How I failed Google and Facebook internship

I finished my last exam a couple of hours ago, if nothing happens (it means that if I do not fail any courses), I will graduate this July… This is the end of my 4 years as a student of National University of Singapore. In this post, I would like to share my experience to apply for internship with Big 4 in Technology (Google and Facebook are companies that I had interviews with, Microsoft, Amazon and other big tech companies never reply my application).

Let’s start with Google, I applied for Google through a referral from a friend working in Google Mountain View (The easiest way to get the interview is to go through referral, they have a system to refer people). After that, if you are a potential candidate, HR will contact you and ask you to provide time slots for interview.

For internship, there will be 2 consecutive rounds of phone interview. Since the interviewers are based in US, I had the interviews at 2 and 3 am in Singapore.

After 2 or 3 weeks, they will email you whether you pass the tech interviews or not.

Then they will continue for host matching process, in which you will be put in a pool and wait to be selected from the teams in Google.

Unfortunately, after 2 months, no hosts chose me, therefore, they ended the recruitment process with me.

Most of people I know fail this host matching process. In 2017, I know a significant of NUS students failed the host matching like me. Maybe it’s quite tough now to get an internship in US.

However, I did not think it’s the end… I tried last chance to ask Google North America to transfer my application to Google APAC. A HR in Google Sydney accepted to transfer my application and the committee reviewed it.

Then somehow after that, they asked me whether I had the bond with Singapore government to work in Singapore for 3 years after my graduation. When I said “Yes’, they told me it may affect my application.

It seemed not positive for me since they had to prioritize the applicants who do not have the bond and are free to work full-time in Australia over my application… And at the end, what should happen happened. I failed…

So that’s it with my application for Google… Furthermore, I also had interview with Facebook in 2017. I submitted the application via the Facebook career portal long time ago, they did not contact me until last February… I heard from friends that Facebook London was expanding so they have more positions to hire interns (this is not confirmed officially by the way).

There will be 2 rounds of technical interview for Facebook, and it is also phone interview. This time the interviewer is based in London, so I had my interview at 11 pm Singapore time.

The interviewer went well (I guess), there was 2 coding questions and I solved them. When I was waiting for the result of round 1, the HR emailed me for a call, which was quite rush…

Again, the Facebook HR asked me if I had any bonds to serve with Singapore? I said “Yes”. Then she explained me the purpose of giving internship is to look for full-time employees. Therefore, if they see that they could not convert me to full-time employee and work in London then it may affect my application (… So sad to hear that, it’s just the internship by the way… Why so serious)

After that, it happened as I expected… I failed…

Well, to be honest, I was really disappointed with myself. I tried and I prepared very well for the interviews…I almost cried for this…

All in all, it’s just the internship, I tried and I failed. But I still have a long career in the future… This failure has taught me various lessons. Things happen as they should be. Going to Google and Facebook used to be my dream. Despite the fact that I did not get it, I still know that getting it is not so far to reach (I was almost there). What I should do now is to improve my skills, so that when there is an opportunity, I am ready for it…

Maybe 5 years later, looking back, I will be happy because I failed both Google and Facebook (who knows)… The dots will somehow connect and every single event in your life will make sense. Just the way you are… 4 years ago, I applied to study Business in National University of Singapore (NUS- my current university). They gave me 5 choices. For the first 2 options, I chose Business major. For the rest, I filled randomly… Accidentally, my third option was Computer Science. And somehow (destiny I guess, I don’t know how to call it), NUS gave me the offer to study Computer Science. Then I got the offer with the thought that I would change my major when I got in NUS (by the way, I take the offer just to have the chance to study overseas).

Then I could say that it was the best decision that I have ever made. After one semester, I figured that Computer Science was what I like and what I should do. I did not realize it at the beginning, but somehow I still get it after a series of random events. So I strongly believe that every failure will just bring me to something that I will be happy at the end…

This is a long post and it is also my reflection for my last semester in NUS. I will join Garena Singapore this July as Software Engineer. A journey just begins….

“… This is not the end. It is not even the beginning of the end. It is, perhaps, the end of the beginning…” (Winston Churchill)