I think the people who come up with leetcode problems are just going to be into competitive programming. There are a bunch of tricks that are specific to competitive programming just like there are a bunch of common tricks/themes in IMO problems. And, like in IMO, some of th3 required skills are only relevant to the competition and some are more generally applicable (even if part of the value of competitive programming is just being good at some coding interviews)
> part of the value of competitive programming is just being good at some coding interviews
This is crystallized into leetcode, which trains you for "technical" interviews that consist of solving leetcode problems. It's a circular system.
However, using algorithm puzzles is something of an improvement over old school puzzle interviews where you might have had to solve a rubik's cube, a chess problem, logic puzzles, or an arbitrary "brain teaser."