Ahahahaha no absolutely not. Unless they clearly enjoy solving those types of puzzles for their own personal enjoyment, anyone chasing status through leetcode comes off as just kinda pathetic. What an incredible waste of time, like competing to get the highest score on an IQ test.

Much more impressive is when people direct their intelligence toward solving problems in high-dimensional domains. Self-contained leetcode problems, at most, break down into (1) translating the problem into known-best algorithm input (2) implementing that algorithm (3) translating the algorithm output into the expected format. Boring.

I think OP meant leetcode is the gatekeeper for software engineers working at a big tech corp or a smaller one where compensation and the career path can vary wildly.

Exactly what I meant

I think people conflate LeetCode with basic programming skills...

I'd go even further - if you're doing leetcode questions instead of talking directly to VP/GMs and having them sell you on the role, you aren't high status at all.

If by that you mean that Leetcode is busy work, I agree. Personal projects and hobby work are a better sign of potential.

No. Coding and being able to FizzBuzz is, for CS grads.

Tell me that's not true.

It's not true.