I applied @ Lepaya — what's next? An overview of our recruitment process in tech and how you can best prepare.

Quick guide

☝️Disclaimer: This process currently applies to the Senior Engineer, Test Automation Engineer and — for most part — to the Principal Engineer role.
However, I am sure you find useful tips in this articles if you applied for a different position.

⏳Time to get hired: ~ 3 weeks

💡Jump to the stage you’re in to get the most relevant information

🔮 Living in the future? Have a look at our blogpost on relocation

Stage 1 — Application review

What to expect?

After you submit your application, our recruitment team and hiring managers will assess your documents based on fit to the role & fit to Lepaya. Our goal is to get back to you within 2 working days — in some cases, we are getting a lot of applications and it can take us up to a week to get back to you. In any case, you will get a reply from us!

Should we decide to move forward with your application, you will receive a link to book a first interview with one of our tech recruiters.

💡Tips for preparation

• Have a look at our tech stack in order to see if that fits with your experience — this can also help you to point out the most relevant projects in your CV.
• Work samples help us to make a skill-based assessment. If you have a GitHub profile or a portfolio that you can share with us, please do!
• Cover letters? We don’t need a standardised 2-pager to assess your application, so don’t feel compelled to upload a cover letter. If you would like to specify your motivation to join Lepaya in a few sentences, we are of course happy to read it!

Stage 2 — Interview with the recruiter

What to expect?

You can choose a time yourself for when you would like to have your first interview with one of the tech recruiters @ Lepaya. The call will be held via Google Meet, will take 30 to 45 minutes and will be a voice call only — so no need to get dressed up! Keep in mind that this is not only an information call but an interview in which we will focus on assessing behavioural elements that are relevant to the roles.

Here are examples of questions we mights ask and why we ask them:

• What have been the drivers & motivators in your career so far? We want to understand the rationale of your decision making in order to assess if Lepaya makes sense as a next step.
• Why do you want to work at Lepaya? This helps us understand if you have a clear enough view on the role & Lepaya and if your intentions align with ours.
• Tell us about a time when something didn’t go the way you expected/ when you felt like you failed. A big question! And a lot of things that we want to find out: Do you feel comfortable talking about “failure”? How do you reflect on- and manage your own emotional response to stressful situations? What lessons have you learned from a difficult time?
• What kind of working environment makes you thrive most? This helps us find out if we can offer you the things you need in order to thrive. We also want to know if you are actively searching for a place that fits you and as such take responsibility for your own well-being.

💡Tips for preparation

• This is a two-sided process: Make sure to also prepare some questions to help you find out if you like this opportunity.
• We always prepare for interviews and appreciate it if you do the same. You can find us in the news, read about the concept of powerskills or check out the blogs on L&D on our website.
• Perfectionism is overrated and learning is fun! Don’t hesitate to tell us about the less “successful” times of your career or the things you feel insecure about.

Stage 3 — The technical assignment

What to expect?

After we discussed the interview with the team and we decided to move forward, we will send you a link to our technical assessment hosted on GitHub. You will have about a week to submit the assignment (but we don’t count the days) and upon submission, we will try to review your code within 3 days.

💡Tips for preparation

• Please note that you will only be invited to the technical interview if you pass our benchmark — this means, that everything we need to know to assess your code should be in the README or communicated to us in another way.
• Follow the instructions 🛠 that’s it, that’s the tip: All we expect from you is clearly written down — nothing more, nothing less.
• Ask clarifying questions: We’d rather you ask one too many questions then if you misunderstood the assignment. And maybe we learn something on the way!

Stage 4— The technical interview

What to expect?

Your code passed — congrats! What follows is a 1-hour interview with two of our Software Engineers, to deep-dive into your code & your way of thinking. Of course, this is also an excellent opportunity to get to know your future colleagues and grill them with questions yourself.

💡Tips for preparation

• Make sure to take a second look at the assignment description in GitHub and the code you submitted — spot any discrepancies? That will probably be the questions you can expect.
• You’re in the interview and don’t know the answer to an unexpected question? That’s alright! We are a learning company so we do love a growth mindset — on top of that, let me pull out this cheesy quote.

I don’t need to know everything, I just need to know where to find it when I need it. — Albert Einstein

Stage 5— The final interviews (uhhhhh 👀)

What to expect?

In this stage you will have a 1 hour interview with our CTO André Carlucci and a 30 minute chat with our founder Peter Kuperus.

The focus of the interviews depends a lot on the previous process, since we want to pick up on points that we still don’t have a clear view on. So make sure you prepare based on the feedback given to you before.

Nevertheless, there are a couple of questions that we often ask at this stage:

• What is your motivation to join Lepaya? > You might have answered this question before BUT especially our founders will probably like to hear it from you again and maybe your answer has developed during the process?
• Where do you want to be in a couple of years? > Yes, we will ask you the classics *sigh* But guess what? We are seriously interested in your career development and want to make sure that we can set you up for success.
• (In case you are applying for a leadership role) What do you find important when hiring someone for your team? Especially in a fast growing company like Lepaya, growing your team is a key element of being in a leadership position. So we’d like to find out what your view on the matter is!

💡Tips for preparation

• Pick up on the feedback you hear throughout the process (both from interviewers & your recruiter 🤓)
• Take a moment to reflect on the previous steps of the process and think about what new things you learned about Lepaya, the role and the team and how that has influenced your perspective.
• Do you still have questions, doubts, remarks? This is your chance to talk to the people who know Lepaya and our tech team best, so make sure you use it!