Microsoft in India, manages their hiring process quite terribly. India hiring is managed by 3rd party vendors, and trust me, they are not justifying the brand name of Microsoft at all.
They have reached out to me for this role, stating me that, I am a good fit for this role, and then they have initiated the Interview process.
First Round, directly from Redmond, HQ with a very senior level executive. I have to agree, the US counterparts at Microsoft are very good to work with as compared to India. Interviewer was fantastic and made me comfortable for the Interview. Interview went well, and had received very positive feedback from the Interviewer. Questions around my Product Management experience as well as early experience.
Second Round, here things got quite messy. Interviewer was from Hyderabad India, and was associated with Microsoft India since long. Since the Interviewer was purely from Technical background, he started asking me only technical questions, with a flavor of coding. Surprisingly, he grilled me only on my coding skills (which I left 8 years ago), and not my Product Management skills. I was quite surprised, as the Job Description for this role, was not in sync with what the Interviewer was expecting from me. In the feedback, Interviewer told me that they are looking for much more versatile person with excellent coding skills. I was quite surprised, why they have convinced me earlier, as they said I was a good fit for this role, being a Product Manager.
Request to hiring team: Review the JDs before sharing it with candidates, they are ambiguous. Set clear expectations from the candidates as well.
