[krschultz]

Absolutely. I went to the local library every Saturday for a month or two and did practice problems without distractions. Total prep time was probably ~40 hours.

My compensation increased by at least $150,000 a year.

Best ROI I've gotten on anything I've done in my life.

I tell that stories to people considering doing it all the time, you'd be amazed how many people hear my experience and say, yeah, naw I'm not going to spend that time.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[tomlagier]

Totally agree. I spent a lot longer (months!) on a very challenging real-world side-project, hoping that would be the ticket to a job.

At the end of the day, it was the ~40-60 hours I put into Cracking the Code Interview that got me the FAANG job, the side project was barely a blip.

[collyw]

40 hours worth of work is a lot.

That's a weeks wage on what is essentially a lottery ticket, albeit with good odds. (Having done some freelance work for a friend in my Spare time, finding 40 hours free is going to take me weeks).

[bradlys]

Meanwhile, I’ve put hundreds of hours of prep in and never received an offer from FAANG.

It really is a lottery ticket. Luck plays a ridiculously large part of the interview.

[collyw]

I had a phone / screenshare interview with Google one day. Asked me to solve a Soduko problem (I have never done a Sudoko until that point). Didn't get it.

Half an hour later wandering done the street a very elegant solution came to me. I wouldn't say I am bad algorithmic stuff, but as I never practice it's pretty random whether I will get during an interview. "Luck" as you say.

[kamaal]

How many problems did you practice?

What was your question bank.

[krschultz]

I did all the medium & hard ones in there and was getting through them pretty consistently. I also don't have a CS degree so prior to that book I took the online Stanford algorithms class, I'm not including that in the 40 hours of work because I think most people reading this probably have more formal education in the field than I have.