I applied through an employee referral. I interviewed at Cisco (Seattle, WA) in Jun 2021
Interview
Pretty good experience. Setting up the interview took some time and the three main rounds were scheduled on three different days due to the availability of interviewers.
The interview themselves were good. One coding round, 1.5 design round, and 1 leadership principles round. Coding was a medium level leetcode question and lots and lots of design/scaling questions. The interviewers were pretty encouraging too.
Standard panel, very simple leetcodes. reverse linked list kind of vibe s . I was literarly asked about how a linked list is structured and reversing it. there was almost no friction which I was shocked by one of the reason I did not accept
They care about your skills, rather than your background. They have a template which they provide and you got to fill that, everyone is provided a unique number. You are instructed not to disclose any of your personal details in the due course of your interview.
The interview process was two rounds. The first round was a behavioral interview. Straightforward questions, like tell me about the most technically challenging project you have worked on. The second round was a system design interview.