FanAI Tech Interview Process

I like to treat every process like a product that we can iterate on and improve. The interview process is no exception. So at the end of every tech interview, I like to have a debrief session with the candidate to learn from them how their experience was and how it compared to other companies they’re interviewing with.

I get loads of valuable feedback during this debrief which helps us fine-tune our interview process and impress candidates as best as we can. This is especially important in this pandemic age as all companies are learning how to best interview people without ever meeting them in person.

We Should Document This

One recent piece of feedback we got was that the candidate didn’t know exactly what to expect and this was anxiety producing. Sure, they knew roughly that there would be a tech screen, a coding exercise, a systems design exercise, and technical conversations with multiple people, but they still felt unprepared coming in. So, this is our effort to help you, the candidate, feel as best prepared as you can before you “walk in” the virtual door of FanAI.

The Pre “Onsite” Process

The Initial Screen / Culture Screen

This is likely your initial contact with anybody who works for FanAI. This is a 30m video call with our talent manager (not the hiring manager) to assess that you have the technical skills and experience to do the job, and to ensure you’ll fit in with our fast-moving startup culture (and that you’re not an asshole). It will also give you the chance to ask any high-level questions about the job or company.

The Tech Screen

During the tech screen, you’ll interview with the hiring manager for about an hour, maybe a bit longer depending on the position. During this interview, we’ll assess your technical breadth and technical depth in your domain. For leadership positions, we’ll also go a bit into your leadership acumen and philosophy.

For all tech positions, we’ll do a live coding exercise in the same language that the job requires. We don’t believe in trick questions; we just want to assess your ability to code up something simple while under pressure and hear how you communicate about it. For backend, we utilize a collaborative coding environment called Coderpad. For frontend, we like to have candidates build a very simple React app in CodeSandbox.

The “Onsite” Process

If you’ve made it this far, we’re definitely interested in having you work for us. You’ll need to interview with some of the other team members who will more broadly assess your soft and technical skills.

The Systems Design Interview

Most technical positions will involve some sort of system design. For remote interviews, to mimic the whiteboard experience, we use a tool call Mural. The frontend systems design interview is more of an object-oriented exercise. The backend systems design interview is designing a full backend system including the API layer, compute layer, storage layer, and any supporting processes. This interview typically takes 1/2 to 1 hour depending on the position.

The “Onsite” Exercise

Any technical interview will involve implementing some real-world code along with one of our engineers. It’s not a take-home exercise. We’ll be there to support you as well as ask you questions as you’re working. For frontend, the “onsite” involves building a small React application, again in CodeSandbox. For backend, it involves coding a small API in Python / Flask that’s an extension of the systems design exercise you just accomplished. This is the meatiest part of your interview so allow 1.5 hours for this part.

The Data Engineering Interview (Backend Only)

Being a big data company, and being a small startup, our backend team needs to be proficient in handling data and working with the data science team. In this interview, we assess your ability to robustly and efficiently handle big data and play nicely with data scientists. This is a 1/2 hour interview and is performed by one of our data scientists.

The Design Interview (Frontend Only)

For frontend engineering candidates, we’d like you to sit down with our head of design and talk shop. We like to assess your design sensibilities when it comes to responsive design, effectively showing analytical data, and just working with design in general.

The Analytical Interview

Being an analytics company, there’s a certain analytical bar that you must meet in order to thrive at FanAI. In this interview, we dive into some analysis that we currently do to gauge your analytical prowess. This interview is typically done by our head of product, but also may be folded into other interviews, like the systems designs interview. We’re looking to understand how well you understand our problem domain and how to solve problems with data.

General Engineering Assessment

This interview is typically done by an engineer of a different discipline than you and covers high-level engineering concepts like how to work in an agile team, understanding web APIs, and deployment methodologies, e.g.

What Happens After My Interview?

Your interview team will meet, review feedback, and decide if we’d like to move forward with your candidacy. If so, we’ll ask for 2–3 references (depending on if it’s a leadership position or not).

We also perform background checks on all our employees. Since we deal with PII (personally identifiable information), we can’t hire anyone with felony crime on their record, especially if it involves data theft, hacking, or any sort of privacy violation.

The Offer

If possible, we’ll try to get to a verbal offer asap. We typically structure our verbal offers in a tiered fashion, giving you some flexibility with cash comp vs. equity comp, and we’re open to exploring other options as well. Generally, we’ll give you 3 options (e.g. a lower salary, higher equity option, a mid-salary, mid-equity option, and a higher salary, lower equity option). Hopefully, at least one of the options is attractive for you based on your risk appetite and cashflow situation. If so, we get you out a written offer, again asap.

What About the Bennies?

We offer a pretty standard benefits package for a startup with a few perks thrown in.

• Full medical, dental, vision (HMO and PPO options available)
• Life, AD&D, legal, etc.. optional add-ons
• 401k (through Transamerica)
• $1,000 educational stipend
• Remote first flexibility (work anywhere in the US you want)
• Company provided workstation (laptop, monitor(s), keyboard, mouse)

Come Work for FanAI!

We’ve saving sports by providing actionable insights into the effectiveness of sports sponsorships. We’re solving big data problems and building a next-generation analytics platform. If that gets you pumped, check out our open positions!