Preparing for an interview at Manifest Solutions requires a balanced focus on academic computer science fundamentals, structured coding execution, and professional communication. Because the company takes a hands-on approach to training its talent, interviewers are highly focused on your potential, coachability, and foundational knowledge.

Object-Oriented Design (OOD) Mastery – This is the most critical technical criterion. You must be able to talk about and implement software using clean OOP principles. Interviewers will look at how you structure your classes, manage state, and utilize inheritance and polymorphism to create flexible code.

Problem-Solving & Code Quality – When completing the take-home challenge, your focus should be on code quality rather than just getting the program to run. You must write clean, self-documenting code with proper naming conventions, minimal duplication, and clear separation of concerns.

Resilience & Composure – The technical screening stage can be highly rigorous and intentionally demanding. You must demonstrate the ability to handle tough technical questions calmly, think out loud, and maintain your composure even when you are unsure of the exact answer.

Communication & Professionalism – As a consultant, you will represent the company at client sites. Interviewers evaluate your verbal communication, your ability to explain technical decisions clearly, and your enthusiasm for continuous learning.

The interview process at Manifest Solutions is structured to evaluate both your baseline technical capabilities and your cultural fit over several distinct phases. The pipeline is designed to identify candidates who possess strong fundamental knowledge and are highly coachable.

The process begins with an initial recruiter contact and a basic technical phone screen. This initial screen focuses heavily on fundamental OOP concepts that are typically taught in introductory computer science coursework. If you pass this stage, you will be invited to complete a take-home coding assignment. This coding test is designed to showcase your practical programming skills and your ability to structure an application using sound design principles.

Following the coding test, you will face a deep technical interview, often led by the company's CTO or senior technical leadership. This round is known for its rigor and is designed to test the limits of your knowledge. The final stage is a highly conversational, laid-back interview with the CEO or company owners, which serves as a culture and personality check to ensure you are a good fit for the consulting model.

The timeline above outlines the standard progression from your initial application to the final hiring decision. Candidates should use this sequence to pace their preparation, focusing on conceptual OOP definitions early on, followed by intensive coding practice, and finally preparing for behavioral and cultural alignment.

To succeed at Manifest Solutions, you must perform exceptionally well across three core evaluation pillars. Understanding what the hiring team looks for in each area will help you structure your preparation.

Object-Oriented Design & Principles

This evaluation area focuses entirely on your ability to architect software using clean, maintainable OOP patterns. Interviewers want to see that you do not just write functional code, but that you write code that can easily adapt to changing business requirements.

Be ready to go over:

• Class Design and Relationships – How to correctly establish inheritance, association, aggregation, and composition.
• Interface Segregation – Designing highly specific interfaces rather than single, bloated ones.
• Dependency Management – Utilizing dependency injection to decouple classes and make your code highly testable.
• Advanced concepts (less common) – Implementing behavioral design patterns (such as Strategy, Observer, or Command) to solve complex architectural challenges.

Example scenarios:

• "Design a system for a rental car agency, ensuring that different vehicle types and pricing structures are handled polymorphically."
• "Explain how you would refactor a codebase where changing one class requires modifying five other unrelated classes."

Hands-on Coding Execution

Your take-home coding challenge is the primary artifact used to evaluate your hands-on coding skills. Evaluators review your submission not just for correctness, but for craftsmanship.

Be ready to go over:

• Clean Coding Standards – Writing readable, modular code that adheres to industry-standard style guides.
• Unit Testing – Implementing robust tests that validate both happy paths and edge cases.
• Data Structures – Choosing the right collections (lists, maps, sets) to manage and manipulate data efficiently.
• Advanced concepts (less common) – Optimizing time and space complexity for data-heavy operations within your application.

Example scenarios:

• "Implement a file parser that reads data, applies a set of business validation rules, and outputs a formatted report."
• "Write unit tests for a service layer class while mocking its database dependencies."

Technical Composure & Communication

This area is primarily evaluated during the technical phone screen with the CTO. This interview is intentionally challenging and is structured to see how you react when pushed to the limits of your technical knowledge.

Be ready to go over:

• Explaining Your Thought Process – Articulating how you arrive at a solution, even when you are uncertain of the final answer.
• Handling Ambiguity – Asking clarifying questions to narrow down vague technical requirements.
• Receiving Feedback – Demonstrating a growth mindset when an interviewer challenges your approach or points out a flaw in your logic.

Example scenarios:

• "How do you respond when asked a highly specific technical question about a framework or language feature you have never used?"
• "Explain a complex technical project you worked on to someone with a non-technical background."