I did go through the online process for applying, but I also had a friend push my resumé around to five different teams with open positions. I got calls from three of them, but not the one I ultimately wanted. At first. Later on the team with the position open that I desired (they design for a e-reading device) put me through two hour long phone interviews. Each one felt like a gate. The team seemed knowledgeable about me and pretty proficient with the interview process. Typically an interview would be followed by about 1 week of waiting, and then a couple days of scheduling and then another interview. Eventually I got a packet with a 1 sheet telling me how I needed to prepare for the full day (six hour) in house interview. I put together a 50 min presentation of three of my projects focused around responding to the extensive guidelines of what I need to explain/present in my portfolio. That sheet was a godsend, as it really helped me prepare a portfolio that showed off my work. The next day I showed up to the headquarters at 11:30 and had my presentation in front of six members of the team. I had lunch with my would-be boss, which was nice and informal. Amz paid. Then I was taken to another part of the campus and waited in a room as six different people gave me 45 min interview sessions. There were 3 whiteboard sessions with members of the design team that I met earlier, and two interviews were really about company and corporation fit. Honestly they seemed like very driven, performance-oriented team, very focused on output over say creativity. Very smart people for sure, and fast. I would have worked very hard for sure on that team. Being as there were no joint-interviews I didn't get the sense of teamwork so much as bullpen that I would have liked, but that's one day and experience that is probably not representative of the way they really work. The experience was overly-thorough, and exhausting, and I'm sure by the fourth or fifth hour it was showing. I was in those offices from 11:30 to 5:30pm. And then... nothing. I didn't hear for a week. And then I found out in a short phone call that although they really liked me, it wasn't a fit. And Amz has a policy of not offering feedback. I did get some VERY good advice from another interviewer on another team about what he meant by "Senior" and it was clear from him why I was not Senior, but that was a different team. My one complaint is this: I spent probably 10 hours preparing for a six hour day, and got no feedback at all. If that's what the Amz design experience is like, it's no wonder their web experience is equally hard to comprehend.

I submitted my application through Amazon Jobs for a Senior User Experience role. About a week later, I got an email from a recruiter asking to schedule a phone call. During the call, we talked about the role, my background, and my interest in Amazon. She explained the interview process, which would include an online assessment and four virtual interviews focusing on coding, system design, and behavioral questions based on Amazon’s Leadership Principles.