Got contacted by an internal recruiter by email. The interview process was made clear by him in this email: first day, initial face-to-face technical interview; second day, pair-programming exercise; last step, conference calls with Head of Engineering. The first interview was nice and very complete. I had the chance to explain in detail the projects I had worked in in the past. There was a collaborative exercise on the whiteboard that was fun and several Java questions of different levels, some of them basic, some of them advanced. The interviewer was friendly at all times and knew exactly what he was looking for. However, after successfully passing the first interview, they couldn't allocate a time slot for me soon enough to do the pair-programming exercise. So I got invited to do an extra HackerRank test, that was not stated in the interview process, before proceeding to the PP. It consisted of 5 theory questions and 3 coding exercises in 90 minutes. The coding exercises were not complex, but I didn't complete all of them. Not enough time in my opinion. Maybe if you practice HackerRank exercises for fun at home on a periodic basis. As a result, I didn't pass the test and my pair-programming session was cancelled. To be honest, I was left with the impression that I didn't have the chance to display most of my skills. These coding exercises are not something you normally do at work and doing them in time just means you have done many in preparation, as if it was an exam. You can still be a terrible programmer and write unmaintainable and badly designed code. The pair-programming session would have allowed me to demonstrate my thought process a lot better than several coding exercises with a timer. But to be fair, that's their rules and they must be after a specific profile.

The interview loop at Anaplan was fairly direct. No extra rounds or overcomplication — just a clear sequence of discussions. Most interactions were centered around real situations and how you approach them, rather than trying to catch you off guard. The panel kept things concise and on track. There was a clear sense of what each round was trying to assess, which helped avoid any guesswork. Decisions were communicated without much lag, and the process didn’t lose momentum at any stage. Closed with an offer.