First of all a big thanx to you guys, you are really awesome, without any mean you are supporting each and every person , thank you alot 🙂 I recently got placed at HSBC , i would like to share my interview experience
HSBC recently visited our campus for hiring software developers (Full Time). Depending on your performance in all the process they classified two types of sub profiles: “Acer” and “Strikers”, Acer was their top profile for that hiring.
1st Round-(Aptitude + Programming Fundamentals)
- This round was of around 1hr 45 minutes. There were following sections in this test: Aptitude, Data Structures, Algorithms & Java (Core). Java questions were of quiet good level and they tested core java knowledge/concepts. Since I was good at java, and having good experience in working with java I was able to score good in Java section, out of 100-120 students 38 were shortlisted for the next Round.
- For this round I would suggest to attempt suitable number of questions from each section so as to clear section wise cutoff and give more time to java questions. Practice question on threads, multiprogramming, and some core in-built java functions, etc.
2nd Round- (Coding round)
Time duration for this round was 30 minutes, it comprised of 2 basic coding questions.
- 1st: Reverse a number
- 2nd: Find a triplet in a given array such that product is a given number X (all numbers were present only once, i.e. non repetitive). Students who cleared at least one question were called for interview in next round. Around 30-35 students were called for next round.
You might be surprised of the fact that such easy question were asked but this time HSBC came for hiring mainly developers as they are going to build solutions on various new technologies.
3rd Round – (Technical Round)
I was called amongst the first 8 students to be interviewed. It started with the mostly frequently asked question “Tell me about yourself” I answered about that (be honest here, and be prepared for this question in almost all interviews). Then she started asking from my resume, she asked me about the research paper I have written, and then she started asking about my projects. I had around 30-40s of video for the demonstration of each and every project, (Picture says 100 words, but a videos says 1000 !!) and she was very much impressed by my projects and the way I presented them to her. Most of the time she was discussing my projects and kept asking me about the technologies I have used and a short description on the same.
- She then asked me some basic java questions like is java purely object oriented?, what is base class of java? Etc. I answered some of them about which I was confident of.
- She asked me difference and similarity b/w a pointer and an array, and some basic questions from c/c++.
- She then gave me some analysis problem :
Q 1. Suppose the entire architecture of their company’s software (banking) is divided in 4 components A, B, C, D and 4 types of customer say 1, 2, 3, 4 are visiting the same, day in and day out. Two type of customers are facing delay in the service, how can you determine which component is having problem and which is not? She gave me 2 minutes to think upon that and write down the points on a paper.
My solution:
i. Have a live calculation of throughput of each of the component (i.e. no of requests completed / no. of requests received.
ii. Since all types of requests would go to each component through a waiting queue, we can set a limit on waiting queue, whenever the no. of requests/jobs increases than the specified even we can trigger detecting that delay is occurring in this component.
iii. Since in each banking transaction, there would be a time stamp of each component on the transaction we can have ideal time limits for each component to process a given transaction and whenever that time limit exceeds we can trigger an event indicating that delay is caused, etc. She was satisfied with my solution and then came upon another problem.
Q 2. Suppose there is an existing solution on any imaginary platform, say a desktop application and we want to move it to new technology say Android, she asked how you would move the same and what would be your considerations regarding the same.
My solution : I said that first of all I would strongly focus on the reason as to why I we would move to a new technology , I would then focus mainly on the things because of which we are moving to new technology, as the new technology might have some advantages / disadvantages I need to first focus on the advantages of the new technology , say android, which is based on java so It would be nice to use inbuilt modules written in core java but on the other hand I would also need to focus on the things in which the new technology is weaker in for e.g. Android is not suitable for performing high computations like machine learning, so I need to build some more efficient codes for the existing one in order to counter the disadvantage of new technology, mainly I suggested that I need to move the application layer only not the entire architecture.
I was then shortlisted for the next round after waiting for 1-2 hours.
4th and 5th Round – (Technical + HR Round)
In this round I was having two interviewers, one HR and one from Technical part. As soon as I entered the room they asked me about the project which I had done 2 years back as I gave the least description about the same project in my resume. Technical manager tried to prove that why won’t my product would work but I tackled every situation he have and finally he agreed that this product would work successfully with a smile and a little laugh 😛 . Now he started asking about my other projects, as I had mainly android application as my projects, and that too were in my mobile at that time and for others I had made a video and uploaded them on YouTube for a better presentation, I asked them if I can show them the videos, they were very happy on the same and asked me show them, they was very pleased with the way I had presented my projects in videos. Then they asked me to practically demonstrate the applications that I had in my mobile at that time, I showed them my applications on machine learning, whistle detection, live exercise tracing etc and they were quiet impressed by all those. Then I told them about my research paper that I have written.
Finally HR manager started me asking questions like why do you want to work for us? I gave them very honest answer that because of the good market and stability they are having it would be good for me to be safe there and have a brighter future in working with such a big company, He then asked my some emotions questions like : What would you do if your boss insults you in front of everyone? With what aggression would you reach out your boss in case you have better alternative than your boss has told you to work on? How would you tackle high pressure from your manager? Etc. I answered them calmly and he was quiet satisfied with my answers.
I would suggest you all that be honest and try to take the interviewers’ to your strong point.
Finally after waiting for about 1 hour results were announced, and I was selected for “Acer” profile. A total of 8 students were selected, 2 for “Acer” and 6 for “Strikers” profile. Thanks a lot GeeksForGeeks. It helped me a lot on working out questions that are certainly asked in Interviews.