I applied online. The process took 2 months. I interviewed at FDM Group (Leeds, England) in Oct 2018
Interview
Before the interview you are required to complete some online assessments which are relatively straight forward. If you are successful, your dedicated recruiter will contract you to update you on the outcome of the tests - I am unsure and not convinced whether they would bother if you were unsuccessful.
Being successful, you will be invited to one of their assessment days at an academy. I was given a good amount of time to prepare for the interview. I prepared and memorised the criteria for their strength based interview approach - however I wouldn't worry about this as on the day I did not feel as though I had to structure my answers around these.
The day will consist of a small group of you, approx 10. You may be asked to introduce yourself to everybody, and at this stage they checked our certificates and passports.
A member of staff then gave us a quick presentation on the day (and reassured us that NOBODY ever has to pay the £20,000 training fee if they decide the scheme is not for them after training). If you give FDM a google, you will find they have been in the news for taking graduates to court, which was the deciding factor in me declining the place.
A member of staff will then break the group of 10 into two small groups. At this point, one group will head off for their interviews, while the other group completes their tests. The tests were all relatively easy, I am unsure on the pass mark however I believe all results are aggregated together for an overall mark, so if you don't do your best on one test, do not worry too much.
The interviews were probably my favourite part of the day. They will have a quick conversation with you, before telling you that the interview is about to start, and you are given about 5 awkwardly worded questions. I would recommend to just reword the questions in your head quickly, as the interviewer will make you aware before that they cannot elaborate or reword the question for you.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Should you trust your own intuition or robust data?
I applied in-person. I interviewed at FDM Group (Toronto, ON) in June 2026
Interview
I honestly feel like the first Java coding question in this OA is designed in a very frustrating way.
The issue is not just that the question is hard. The real problem is that the provided starter code seems to contain some very hidden trap that makes the solution fail to compile, and the platform gives almost no useful compiler feedback. You only have around 20 minutes, but you are expected to not only write the actual logic, but also somehow identify the intentionally confusing issue inside the provided code without a proper IDE or clear error message.
That makes the question feel less like a Java coding assessment and more like a blind debugging challenge. Unless you are very strong at debugging Java syntax and environment issues under pressure, it is extremely easy to get stuck forever even if your actual idea is correct.
I understand that companies want to test attention to detail, but hiding a subtle compile issue in the source code and giving no clear feedback feels unnecessarily punishing. In a real development environment, nobody debugs this way. You would normally have IDE hints, compiler logs, stack traces, or at least enough information to locate the problem.
For an entry-level or graduate-style OA, this feels especially rough because the assessment is supposed to test basic coding ability, not whether you can reverse-engineer a hidden trap in a broken template within 20 minutes.
Screener Call with a recruiter, very basic technical assessment with programming challenges, then a video interview. Quick review of your resume and projects, very straightforward. Recieved a call from the recruiter about a week later saying the team wanted to hire me but couldn't confirm a start date yet, but probably could in the coming weeks.
For the next 6 months I received a call from FDM once per month asking me if I was still interested in the role, and informing me that they could not confirm a start date. While waiting for FDM I applied, interviewed, and received an offer for another company, which I accepted.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Tell me about a time you've had a disagreement with a colleague, how did you resolve this?
I applied in-person. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at FDM Group (Toronto, ON)
Interview
OA then HR then a group interview. Not very technical. The OA is easy. The HR call is basiclly just going over your resume, The group interview is like a case study.