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Product engineeringProduct company

Xero

Software company building cloud accounting software for small businesses and their accountants and bookkeepers.

Not known5 stage process documentedFounded 2006
Headquarters

Wellington, New Zealand

Headcount

1,000 to 5,000

1,000 to 4,999 people
Work model

Not known

Hiring

Not known

Not enough signal to say. Check the careers page directly.
Where to apply

No careers page on file yet. Try their LinkedIn or the job boards below.

Website

Ask for a referral to Xero

A referral only means something if the person giving it can actually speak to your work. I will refer you where I know someone on the inside and your profile genuinely fits the role, and I will tell you plainly when I cannot. Either way you get an answer, and a straight one.

  • I read every request. A reply takes a few days, sometimes longer.
  • I will not refer someone for a role their profile does not fit. It wastes your time and costs me the contact.
  • Where I cannot refer you, I will say why, and point you at the way in that does work.
  • Nothing you send here is shared with anyone without you agreeing to it first.

If you found the opening, paste it. It tells me which team you mean.

A Drive, Dropbox or personal-site link is fine. Make sure it opens without a request for access, or I cannot read it.

At least a short paragraph. This is what I would be putting my name behind, so specifics beat adjectives.

Comma separated, up to six. Things you would be happy to be tested on.

How they hire

This is the engineering process Xero publishes. The leadership round applies only to people leader roles.

  1. 1

    Talent team screen

    Official
    Recruiter screenRemote

    A video call covering your background, experience and goals, and what to expect from the rest of the process.

  2. 2

    Coding exercise

    Official
    Live coding

    A live coding interview with an engineer guiding you, looking at problem solving and code quality.

  3. 3

    Systems design

    Official
    System design

    How you approach building systems that are scalable, reliable and efficient.

  4. 4

    Values interview

    Official
    Culture fit

    Examples of how you live Xero’s values, drive results and work across teams.

  5. 5

    Leadership interview, people leaders only

    Official
    Senior leadership

    Built around Xero’s four LEAD principles: lead with vision, elevate capability, act like an owner, and distil and solve problems.

What comes up

Recurring themes from candidate accounts, not a question bank. Nobody is served by leaked question lists, least of all you in the interview.

  • Quality of code, not just a working answer

    Official

    The coding round is framed around producing high quality code with an engineer alongside you.

  • Scalable, reliable systems

    Official

    A dedicated round on system design.

  • Values with real examples

    Official

    Come with concrete stories of delivering results and working cross-functionally.

Worth reading before you apply

From the Sefism resource library, matched to the rounds above.

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A free newsletter of short, focused posts on system design and problem solving, from the team behind the Grokking courses. Recent posts cover company interview processes (such as OpenAI and Anthropic roles), the most asked mobile system design questions and preparation plans, each linking to a fuller article on the blog. It suits engineers who want a steady, low-effort way to keep system design and interview topics fresh between deeper study sessions.

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The AWS certification most junior cloud roles ask for: designing secure, resilient, high-performing and cost-optimised architectures on AWS. Take it after building real things with IAM, VPC, EC2, S3 and RDS, and pair it with a project you can explain.

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Browse the whole library

What it pays

Nothing collected for this company yet, and nothing worth guessing at. A made-up range is worse than no range because people negotiate against it.

Add to the Xero page

This library is only as good as what people who have been through it are willing to share. Most of these companies have no hiring process documented anywhere, and one account of what the rounds actually were is worth more than anything I can research from the outside.

What are you adding?

This decides how the claim is labelled on the page. Only someone representing the company can produce an “official” label, and I check that separately.

Year and month.

Comma separated topics, not the questions themselves.

Round by round is ideal: what each one was, how long, remote or in person, and what it covered.

Credit

Anonymous is the default. If you keep it anonymous, nothing identifying you reaches the page: it is published as a candidate account and your name stays with me. Never send anything covered by an NDA, and never send a take-home or a question paper.

Universities they recruit from

No sourced university links yet. A campus drive, a career fair appearance or an internship partnership is what puts a university here.

Add to the Xero page

This library is only as good as what people who have been through it are willing to share. Most of these companies have no hiring process documented anywhere, and one account of what the rounds actually were is worth more than anything I can research from the outside.

What are you adding?

This decides how the claim is labelled on the page. Only someone representing the company can produce an “official” label, and I check that separately.

Year and month.

Comma separated topics, not the questions themselves.

Round by round is ideal: what each one was, how long, remote or in person, and what it covered.

Credit

Anonymous is the default. If you keep it anonymous, nothing identifying you reaches the page: it is published as a candidate account and your name stays with me. Never send anything covered by an NDA, and never send a take-home or a question paper.

How to actually get seen

Treat the coding round as a pairing session: talk through your choices and keep the code tidy. Prepare two or three specific stories that tie your work to Xero’s values.

Sources

Whole profile last checked 2026-09-22.

Interviewed at Xero? Fill in what changed.

Processes change, rounds get added, tests get replaced. If what you went through was different from what is on this page, tell me and I will update it.

Want me to refer you here?

Send me the role, your CV and a few honest paragraphs on why you fit it. Where I know someone inside and your profile matches, I will make the introduction. Where I cannot, I will tell you why and point you at the route that does work. You get an answer either way.

Ask for a referral to Xero

A referral only means something if the person giving it can actually speak to your work. I will refer you where I know someone on the inside and your profile genuinely fits the role, and I will tell you plainly when I cannot. Either way you get an answer, and a straight one.

  • I read every request. A reply takes a few days, sometimes longer.
  • I will not refer someone for a role their profile does not fit. It wastes your time and costs me the contact.
  • Where I cannot refer you, I will say why, and point you at the way in that does work.
  • Nothing you send here is shared with anyone without you agreeing to it first.

If you found the opening, paste it. It tells me which team you mean.

A Drive, Dropbox or personal-site link is fine. Make sure it opens without a request for access, or I cannot read it.

At least a short paragraph. This is what I would be putting my name behind, so specifics beat adjectives.

Comma separated, up to six. Things you would be happy to be tested on.

Add to the Xero page

This library is only as good as what people who have been through it are willing to share. Most of these companies have no hiring process documented anywhere, and one account of what the rounds actually were is worth more than anything I can research from the outside.

What are you adding?

This decides how the claim is labelled on the page. Only someone representing the company can produce an “official” label, and I check that separately.

Year and month.

Comma separated topics, not the questions themselves.

Round by round is ideal: what each one was, how long, remote or in person, and what it covered.

Credit

Anonymous is the default. If you keep it anonymous, nothing identifying you reaches the page: it is published as a candidate account and your name stays with me. Never send anything covered by an NDA, and never send a take-home or a question paper.

Work with me

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