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InterSystems interview notes, page 1 of 2

Large Enterprises

Screna has 12 InterSystems interview write-ups. The most reported round is the technical phone screen (9).

12 interview notes · updated Jul 2026

InterSystems·Software Engineer·Onsite - Behavioral / Leadership

May 2026
Behavioral round at InterSystems for a software engineering role. The twist was that my resume mentioned tutoring a networking course, so they had me actually teach a concept on the spot, which I was not expecting to be that nerve-wracking in an interview setting.
  • Walk me through a networking concept as if you were teaching it to a complete beginner. Use an analogy if it helps.
  • Tell me about a time you had to work through a disagreement with a teammate or collaborator.

“They pulled this straight from my resume where I listed tutoring a networking course.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

May 2026
Resume-based interview at InterSystems for a software engineer role, focused almost entirely on AI/ML work. The whole thing was a deep dive into how I measured and validated AI systems, which I wasn't fully expecting from a resume walkthrough.
  • How did you compare different AI/ML approaches using offline versus online metrics, and how did you determine statistical significance?
  • How did you measure the real-world business impact of your AI work, and what KPIs did you use?
  • Walk me through a situation where your model performed well offline but failed to produce gains in production. How did you handle it?

“This is where I felt most on solid ground.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

May 2026
Two-part interview at InterSystems for a software engineer role. First half was a resume and project walkthrough, second half shifted into a coding discussion where they asked about longest palindromic substring but wanted verbal explanation rather than actual code. Pretty reasonable as far as these things go.
  • Walk me through your resume and past projects.
  • Given a string, how would you find the longest palindromic substring? No code needed, just explain your approach and cover both the O(n^2) expand-around-center method and Manacher's algorithm, including the trade-offs between them.

“Standard stuff.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

May 2026
Interviewed for a software engineering role at Intersystems and got a classic palindrome substring problem. Pretty standard algorithmic interview, nothing too surprising, though they wanted verbal explanation of the approach rather than actual code which threw me off a little.
  • Given a string, find the longest contiguous substring that reads the same forwards and backwards. Explain your approach, time and space complexity, and any edge cases you'd handle.

“They told me upfront no coding needed, just talk through it.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

May 2026
Two-part interview at InterSystems for a software engineering role: first half was resume and behavioral stuff, second half was a code-reading exercise in a language I'd never seen before. The code-reading part was genuinely interesting, kind of low-pressure in a weird way since nobody expects you to know the language.
  • Walk me through a project on your resume and explain the technical decisions you made.
  • Given code written in an unfamiliar programming language shared on screen, explain what each section does based on syntax and context.

“Pretty standard opener, talked through a backend project I'd worked on.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

May 2026
Got a classic brain teaser during a software engineering interview at InterSystems. Not the kind of thing I expected to spend 10 minutes sweating over, but here we are.
  • You have two ropes that each burn completely in 60 minutes, but they burn unevenly. Using only these ropes and a lighter, how would you measure exactly 45 minutes?

“The 60-minute part is trivial, just burn one rope.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Recruiter / HR Screen

May 2026
Behavioral screen for a software engineer role at InterSystems, basically just one question about motivation and fit.
  • Why do you want to work at InterSystems specifically? Walk through what draws you to the company, whether that's the products, the engineering culture, the healthcare data space, or something else, and how it connects to your background and where you want to go.

“Pretty standard fit question but InterSystems is niche enough that you can't just wing it.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

May 2026
Interview for a software engineer role at Intersystems that was basically a teaching exercise. They had me pretend I was a TA again and walk through a networking concept live, which was either a fun format or kind of nerve-wracking depending on how you feel about being put on the spot mid-explanation.
  • Pick one networking concept and teach it to a beginner in 3 to 5 minutes. Cover a definition, an analogy, common misconceptions, and end with a comprehension check.
  • How would you adjust that same explanation if your audience had no technical background at all?
  • What would you do if a student pushed back on your explanation or said they thought you were wrong?

“I went with the three-way handshake because it felt like the safest bet from my TA days.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Onsite - Behavioral / Leadership

Jun 2026
Behavioral round at InterSystems for a software engineer role. Pretty much one big open-ended question about teamwork, which sounds easy until you're actually sitting there trying to pick the right project to talk about.
  • Walk me through a past project where you worked on a team. What were the biggest challenges you ran into (technical, interpersonal, scope, deadlines) and how did you and the team deal with them? What did you take away from it?

“This question is deceptively wide.”

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InterSystems·Software Engineer·Technical Phone Screen

Jun 2026
Interviewed for a software engineering role at InterSystems and got a fairly deep technical question around XML processing. Not the kind of thing you can wing with surface-level knowledge.
  • You have an XML document where some elements contain CDATA sections that are themselves valid XML. Write code to detect these CDATA blocks, strip the wrapper, and inline the inner XML so the whole thing parses as one unified tree. Also explain why standard parsers choke on the original input, what edge cases you need to handle, and how you'd test it.

“This one took me a second to even parse the premise.”

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