I am what people considered really good at math and I would have 50% chance of passing any combinatorics / algorithmics interviews at FAANGS even completely unp

I am what people considered really good at math and I would have 50% chance of passing any combinatorics / algorithmics interviews at FAANGS even completely unprepared based on my friends who have done them and told me the exercices. How can I tell ? That was most of my education and still partly my personal obsession, and in a competitive setting in my country I was among the top 10 of my year nationwide on pure algorithmic problem solving. I can ABSOLUTELY CONFIRM you this is completely "orthogonal" to being a good engineer / datascientist. There are good datascientist without this skill, and many people with this skill which are bad datascientist. Like in most job, your sucess will mostly depends on other stuff like being rigorous, focused, hardworking, being a team worker and most importantly, LOVING WHAT YOU DO. Find your sweet spot wit hthe right combination, a mix of vague problem solving, project management, team spirit and you will be as much a good engineer than the next math wizard.