Part 3 finishes the 58-report set with the older OA and video rounds, then turns the full evidence into a practical study plan.

Coverage: Reports 41–58 · IMC New Grad SWE / SDE / Graduate Software Engineer / Graduate Software Developer · OA, video, recruiter, technical, and final rounds · 2018 through September 2022

Date note: Every question below uses the report date shown directly under its numbered report heading.

Continued from Part 1 and Part 2 in the same IMC New Grad series.

Reports 41–48: the rest of 2022

41: One screenshot, one partial implementation

Report date: September 11, 2022 · Role: SDE New Grad

The candidate pointed to Reaching Points with Perfect-Square Obstacles and Busy Intersection. The only code image showed the beginning of a Java intersection solution with arrival and street queues. It did not include the complete code.

42: The strongest photographed 2022 pair

Report date: September 8, 2022 · Role: SDE New Grad

Four images preserved Reaching Points with Perfect-Square Obstacles and Busy Intersection, including both function contracts, bounds, and the first example for each task. The candidate warned that blocked endpoints matter and described the idle-time jump.

43: OA done, video still ahead

Report date: September 2, 2022 · Role: SWE Graduate

The candidate said both OA tasks passed. The path constraints for Reaching Points with Perfect-Square Obstacles were not fully reproduced; Busy Intersection was described as two one-way roads, one car per second, and three movement rules. The video invitation had arrived, but no video prompt was reported.

44: The broadest recruiter-call detail

Report date: September 2, 2022 · Role: New Grad SWE

1. OA: Reaching Points with Perfect-Square Obstacles and Busy Intersection.
2. Recorded stage: three behavioral and six technical questions, but the candidate did not list each one.
3. Recruiter call: graduation, GPA, past IMC interviews, relocation, motivation, other processes and deadlines, finance versus tech, and what matters when choosing an offer.

The report expected a technical screen and a later behavioral round, but those future rounds were not completed in the source.

45: A terse all-tests-passed report

Report date: August 24, 2022 · Role: SDE New Grad

The candidate used DFS with checked states for Reaching Points with Perfect-Square Obstacles and two deques for Busy Intersection. They said both tasks passed all tests but did not share code, examples, or exact bounds.

46: Six video questions, one exact prompt

Report date: August 18, 2022 · Role: New Grad SWE · Result: Rejected after video

The process had two undisclosed OA questions and six recorded questions. The exact prompt preserved here was the final one: explain binary search to a nontechnical group in two minutes. Preparation time was about 30 seconds, with 45–60 seconds for most other answers. General IMC OA practice: Busy Intersection.

47: A legacy link with strong task images

Report date: August 17, 2022 · Role: SDE New Grad

Two images preserved the move formulas for Reaching Points with Perfect-Square Obstacles and the queue rules for Busy Intersection. The candidate said DFS passed and a recorded-video invitation arrived the next day.

48: Stack, knight, then a data-structure explanation

Report date: February 25, 2022 · Role: Graduate Software Engineer

1. OA: Adding Stack 2.0 with constant-time sum support.
2. OA: Knight Minimum Moves with a Capturable Bishop.
3. Automated video: discuss list trade-offs and suggest another data structure for hotel reservations. The in-memory hotel reservation exercise is related design practice.

The hotel prompt was conceptual. The source did not ask for a complete object model or distributed system.

Reports 49–58: 2018–2021

49: Medium plus hard in Amsterdam

Report date: August 1, 2021 · Role: Software Engineer New Grad · Location: Amsterdam

The two-hour OA had one medium and one hard question: Adding Stack with Top Values and Knight Minimum Moves with a Capturable Bishop. The report stops after the OA.

50: Recursion and linked-list complexity

Report date: May 18, 2021 · Role: New Grad software · Location: Amsterdam

A firsthand commenter described a call with two engineers:

1. Give a real-world example of recursion.
2. Explain recursion, its problems, and how it can be improved.
3. Discuss a linked-list operation and its complexity. The exact operation was forgotten.

The commenter said the round focused on algorithms and data structures rather than past projects. Related data-structure practice: Adding Stack 2.0.

51: Java or C++ only

Report date: May 11, 2021 · Role: Graduate Software Developer · Location: Australia

The HackerRank allowed Java and C++. One question was Adding Stack 2.0 with an O(1) multi-element increment. The other was remembered only as a graph question. The candidate was not comfortable with either allowed language and did not pass.

52: Special BFS and special stack

Report date: December 22, 2020 · Role: Graduate Software Developer · Location: United States

The two-hour HackerRank had a “special BFS” problem and a special stack. The report gives no rules beyond those labels, so neither can be mapped exactly. Related practice: Avoiding the Obstacles and Adding Stack with Top Values. A same-date mirror is not another candidate.

53: One medium problem, then HireVue and final

Report date: December 1, 2020 · Role: Graduate Software Developer · Location: United States

The first round was a medium knight-path variant; practice the preserved family in Knight Minimum Moves with a Capturable Bishop. Then came a mixed technical/behavioral HireVue with about 30 seconds to prepare each answer. The final was a two-hour interview with two engineers and a strong data-structure focus.

54: Hidden Artifacts plus an uncertain second task

Report date: November 24, 2020 · Role: Graduate Software Engineer · Location: Chicago · Result: Rejected after video

1. OA question 1 linked directly to Hidden Artifacts, with small unspecified changes.
2. OA question 2 linked a source containing both stack and knight questions, so the exact task remains uncertain.
3. The 30-minute one-way round had three behavioral and seven technical agree/disagree questions.
4. Candidates had about 15 seconds to prepare and 45 seconds to two minutes to answer.

55: The thread question survived

Report date: October 1, 2020 · Role: New Grad SWE · Location: Amsterdam

The OA used Adding Stack with Top Values and Knight Minimum Moves with a Capturable Bishop. A recruiter call covered motivation and behavior. The later video round unexpectedly used hard true/false questions. One exact prompt survived: are multithreaded algorithms always better than single-threaded algorithms?

56: Two medium questions, ten video questions

Report date: September 1, 2020 · Role: New Grad SWE · Location: United States

The first stage was a 90-minute HackerRank with two medium questions, one described only as dynamic programming. Maximum Falling Path Sum is related DP practice, not a claimed match. The next stage had ten short technical and behavioral video questions whose wording was not preserved.

57: Artifacts, quicksort, and communication

Report date: August 1, 2020 · Role: New Grad SWE · Location: Chicago

1. OA: Hidden Artifacts, locating rectangular artifacts in a two-dimensional search area.
2. Recorded technical: discuss quicksort's relative speed.
3. Design: describe a library interface, with the domain missing from the report.
4. Behavioral: describe an influential senior colleague.

The artifact task has a complete source-backed practice page. The other three are preserved as verbal prompts rather than stretched into coding problems.

58: The oldest Graduate Software report

Report date: April 1, 2018 · Role: Graduate Software Developer · Location: Amsterdam

The process started with numerical, verbal, and diagram tests, then three programming tasks. A Skype round reviewed the code and corner cases. One exact question was preserved: how would you define an abstract method that can return either an integer or a floating-point value?

The source does not name the language or expected answer, so the prompt stays exactly that narrow. Related OOP practice: Design an In-Memory Hotel Reservation System.

What repeated often enough to prioritize

Tier 1: Practice until automatic

1. Busy Intersection and other queue simulations with idle time and tie-breaking.
2. Avoiding Monsters and other multi-source-BFS/maximin path problems.
3. A custom stack with lazy updates.
4. One threshold-plus-reachability problem such as Rock Jumping.
5. Reading a long prompt carefully before coding.

Tier 2: Be ready to explain deeply

1. Time and space complexity for arrays, hash tables, heaps, linked lists, and queues.
2. Threads versus processes, including why more threads can be slower.
3. Cache trade-offs, especially LFU versus LRU.
4. BFS, DFS, binary search, and recursion in plain English.
5. The edge cases and invariants in code you just wrote.

Tier 3: Later-round differentiators

1. Implement a small matching engine and support order cancellation.
2. Debug code you did not write.
3. Model a small in-memory service with clean objects and explicit errors.
4. Explain a project without jargon, then handle detailed follow-ups.

Final checklist

OA

☐ Solve Busy Intersection without stepping through empty seconds one at a time.

☐ Solve a multi-source-BFS problem and explain the maximin step.

☐ Implement lazy stack updates instead of touching every affected value.

☐ Test empty inputs, ties, large gaps, blocked endpoints, overflow, and impossible cases.

☐ Read the function signature and examples before deciding what familiar problem it resembles.

Video and recruiter screens

☐ Explain binary search, a stack, recursion, and cache policies without jargon.

☐ Prepare short stories for teamwork, failure, feedback, and an influential colleague.

☐ Have a specific answer for Why IMC and why trading technology.

☐ Know graduation, location, sponsorship, offer deadlines, and availability.

Technical and final rounds

☐ Review every OA solution and be ready to defend complexity and edge cases.

☐ Implement a small order book or matching engine with fast cancellation.

☐ Practice debugging an unfamiliar codebase before rewriting it.

☐ Ask what is required before expanding an under-specified design prompt.

Series navigation: Part 1 · Part 2 · Part 3 (you are here)