Three months as Software Engineer Intern at Google Brazil

Twenty-two people were selected to work as Software Engineer interns at Google Belo Horizonte (Brazil) for three months. A surprise that struck all of us, some believed it was a prank, others screamed of happiness. “What are the chances?” They wonder.

Before talking about the experience I should explain how I found the Google internship, how I prepared and the preparation of the trip to Belo Horizonte.

Before the internship

Preparation to the interview

I’m a computer science student at UNICAMP, University of Campinas in Brazil, and it’s very common to receive emails about the latest opportunities, so thanks to the secretary of the Institute of Computing, I was informed about the Google Internship. The opportunity was also a program for Black people communities and for people with disabilities.

In the link of the registration, I also received material about tips and suggestions of a good curriculum vitae and how to perform nicely in a technical interview.

The interview

So, I sent my curriculum vitae, and watched the Google interview live and finally waited for a few weeks. Then I received the first email to schedule my first interview. It was really a short interview in brazilian portuguese, it took about 40 to 45 minutes.

I received a link for the interview, met my interviewer and I explained that I was in my last year of college and I asked a few questions about him and we started the actual interview. Overall, the most important questions were (no matter the type of question):

1. How to build your data, think of your data structure
2. What kind of logic is required to make a certain condition, are there possible flaws in your first idea?
3. Consider the first and last situation in the problem (define the criteria of the limits)
4. Did you find any pattern about it? Is it possible to build a function about that?

The second interview was a bit more complex, with a couple of common topics from a conde interview, mine was about probabilies, but other interns had about string manipulation and graphs.

What actually matters in the interview is to discuss with the interviewer about what you understand, ask questions and figure out with the interviewer how to solve the problem together.

Something interesting is that the interviewer is responsible to evaluate and help you. The person should give enough information, and answer your question to lead to a common solution. Because what actually matters working in a big tech company is communication and teamwork for problem solving.

The Internship

All of the traveling costs were covered by Google, I had to travel from Campinas to Belo Horizonte, and got a hosted at a hotel near the office.

Most of the first 2 weeks were filling forms, setting up the computer and getting used to their technologies.

Google's technologies despite having a lot of common languages in their services, the hard part is to get used to their own architecture, product rules and their own libraries and frameworks.

Each intern got assigned to a team and received a project plan to achieve in the three months with a host and co-host. The level of detail of each project and type of presentation changes from team to team and also from the department you’re working.

Our work was mostly flexible, due to the transition from the remote work from and work in the office. A couple of days were needed to go to the office, which were the most interesting, there’s a great infrastructure and great enviroment.

Google’s workflow is very collaborative, I worked with my host and co-host that made much easier, not just in programming, but Google has a lot of projects available making it quite hard to understand by myself.

Also, you need to document your work properly, making sure it’s easier for the internship recruiters to evaluate your work later on. The internship itself is a whole evaluation if you’re worth being a Google’s employee.

But not every moment is about work, you’re able to participate in many club activities, such as soccer, volley, board games, track and even games.

Final remarks of the Internship

The experience was truly unique, and I recommend to any student to try their selective process. Not just for your career, but it’s an experience you’re able to make new friends and learn new stuff that goes beyond computing.

Useful tips

Check it out Cracking the Coding Interview book, it’s really useful to understand the main practises.

To check more opportunities check Google Careers.