As members of Zillow Group, we like to celebrate the contributions and unique perspectives of the members of our teams. As an extension of this goal, we’re introducing “Team Highlights,” a new series of articles and interviews highlighting people, their projects, and their experiences.
I’ve worked at Zillow for almost a year now. I joined through the awesome “Returnship” program. Prior to that, I was out of the workforce for 6 years raising a family. Thanks to the Returnship program, I am now a full-time employee working as a backend Java developer here in the Zillow Seattle office. I really appreciate all the people at Zillow who gave me the opportunity to prove myself and have supported me in this transition, ramping up my skill set, and becoming a contributing member here at Zillow. Outside of the office, I’m a wife, a mother of 2 young kids, and I love the outdoors, my church, hip hop dance and singing.
My team is responsible for processing property/home listing feeds. One of the interesting projects that I’ve worked on is to monitor the size of these listing feeds. Most of the time, the size of a feed doesn’t change significantly, but at times changes can be dramatic. I built a system that stops the processing of feeds that have a questionable size and raises alarms, so that we can resolve issues with listing feed providers. This project helps prevent good listings from being removed or bad listings from being added to our site. Ultimately, this helps with the stability of the listings we display on Zillow so our customers will have a good experience.
I’ve worked at startups as well as big companies and I can say that Zillow’s culture is one of the best. Zillow has the flexibility and fun of a startup and the financial stability and benefits of an established company. Upper management believes in empowering employees rather than dictating what to do. I’m impressed by how often people are the emphasis in company meetings, there is a higher level of transparency from managers here.
We do a lot of different things here at Zillow, from team building events, festival celebrations, community volunteer works and even Zillow’s own talent show. Zillow also holds educational events and hackweeks, allowing employees to do whatever project they can dream up and showcase their projects at the end. Also, our CEO, Spencer, seems like a very humble person which is a great leadership trait, not something you typically see in the corporate world. His people and leadership focused values have influenced the unique company culture we have in Zillow.
The people at Zillow are very helpful. I’ve even had people who I’d never met come by my desk to help me with questions. These kinds of experiences set a precedent and example for new employees. There have been times I’ve been busy and didn’t want to be bothered, but remembering the kindness others had shown me reminded me to help those in need.
Along with the beautiful view we have in downtown Seattle, Zillow has an open office setting. Though some may consider this as a drawback, our downtown Seattle office provides a dedicated library/quiet space, private phone booths, and several small meeting rooms as an alternative. Zillow’s commitment to a work-life-balance has really impressed me. Managers are respectful of people’s personal time, not expecting them to work on weekends. Schedules are flexible and can be worked out with managers ahead of time to accommodate people’s different needs. There are even treadmill rooms where people can exercise while working!
Zillow is a 10 year old company and yet it maintains the spirit of a startup. Our CEO believes our company needs to embrace change and keep a spirit of innovation–we’re not afraid of failure. The dichotomy of being a seasoned company and a new startup makes Zillow a very interesting place to be in. It’s very different from other places I’ve worked.
Practice, practice, practice! All engineer interviews require interviewees to write code on a whiteboard. Practice coding questions on a whiteboard and do mock interviews. Research/understand the technologies used by the company you want to interview with. And make sure you help the interviewer understand your thought process and logic, even when you don’t have an answer to the question. Above all, be yourself!