nCino, Inc., the worldwide leader in cloud banking, offers thrilling career opportunities through its division, SimpleNexus. As a Software Engineer, you will work alongside dynamic teams of engineers, product managers, and UI/UX designers to innovate and enhance our cloud-based products. The position involves ownership of technical planning, implementation, and feature delivery using a diverse tech stack, including Ruby on Rails, Vue.JS, GraphQL, Swift, and Kotlin.

To help you navigate the process of joining this industry leader, Interview Query presents a comprehensive guide tailored for aspiring nCino Software Engineers. This guide covers everything from understanding the interview stages to practicing common interview questions and technical challenges you might face. Welcome to your journey with nCino!

Submitting Your Application

The first step is to submit a compelling application that reflects your technical skills and interest in joining nCino, Inc. as a Software Engineer. Whether you were contacted by an nCino recruiter or have taken the initiative yourself, carefully review the job description and tailor your CV according to the prerequisites.

Tailoring your CV may include identifying specific keywords that the hiring manager might use to filter resumes and crafting a targeted cover letter. Furthermore, don’t forget to highlight relevant skills and mention your work experiences.

Recruiter/Hiring Manager Call Screening

If your CV happens to be among the shortlisted few, a recruiter from the nCino Talent Acquisition Team will make contact and verify key details like your experiences and skill level. Behavioral questions may also be a part of the screening process.

In some cases, the nCino software engineer hiring manager might stay present during the screening round to answer your queries about the role and the company itself. They may also indulge in surface-level technical and behavioral discussions.

The whole recruiter call should take about 30 minutes.

Technical Virtual Interview

Successfully navigating the recruiter round will present you with an invitation for the technical screening round. Technical screening for the nCino software engineer role usually is conducted through virtual means, including video conference and screen sharing. Questions in this 1-hour long interview stage may revolve around nCino's tech stack such as Ruby on Rails, Vue.JS, GraphQL, and mobile technologies like Swift and Kotlin.

In the case of software engineering roles, coding challenges and questions regarding design patterns, system design, and web application development are incorporated. Apart from these, your proficiency in object-oriented programming, problem-solving, and technical planning may also be assessed during the round.

Onsite Interview Rounds

Followed by a second recruiter call outlining the next stage, you’ll be invited to attend the onsite interview loop. Multiple interview rounds, varying with the role, will be conducted during your day at the nCino office. Your technical prowess, including programming skills and coding capabilities, will be evaluated against the finalized candidates throughout these interviews.

If you were assigned take-home exercises, a presentation round may also await you during the onsite interview for the software engineer role at nCino.

Quick Tips For nCino Software Engineer Interviews

You should plan to brush up on any technical skills and try as many practice interview questions and mock interviews as possible. A few tips for acing your nCino interview include:

• Know Your Tech Stack: nCino's software engineer interviews focus heavily on their tech stack, including Ruby on Rails, Vue.JS, GraphQL, and mobile technologies like Swift and Kotlin. Study these technologies thoroughly and be prepared to discuss your experience and projects involving them.
• Be Problem-Solving Oriented: nCino values candidates who can independently problem solve and make decisions. Brush up on your knowledge of design patterns, system design, and object-oriented programming.
• Embody the Team Spirit: nCino emphasizes collaboration and communication. Practice responding to behavioral questions by showcasing examples where you successfully worked in a team, mentored others, or adapted to changing project needs.

Typically, interviews at Ncino, Inc. vary by role and team, but commonly Software Engineer interviews follow a fairly standardized process across these question topics.

• Write a SQL query to select the 2nd highest salary in the engineering department. Write a SQL query to select the 2nd highest salary in the engineering department. If more than one person shares the highest salary, the query should select the next highest salary.

• Write a function to merge two sorted lists into one sorted list. Given two sorted lists, write a function to merge them into one sorted list. Bonus: Determine the time complexity of your solution.

• Create a function missing_number to find the missing number in an array. You have an array of integers, nums of length n spanning 0 to n with one missing. Write a function missing_number that returns the missing number in the array. The solution should have a complexity of (O(n)).

• Develop a function precision_recall to calculate precision and recall metrics. Given a 2-D matrix P of predicted values and actual values, write a function precision_recall to calculate precision and recall metrics. Return the ordered pair (precision, recall).

• Write a function to search for a target value in a rotated sorted array. Suppose an array sorted in ascending order is rotated at some pivot unknown to you beforehand. Write a function to search for a target value in the array and return its index, or -1 if the value is not found. The algorithm's runtime complexity should be in the order of (O(\log n)).

• Would you think there was anything fishy about the results of an A/B test with 20 variants? Your manager ran an A/B test with 20 different variants and found one significant result. Would you suspect any issues with these results?

• How would you set up an A/B test to optimize button color and position for higher click-through rates? A team wants to A/B test changes in a sign-up funnel, such as changing a button from red to blue and/or moving it from the top to the bottom of the page. How would you design this test?

• What would you do if friend requests on Facebook are down 10%? A product manager at Facebook reports a 10% decrease in friend requests. What steps would you take to address this issue?

• Why might the number of job applicants be decreasing while job postings remain constant? You observe that job postings per day have remained stable, but the number of applicants has been decreasing. What could be causing this trend?

• What are the drawbacks of the given student test score datasets, and how would you reformat them for better analysis? You have data on student test scores in two different layouts. What are the drawbacks of these formats, and what changes would you make to improve their usefulness for analysis? Additionally, describe common problems in "messy" datasets.

• Is this a fair coin? You flip a coin 10 times, and it comes up tails 8 times and heads twice. Determine if the coin is fair based on this outcome.

• How do you write a function to calculate sample variance? Write a function that outputs the sample variance given a list of integers. Round the result to 2 decimal places. Example input: test_list = [6, 7, 3, 9, 10, 15]. Example output: get_variance(test_list) -> 13.89.

• Is there anything fishy about the A/B test results with 20 variants? Your manager ran an A/B test with 20 different variants and found one significant result. Evaluate if there is anything suspicious about these results.

• How do you find the median in a list with more than 50% repeating integers in O(1) time and space? Given a list of sorted integers where more than 50% of the list is the same repeating integer, write a function to return the median value in O(1) computational time and space. Example input: li = [1,2,2]. Example output: median(li) -> 2.

• What are the drawbacks of the given student test score data layouts? You have data on student test scores in two different layouts. Identify the drawbacks of these layouts, suggest formatting changes for better analysis, and describe common problems in "messy" datasets.

• How would you evaluate the suitability and performance of a decision tree model for predicting loan repayment? You are tasked with building a decision tree model to predict if a borrower will repay a personal loan. How would you evaluate whether a decision tree is the correct model for this problem? If you proceed with the decision tree, how would you evaluate its performance before and after deployment?

• How does random forest generate the forest and why use it over logistic regression? Explain how a random forest generates its forest of decision trees. Additionally, discuss why you might choose random forest over other algorithms like logistic regression.

• When would you use a bagging algorithm versus a boosting algorithm? You are comparing two machine learning algorithms. In which scenarios would you use a bagging algorithm versus a boosting algorithm? Provide examples of the tradeoffs between the two.

• How would you justify using a neural network model and explain its predictions to non-technical stakeholders? Your manager asks you to build a neural network model to solve a business problem. How would you justify the complexity of this model and explain its predictions to non-technical stakeholders?

• What metrics would you use to track the accuracy and validity of a spam classifier? You are tasked with building a spam classifier for emails and have completed a V1 of the model. What metrics would you use to track the accuracy and validity of the model?

If you're inspired by a high-energy, entrepreneurial environment and want to be part of an innovative team at the forefront of cloud banking, nCino offers the perfect platform to channel your passion and ideas. As a Senior Software Engineer at nCino, you'll be integral to a collaborative, agile team using state-of-the-art technologies like Ruby on Rails, Vue.JS, GraphQL, Swift, and Kotlin. You'll have opportunities to independently tackle complex coding tasks, participate in design sessions, and mentor junior developers, all while ensuring the highest quality through diligent code reviews. Your role will extend beyond coding to shaping new code standards, framework-level projects, and technical strategies.

For more insights about the company, check out our main nCino, Inc. Interview Guide, where we have covered many interview questions that could be asked. We’ve also created interview guides for roles such as software engineer and data analyst, helping you understand nCino’s interview process for different positions.

At Interview Query, we empower you to unlock your interview prowess with a comprehensive toolkit, equipping you with the knowledge, confidence, and strategic guidance to excel in every nCino software engineer interview question and challenge.

You can check out all our company interview guides for better preparation, and if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out to us.

Good luck with your interview!