My advice if you're currently prepping: Don't worry too much about hard problems. They're much more rare. While true you may get an interviewer who hasn't properly calibrated their question, but more often than not, it's easy or mediums. Invest your time into telling a convincing story about your previous experiences, the impact you made at companies, and how great it'd be to work with you.
During a downturn, Big Tech doesn't send out a memo to increase the difficulty of algo / DS questions. It's being more picky about culture fit, skill match, prior experience, recommendations from current staff, etc..
It's more do we hire Bob who is qualified and could learn embedded software for hardware devices or hire Jill who is just as qualified but has experience in the space. Previously we'd hire both. Now we hire Jill.
My advice if you're currently prepping: Don't worry too much about hard problems. They're much more rare. While true you may get an interviewer who hasn't properly calibrated their question, but more often than not, it's easy or mediums. Invest your time into telling a convincing story about your previous experiences, the impact you made at companies, and how great it'd be to work with you.
During a downturn, Big Tech doesn't send out a memo to increase the difficulty of algo / DS questions. It's being more picky about culture fit, skill match, prior experience, recommendations from current staff, etc..
It's more do we hire Bob who is qualified and could learn embedded software for hardware devices or hire Jill who is just as qualified but has experience in the space. Previously we'd hire both. Now we hire Jill.