You find a bug in production code that you didn't write and that's outside your current sprint scope. What do you do?

situational · Junior level · general

What the interviewer is really asking

Evaluate ownership, prioritization judgment, and escalation instincts in an ambiguous ownership situation.

What to say

• Describe the first step: assess severity — is it data-loss level, UX broken, or cosmetic?
• Explain how you'd communicate the find: open a ticket, Slack the team, or immediately escalate depending on severity.
• State that you'd confirm with your lead before deciding whether to fix it yourself or let the owner handle it.

What to avoid

• Don't say you'd ignore it because it's not your code.
• Avoid immediately jumping to fixing it without informing anyone.
• Don't frame the decision as binary — it depends on severity and context.

Example answers

Strong: I'd first assess impact: if it's a data-integrity issue or security hole I'd flag it immediately in the team channel and to my lead, even mid-sprint. If it's cosmetic, I'd file a detailed ticket with reproduction steps and link it to the relevant component owner. Either way I wouldn't silently fix and push to someone else's code without a green light.

Weak: It's not my area, so I'd assume someone else will notice and catch it.