got an offer from Starbucks Technology for a new grad SWE position (they call it Software Engineer I). wanted to share what actually helped me prep since I couldn't find much specific info when I was going through it.
background: CS degree from a state school, two internships (one in fintech, one at a mid-size SaaS). starbucks reached out via linkedin actually, which surprised me.
the process: recruiter phone screen (30 min, mostly resume questions and a quick culture chat) technical phone screen (45 min, 2 LC-medium problems on hackerrank) virtual onsite: 3 coding rounds + 1 behavioral round
coding. all mediums, nothing hard. i saw array manipulation, string parsing, and a basic graph traversal (BFS on a grid). one of the rounds had a follow-up optimization question after i solved the main problem, asking me to reduce space complexity. be ready for that.
behavioral. they asked: tell me about a time you had to work with someone difficult, tell me about a project you're proud of, and what do you know about starbucks technology? that last one is important, look up their app, their loyalty program engineering, their digital transformation initiatives. they want to see you actually care about the company, not just treating it as any tech job.
what i think helped: doing real STAR method for the behavioral. not just rambling a story but actually having a structure. being honest when i was stuck on a coding problem. saying 'i'm going to think about this out loud' bought me time and they seemed to like seeing the process. researching the starbucks app specifically. i mentioned knowing that the rewards program is one of the most successful loyalty systems in retail, and the interviewer lit up.
comp. new grad SWE I in Seattle: my offer was $115k base with a 10% annual bonus target and some RSUs (smaller equity component than pure tech, fyi). total first year around $125-130k all-in. for a first job in a COL city it felt ok, not FAANG money obviously.
good luck if you're prepping now.