Was interviewed by two people, none of them were from the team that hires. They were not aware of the position and context of interview, probably haven't read my CV. Looks like in EPAM interviewers are chosen randomly from those who have free time slot for scheduled time. The questions were irrelevant - aimed mostly on recalling formal terminology and buzzwords definitions, or questions like "How many clicks does it take to reach this page?". To put it shortly, questions absolutely not helpful in evaluating practical engineering skills and real-world problem-solving. Very frustrating experience.

Poor handling of sponsorship alignment led to wasted interview time and unclear process. I recently went through the interview process for a Data Engineer role in London. The technical interview experience itself was positive, and the team was professional and engaging. The interview process was thorough, including an in-person technical round that was quite detailed and time-intensive. From the beginning, I was informed that visa sponsorship was possible, and I was encouraged to proceed through the process. Based on this, I progressed through multiple stages, including taking time off work and coordinating availability for interviews. While the interviews themselves went well and I received positive signals throughout, there appeared to be a lack of alignment between early-stage screening and the final decision criteria around sponsorship approval. Only at a later stage was it communicated that internal HR sponsorship approval was uncertain and ultimately not approved due to cost-related considerations. This resulted in the process ending after a significant investment of time on both sides. This also required taking time off work and coordinating availability across multiple stages, so the lack of clarity around sponsorship approval resulted in a meaningful and avoidable time cost. While I appreciate the professionalism of the hiring team and interviewers, the overall process handling around sponsorship could be improved by ensuring eligibility constraints are clearly validated earlier in the process before candidates progress through multiple interview stages.

There are a two rounds of technical interviews (local and overseas experts). Questions that were being asked during the interview include SQL, Python and Pyspark, cloud knowledge around the data storage, authentication type, data tools like Data Factory, Databricks