
This part of the discussion will explore your motivation for joining Facebook. Your interviewer will
seek to understand your interests to determine if you’d enjoy the nature of work at Facebook and
across our portfolio of products. We’ll be looking to understand why you are interested in working
to improve Facebook and whether you exhibit a strong general drive and desire to progress as a
technical leader.

Example questions will be similar to the following:

• Tell me about the different transitions you made in your career and why you choose
these particular paths.
• What are you looking for in your next career step?
• Why are you interested in this role, why now?
• What inspires you in your work, and what drains you?
• How do you think this role would be different from your current role?
• Why did you / would you leave your current / most recent company?
Recap & Focus Areas
• Provide specific examples when asked questions and avoid general statements.
• When hiring senior engineers we are looking for people to be confident and drive the
discussion throughout the interview in an assured manner.
• Don’t be afraid to self critique if you learned something from a situation.
• Your interviewer may ask questions to understand your environment and the challenges
you've faced. Here, we are looking for your ability to thrive in ambiguity while remaining
critical of your environment.
• Demonstrating empathy is important for this interview and having an understanding of
others perspectives is also crucial; we operate as a bottom-up structure and expect our
technical leaders to actively encourage team participation.
• Data is powerful. Make sure you know your metrics, especially technical metrics.

Appendix / Resources
Links to exercises, information and guides to help you prepare
Here are some resources to learn more about Facebook.

Facebook

• About Facebook
• Facebook News
• Facebook Careers
• Facebook Values

Thank you for taking the time to review this guide

and good luck in the interview - you’ll do great!