Goldman Sachs

Goldman Sachs runs a consistent process worldwide, with an online assessment, a recorded video interview and a final "Superday" of back-to-back interviews. In India the flow below applies to campus, internship and most lateral hiring.

1. Application

Apply on the Goldman Sachs careers site, selecting up to a few divisions and locations. Campus candidates apply through their placement cell or directly for the Engineering Campus Hiring Programme, which usually opens in the spring for pre-final and final year students. Lateral candidates apply to specific requisitions or via referrals.

2. Online assessment

Engineering applicants take a timed coding assessment on a platform such as HackerRank with two to four problems on data structures and algorithms plus multiple-choice questions on programming, databases and logic. Non-engineering applicants may receive an aptitude or numerical reasoning test depending on the division.

3. HireVue video interview

A recorded, one-way interview with roughly three to six questions. You get about 30 seconds to prepare and up to two minutes to answer each, with no re-records. Questions cover your motivation, teamwork, a challenge you overcame and, for some roles, a short technical or market question. The firm's recruiters review the recordings.

4. Superday or final interviews

Shortlisted candidates attend a Superday: two to five interviews of 30 to 45 minutes each, held on one day, virtually or on site in Bengaluru or Hyderabad. Interviewers include engineers, managers and senior leaders. Engineering Superdays mix live coding, system design and behavioural questions; operations, risk and finance Superdays mix domain, numerical and behavioural questions.

5. Decision and offer

Feedback from all Superday interviewers is pooled and decisions typically come within one to two weeks. Offers specify division, team and location. Internship offers can convert to full-time roles based on performance over the summer.

6. Background check and onboarding

Education, employment and regulatory background checks are completed before joining. New analysts start with a firm-wide orientation and division-specific training programmes.

Expect three assessed stages: an online test, a HireVue video interview and a Superday of two to five interviews. Engineering is the most common path in India, so the examples below lean that way but include the other divisions.

Round 1: Online coding or aptitude assessment

Ninety minutes to two hours on a proctored platform. Engineering candidates should aim to fully solve at least two problems with clean, tested code.

• Arrays, strings, hash maps, two pointers, sliding window
• Trees, graphs, dynamic programming at medium difficulty
• MCQs on OOP, SQL, operating systems and probability
• Non-engineering: numerical reasoning and situational questions

Round 2: HireVue video interview

Fifteen to twenty minutes, recorded. Answer with a clear structure and keep each response between 90 seconds and two minutes.

• Why Goldman Sachs and why this division?
• Tell us about a time you worked in a team under pressure
• Describe a project you are proud of and what you would do differently
• What is something in financial markets or technology you have been following?

Round 3: Superday technical and domain interviews

Two to four interviews of 30 to 45 minutes each with engineers or domain specialists. Live coding is done in a shared editor; talk through your approach before writing.

• Design an LRU cache; find the kth largest element; detect a cycle in a graph
• Java or Python internals: collections, concurrency, memory management
• System design at analyst level: a rate limiter, a pricing feed, a batch reconciliation job
• Operations and risk: explain trade lifecycle, settlement, VaR or a P&L break

Round 4: Superday behavioural and leadership interview

A 30 minute conversation with a senior manager or leader, focused on judgement and fit.

• A time you had to deliver bad news to a stakeholder
• How do you handle ambiguity when requirements keep changing?
• What do you do when you disagree with a senior colleague's decision?
• Questions about your interest in the firm's businesses and recent news