Your point is good, but in making it, you sound like an adversarial interviewer.
You and OP are actually agreeing with "the correct answer is it depends and now let's discuss context". This echoes my experience as interviewer too. It's a red flag when the candidate responds with "the correct answer". That's what OP is calling out.
I'm replying here because I get the impression you're looking for "the right answer" as you see it: "the first step is to mitigate then do root cause". You're right! But it also could be too adversarial.
> Your point is good, but in making it, you sound like an adversarial interviewer.
Most interviewers are adversarial.
Let's be honest - if an interviewer wants you to pass a system design interview, they'll make it work. I see this with particular candidates all the time. If we want the person to make it through - we'll let them get through. If we don't want them to get through - no amount of correct and behaviorally appropriate answers are gonna make them get through.
Pretty much this. You can have experience and also perform well in a system design interview. However, passing some of these rounds involves chance. Some interviewers are looking for specific answers. For example, some interviewers are looking for you to be knowledgeable about recent papers specific to the heavy-hitters problem. Or the two ways to best support lynchpin objects. It’s not so much as dropping well-known building blocks to construct a system but rather the interviewer asking you to design a system requiring specific characteristics you might not have any specialization in building.
You and OP are actually agreeing with "the correct answer is it depends and now let's discuss context". This echoes my experience as interviewer too. It's a red flag when the candidate responds with "the correct answer". That's what OP is calling out.
I'm replying here because I get the impression you're looking for "the right answer" as you see it: "the first step is to mitigate then do root cause". You're right! But it also could be too adversarial.