By Ginny Cheng 

One of the toughest things for a recruiter is when we have to share unfavorable interview results with a candidate, especially when your gut tells you that he/she is absolutely Microsoft material but may simply need to find that right team and product group fit.

Although I have several memorable stories of how persistence does pay off, one particular candidate stood out as his story spanned over a couple school recruiters. After working with him last year where he interviewed unsuccessfully, I recently brought him back again this fall for a full time Program Manager (PM) position.

I’ve asked him to share his story because it exemplifies a type of determination that’s both admirable and inspiring.   To respect his privacy, I’ve kept his story anonymous.  So in his own words:

Today, I have a pretty unique story concerning my interviewing experience at Microsoft. It started three years ago and took me through twenty individual interviews (including separate phone screens, on-campus interviews and Redmond interviews). Let’s just say that you probably won’t hear something like this again anytime soon.

The whole story began when I was a sophomore in college. I was always a fan of Microsoft products and was interested in working there, but after hearing about the beauty of the Pacific Northwest, cool projects and awesome summers at Microsoft from friends, I decided to take a shot at interning there and signed up for an interview (that and I also had no intention of going back to my previous summer job – an underpaid tennis instructor for obnoxious rich kids). As most of you know, Microsoft usually has a two round process; first, a screening round (either by phone or on college campus) and if the candidate performs well, a second round in Redmond. I was set up for my first round interviews on my college campus. The interview went extremely smoothly and I felt I made a great connection with the interviewer. Aside from standard interview questions, I was also asked which position I was most interested in, to which I responded Program Manager. Later, I was invited to Redmond for second round interviews, however, for an SDE position.

In Seattle, I spent most of the first day relaxing and sightseeing. The next day I had my interviews. This is when things began to take a turn for the worse. That morning, I started to develop a headache that worsened as the day progressed. The first interview went great. The second I started to feel the headache more, so I stumbled a little. By the third, I started turning pale and felt really sick. I couldn’t even tackle the simplest problems. Luckily, the fourth guy had to pick up his kid from school, so that interview had to be rescheduled. I got back, had that fourth interview by phone (which went well) and then didn’t hear anything from my recruiter for over a week. Finally, I emailed my recruiter and received a reply that she had strange news for me. It ended up that the interviewers determined I would fit a PM role better than an SDE and wanted me to come out again and this time interview for a PM position (which is what I asked for to begin with!).

My second time in Seattle I had morning interviews and luckily, no headache. I felt that the first two went very well and I made a positive connection with the interviewers. In the third, I stumbled a little. The fourth interviewer was a lead PM for the group. He had a very nice personality and talked with me about my whole day and my impression of Microsoft. Again, after I got back, I did not hear from my recruiter for over a week. I tried to contact my recruiter, but to no avail – no emails, no phone calls got through. Finally, I was able to contact another recruiter and was told that I wasn’t getting an offer.

Next year, my school recruiter recommended me to fly out again (for the PM role). What chances – one of my interviewers was the same as a year ago (and he remembered me)! This set just did not go well – I made a few mistakes early on and couldn’t really make a connection with the interviewers. Ironically, in my last interview, the interviewer suggested that perhaps I’d be a better fit as an SDE! This time my recruiter got back to me promptly, though with news that I wasn’t getting an offer.

[One more year passes] I was now in my senior year and deciding between a one year Master’s degree, or getting a job. My friend recommended me to MS for interviews, but this time I didn’t get to skip first rounds on my school campus. The interviewer decided I wasn’t a fit, but the recruiters determined the results were inconclusive and set me up for a phone interview. I felt the phone interview went very well. Unfortunately, the phone screener disagreed and I didn’t get past first rounds (I was quite amazed at the way things turned out). Regardless, I ended up turning down other offers for the Master’s degree (to my parents’ chagrin as a few were rather lucrative, but instead of making money I was going to cost them another semester).

[Earlier this year] After completion of my last summer internship and facing my final semester in college, it was time to choose a full-time company to work for after school. I contacted my MS recruiter and expressed interest in interviewing there one more time (why not? – I thought if I don’t get it – well, I would have literally done all I could, and if I did – well MS is still a really cool company to work for). I expected to be set up for a first round interview, but instead, she offered to fly me out for a special event for potential candidates and offered tips on interviewing. This time I asked to interview for a PM and SDE positions at the same time! The trip started off somewhat poorly – my friend offered me a ride to the airport and then flaked out at the last minute, so I was really worried I’d miss the flight. When I got into Seattle, I was greeted by unseasonably cool and rainy weather! Luckily, these were the only low points of my trip. The recruiters did an outstanding job of planning and organizing really cool events for us (candidates) and I really enjoyed them all.

My interviews this time began at nine in the morning! The first interviewer was a very kind young PM. He asked me a few design and concept questions – some easy, some difficult – and then we chatted at the end. The second interview was with a developer, who asked me to write some code for him. He asked me a really interesting programming question and with a hint, I solved it correctly. Again, it was a pleasure interviewing and talking with him. The third took me to lunch. We talked about my past experience, some MS technologies, then he took me back to his office and asked a few technical design questions. This interview also went extremely smoothly. The fourth interview was with another team. I was expecting more design or coding questions, but instead the interview was very relaxed and I was only asked behavioral questions. The interviewer then directed me to a fifth interview. The fifth and final interview was less of an interview and more of a conversation [Note from Ginny:  second round of interviews ranges from three to five or more interviewers depending on team]. The interviewer asked me about my interests.  We talked about technology in general and then he told me about his team and what he does. This was the smoothest set of interviews I’ve ever had and everything just seemed to click. I found out I got an offer (for a PM position) as soon as I got back to the recruiting building that evening.

So what’s my point? Well, I definitely had friends who flew right through the interview process and got offers on their first try. But it doesn’t always work out that way. I could have quit and given up after any set of interviews, deciding this wasn’t for me (and I had great opportunities from the other two of the top three companies), but I always knew that Microsoft is a really exciting place to work, and this is where I wanted to be. So I fixed my mistakes and tried again and, in the end, things worked out more smoothly than I could have imagined. My advice is if you really believe, if you know where you want to be, then don’t let your mistakes or bad experiences stop you.

Oh yeah, he accepted our offer and will be starting upon his graduation next year!  I am really proud of him and I encourage all of you to continue to work with your recruiter if you feel you have improved after some time from your previous interview with us (usually about 6+ months after).  Especially with students, it's not uncommon to interview at least twice with us before receiving an offer since students haven’t had much technical interview experience.   

- Ginny

By: Ginny Cheng

I received several inquiries from folks that wanted to learn more about the Microsoft Mac Business Unit (MacBU) -- which is growing in both the Redmond, WA and our Mountain View, CA office. 

Mick Foley is one of the Development Leads in the CA office and was kind enough to answer some of the most common questions they get about this group. 

For example, a lot of people ask, “Microsoft has a Mac business group?”

Mick:  Depending on when and how you measure it, Microsoft is either the largest or second largest third party vendors for Mac platform (vs. Adobe). People are often surprised that Microsoft has a Mac Business Unit. Ironically, most Mac people are very aware of Microsoft on the Mac: Office is one of the best selling and therefore most common software packages for the Macintosh.

However, many Microsoft employees are completely unaware that we develop and sell software for the Mac. BTW, in addition to Office, we also develop the Mac Messenger IM client and we are currently working on a new version of RDC for Mac – these are both free products that we develop for to meet a need that we see in the Mac market.

What products do you work on within the MacBu?
I am a developer lead on Entourage. Entourage is the Email/Calendar/Contacts/Exchange client that is shipped as part of Mac Office (along with Word, Excel and PowerPoint). While we are not a part of Outlook, we cover many of the same areas and occupy the same “spot” in the suite. The developer lead role involves both coding and management – I spend about 1/2 of my time in each role.

Do you have to have experience with Mac to excel in this group?
Absolutely not! Of the five people who report to me, only one had significant Mac experience before coming to the MacBU. The MacOS continues to change quite rapidly – in the last 6 years Apple has moved to an entirely rewritten OS (Mac OS X), revised 6 times (10.0 to 10.5) and changed processors (PowerPC to Intel) – even people with years of Mac experience are learning new things all the time. We’re looking for people who can learn quickly, solve hard problems, and work well in cross functional (dev, test, product management) teams. Much of our code is written in C++ so experience there helps, but like Mac specific experience we’re more interested in more general problem solving.

Can you tell me about the growth in this group?  Is it like a start-up?
We are definitely in a hiring phase right now. We are about to ship Office 2008 and we are starting to plan for the next version. As we look at the work we want to do and the time that we have to do it, it is clear that we need to expand. In terms of culture, I think that we have a mix of smaller company focus – being on the Mac makes us somewhat different – but large company resources. We are very much a team culture – working at the MacBU is very much about working with others: both with those who share your role and across disciplines.

Do you guys focus on different features in Redmond vs. Mountain View?
The Mac Office suite consists of four products: Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Entourage. Word and Excel (and Messenger!) are developed in Redmond and PowerPoint and Entourage are developed in Silicon Valley. There is a fair amount of shared code that is developed by teams in both locations. In general, we see ourselves as one group, split over two locations – not two groups that happen to ship together.

What’s your vision of the MacBu 5 years from now?
We will certainly still be developing and shipping Mac Office – it’s an important and profitable business for Microsoft. However, I think that the nature and scope of the Office suite will continue to evolve and grow. Personally, I expect that we will be looking at more and more collaborative scenarios to enable teams to work together. I also think that we may be developing and shipping other products that complement the Mac Office scenarios. In terms of the code, I see us continuing to integrate newer Apple and Microsoft technologies to both improve existing functionality and to enable new features to solve new problems.

Do you have any tips for people that end up interviewing for this team?

1. Get a good night’s sleep – come in fresh and ready to think.
   
2. Be prepared for technical problems – we do ask them. However, looking on the Internet for questions and answers won’t help – we avoid asking the ones that are up there, especially the abstract logic questions. Rather, be prepared to discuss and code problems on a whiteboard relating to real code and problems that we have seen in our code.
   
3. If you’re a college student, think about what you are interested in learning from us about where/how/why we work at Microsoft. What position you take after school is a key decision in your life – it will affect where you live, who you are spending time with and what you are doing for many of your waking hours. Make sure that you get the info you need to make the right decision for you.

Lastly, tell us about yourself. How did you end up with Microsoft? 
I’ve been at Microsoft for almost 5 years – I joined when Microsoft acquired a Virtual PC from Connectix (small (~120 people) company). Virtual PC was a virtualization package that enabled Mac users to run Windows software on their Macs. I moved into the dev lead role on Entourage about 2 years ago. In all honesty, I had never really considered coming to Microsoft – I’ve been programming the Mac for many years, so Microsoft was not exactly on my radar. I have to say that I was initially very surprised by the passion for software and customers that I see here at Microsoft. This passion and Microsoft’s dedication to its employees makes it truly one of the great places to work today.

Prior to Microsoft and Connectix, I worked in the game/educational software industry. In my 10 years, I worked for Maixs (now part of Electronic Arts) including work on SimCity and SimCity 2000, Presage (a small game studio) and Lucas Learning (educational software in the Star Wars world...). While working in the game space was often quite fun – the artists and sound people are great – the nature of the gaming business keeps budgets low and schedules insane. Leaving games in 2000 to go to Connectix, I found that the projects are just as interesting, the pay is better and the schedules allow a life outside of work. I think that the most surprising thing for me when I got into non-game software is that features that get cut can return in a future version. For the most part games, even sequels, are complete rewrites so if a feature is cut, it is gone for good.

Thanks, Mick! That was very interesting.

To check out available positions with the MacBU, go to Microsoft.com/careers site. If you’re a college student, contact your school recruiter instead.

 - Ginny

As many of you know, the holy month of Ramadan was recently celebrated around the world.  And, I was invited to a Iftar dinner party in the Building 34 Café on Microsoft's Redmond campus.  I was flattered by the invitation and definitely made it a point to be there in person to learn about this tradition.  

I went to the event with one of my very close friends, Heidi. What we saw amazed us in the most pleasant way. Café 34 was packed with over 700 people from across the company, it was a very diverse group of people from different parts of the world. Some of them, just as curious as we were, came to learn more and connect with peers. We were greeted by smiling volunteers who welcomed us and offered sweet dates and sweet drinks. They told us that they typically break the fast at the end of the day with something sweet.

As we took a seat in the cafe, we noticed that each table was filled with lots of appetizers and also had a brochure with the agenda for the evening.  On the agenda, I saw that Lisa Brummel (Senior Vice President of Human Resources) was the guest of honor and the Keynote speaker.  I also saw that Sophia Salim was going to do a presentation on the tradition and celebration of Ramadan. I was so filled with emotion when I saw Sophia’s name, because one year ago, I was Sophia’s recruiter and we hired her during one of the Dubai recruiting trips. It was great to see Sophia become a part of the MS family, going up on the stage and presenting to a crowd of 700 people...and in front of Lisa!

I also met with so many of my hires (folks that we hired on my international recruiting trips) who are all great friends now.  I  was delighted to see them all displaying their leadership skills and organizational capabilities. I met with Ikram, Murad, Burhan, Mian Fahim, and Sufian to name a few.

In addition, I would like to mention two more names here: Asad and Salman, who were on the forefront of organizing this event.  I would like to personally thank them and congratulate them on pulling off such a successful event of this magnitude, based entirely on volunteering efforts. I approached them to see if they would like to do a short interview about the event for Jobsblog, and they were excited and very willing to give us some of their time.

Asad is a Senior Program Manager with MS Business Services Online Group, which is defining the Software as Service platform for the key enterprise services. He joined MS about two years ago. Salman is an SDET  in Exchange Front End Server team. He has been working at MS for over 5 years now working primarily on the active sync protocol. Both Asad and Salman are associated with multiple DAC aliases and work with a bunch of volunteer efforts 

I started off by asking Asad and Salman to give us an idea of how this whole thing began.
Asad: The idea was to promote diversity, cultural awareness, and interaction among various groups at Microsoft. Hence, promoting harmony and tolerance among various cultures and ethnic groups at MS, making it a great place to work. Events such as these make Microsoft not only serve as a successful business model, but a great model of harmony and tolerance among a very diverse set of people.  Salman chimed in by adding: “For me it was more about providing a platform where mutual learning could occur”.

Is this the first time we are doing this event at Microsoft?
Actually, we started the tradition last year. It all started out at the grassroots level. We came together as a volunteer group of about 10-12 people. We met several times to plan the event, and launched a massive poster campaign in all kitchens, on all floors of all MS buildings. We served food from 6 different restaurants, covering all corners of the world. Last year, about 400 people attended. This year the attendance almost doubled and we had more than 700 people attend, about 60% of which do not practice Ramadan.

I almost know the answer to this question, but would still love to hear from you… what’s the feedback been like?
The feedback has been nothing short of outstanding all around the company.  People not just enjoyed the food from all over the world, but they had a genuine interest in learning more about the Muslim tradition of fasting in the month of Ramadan. I think 700 MS employees taking their time off in the evening, sitting through the presentations, and joining us for Iftar and dinner is a moving story in itself. We had a video presentation, followed by Iftar (traditional breaking of fast at sunset) and a couple of short personal presentations explaining the philosophy and the mechanics of the tradition of Ramadan, followed by dinner.

What is your long term vision around this?
We would like to continue this tradition, and hopefully we will see it grow into an even bigger event. Lisa Brummel, SR  VP - Human Resources, has been very supportive and graciously accepted to be the chief guest for the second year in a row. Lisa has been a great source of encouragement and support to all of us, and it speaks volumes of Microsoft’s commitment to diversity and making it a better workplace for people with different religions, national origins, and cultural and social backgrounds. Promoting diversity and harmony is an ongoing effort.

How much work is it to pull-off an event like this?
A lot of work. It took the volunteer team more than a month of planning and execution that resulted in such a successful event. We met 6 times during this time, going over every minute detail of the event. Hosting 700 people entirely by volunteers, takes a lot of planning and effort. This included preparing presentations, editing video presentations, coordinating logistics and making sure we had an elaborate menu with food from almost every continent.

I feel like I can't say enough about how great this event was, to do it justice. It was one of those moments where, once again, I felt proud to be a part of this company.  I feel like we TRULY practice what we say.

In addition, I would like to thank Lisa, on behalf of all the folks who attended. Her presence meant a lot and is definitely a great source of encouragement for all.  I look forward to many more enlightening events like this one in the future.

- Priya

On Wednesday, October 17th at 4pm PT / 7pm ET, Hey-Genius.com will host another Live Meeting for those who want to delve deeply into the geekery behind the scenes here at Microsoft. Last time Hey-Genius talked to the folks at Silverlight, and this time they'll be chatting it up with Karim Farouki, a Group Manager in Microsoft Live Labs.

Live Labs is a pack of scientists, engineers, entrepreneurs and the online community members who are tinkering around with the Web technologies like Live search, Photosynth, and more.

Karim will give an overview of Live Labs, do a couple product demos, and answer questions about the cutting edge web products being worked on by the Live Labs team.

Interested?  Just head over to www.Hey-Genius.com/LiveMeetings.html and click "live meetings" to register.

Gretchen
JobsBlog Editor

Warning- shameless plug ahead.....

I wanted to let you know about a resume workshop I led on Live Meeting a few weeks ago. If you are interested in learning about some of my favorite do’s and don’ts, then this is a great workshop to watch.  

The main topics in this workshop (it lasts around 50 minutes) are as follows:

1. 3 categories of a strong resume (work experience, education, projects and leadership)
   
2. How to get noticed in a crowd of resumes
   
3. Tips and Tricks

So, log-in and check out my workshop.  It's available online until March 2008.

I have to say it's pretty good.  Well, I am the host...but even if I wasn’t, I would still say it was good. A lot of the content is geared towards college students, but many of the main points cross over nicely to industry candidates. 

If that isn’t enough incentive for you to log in, here is one more reason—you can hear what I sound like!  I used my best radio voice.

- Janelle

You tell me.

This has been an interesting media week for Microsoft. We just launched Halo 3, one of the coolest video games of all time.  And I read in the press about rumored talks between Microsoft and Facebook , one of the COOLEST social networking sites around.  (No idea if the reports are true; I hear the same buzz in the media that you do.)  Anyway, It’s been a cool week.

The reason I ask this is because I was watching a cable news channel yesterday where 3 middle-aged men in business suits were talking about Facebook and Microsoft … and how they thought Microsoft was uncool. They mentioned that Microsoft involvement would ruin Facebook and its reputation of being cool. This made me laugh, since the people talking about Microsoft were about as uncool as they come. But it brought up a more important question--- Is Microsoft cool?

I think it is.  I think there are a ton of great groups that are doing really cool things. Do we advertise those cool things as well as we could? Maybe not.  But do they exist? Yes! I definitely think they do. I know I’ve hired a ton of cool people this year, and I’m not alone in doing so.

What do you think? Are we cool? Are we neutral? Are we getting better? Are we getting worse in the coolness factor?  I’m all ears.

(And apologies for saying cool so much in this post—I wanted to get my point across and couldn’t seem to find a better word.) Maybe hip? Radical?

- Janelle

I am a big sports fan. I love the idea of finding the right combination of the right people with the right abilities to make a winning team.

Working in a large company is very similar to that. A great leader/manager will know when to build people up from within the organization,  teaching them the tools and providing the resources they will need to be successful. A great leader also knows when you need new players on your roster—when it’s time to look outside your own team and draft someone new into a leadership role.

This got me thinking: There was an article in the Wall Street Journal a few days ago, talking about how Steve Ballmer has decided to look outside the Microsoft organization for hiring new managers and top talent. The article talks about bringing in people from other industries, while not upsetting the masses, which many see as a strictly developer culture. 

We have had some great acquisitions from some of our drafts, including COO Kevin Turner, CFO Chris Lidell and Recruiter Extraordinaire Janelle Godfrey (Hey- I wasn’t home grown within MS, so I’m going to say I was an amazing acquisition to the team). 

Seriously though, smart companies need to know when to build people up and when to look elsewhere for talent. I think it’s a smart move on Microsoft’s part to be willing to look outside the organization.

Many employees will say that we should be promoting within. I think we do a lot of promoting within. It's definitely a strong point for working at Microsoft.  However, there has to be a balance. 

In order for an organization to continue to be at the top of its game, you need people who know this place like the back of their hand. You need college hires, you need people with 10+ years of experience working in 10 different groups. But, you also need people who have seen how the other half works, including our competitors and people from other industries.  This balance allows a company to thrive.

Therefore, I think it’s a good thing. I’m glad my company is willing to look elsewhere to hire top people, and I don’t see it as a last ditch effort to make an impact.  I think it’s very strategic.

What do you think?

Are there any superstar players we should hire?  Who are some of the real visionary CEOs/leaders out there that could be added to the Microsoft roster? Should we make any trades?

-Janelle

As you loyal readers know I am pretty open to constructive criticism about Microsoft, and there is no finer place on earth to find people who ask the “tough” questions than in a Meet the Company Presentation on a college campus. College students are my favorite - which is why I recruit them. They are honest, bold, sometimes misinformed, and sometimes they hit the nail right on the head. 

In my school set we have visited 20 schools already this year, and without a doubt the best comments and questions come from these presentations.  A lot of times, when I'm at a school and the crowd seems a bit timid, I ask everyone to tell me their favorite Microsoft rumor, “horror” story, or myth they’ve heard. Then I spend the next 20 minutes trying to answer them to the best of my ability. Most times, I don’t even need to ask because the students bring them up on their own.

I wanted to share some of my favorites that I have heard/been told/seen at a presentation. Maybe it’s something you’ve been thinking-  or maybe you were the one who asked it!

MY FAVORITE SEVEN THINGS SAID/ASKED/SEEN DURING MS PRESENTATIONS THUS FAR (school names withheld, to protect the identity of the innocent):

7. “During an interview my friend said he met with 10 people, and they each asked him the same question over and over just using different verbiage--- the same question. Is that true?”  Typically, our interviewers ask a variety of questions.

6.  A group of “protestors” showed up, wearing Linux t-shirts and holding stuffed penguins.  I love that!

5.  “I heard that Seattle has the highest suicide rate in the country… do you think that has anything to do with Microsoft being headquartered there?”  Ouch.

4. “Okay, I hate using computers—what other type of jobs would you recommend for me at Microsoft?” You might be out of luck.

3. “Are people at Microsoft allowed to own or use on campus I-Pods or Macs? I heard that managers take them away if you are found to have one?”  Um, no, that doesn't happen.

2.  “I heard that Google has more users from the Redmond, WA area than anywhere else in the country, and that the internal servers now have to block it from Microsoft users due to the fact that all employees use Google.”   That’s quite the conspiracy theory!

1. "Does Microsoft come up with any original ideas? It just seems as though you copy things everyone else does but just make a lamer version.”  That was my favorite.

Do you have a pressing question you wanna ask? A horror story or myth I can put to rest? Please let me know. I’m ready for it.

- Janelle