I applied online. The process took 3 weeks. I interviewed at General Mills (Minneapolis, MN) in Mar 2020
Interview
Applied online, the recruiter reached out in 2-3 days and scheduled a phone call pretty quickly. The recruiter sent me a coding assessment which was easy. The next round was a technical phone screen with a Senior Data Scientist followed by a half-day on-site interview. Before the onsite interview, I had to also complete Hogan Personality Inventory, Hogan Motives, Values, Preferences Inventory, The Hogan Development Survey and a Deductive Reasoning Assessment.
Interviewed with 4 interviewers from the Data Science team in 3 rounds (2-1-1) and had lunch with one where I had the chance to learn more about the company. My recruiting coordinator had told me it would only be a behavioral interview and there wouldn't be any case studies, but there was a technical case study where I was presented with a Jupyter notebook of someone's analysis on a common dataset to provide feedback as well as discuss what insights I can gain. During this, they asked me questions like what is Standardization & Normalization, etc.
Another interviewer also spent quite some time discussing how to implement a recommendation system for Betty Crocker's website amongst other technical and behavioral questions. So the interviews aren't purely Behavioral of the type "Tell me about a time.....", they are a balanced mix of technical and behavioral. There isn't any whiteboard coding involved.
Overall I had a fantastic experience with the recruiters and the interviewers as well. Still waiting to hear back from them about my results. The process moved fast, I was on-site within 3 weeks of applying.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Codility assignment with two SQL queries and one Python challenge where you had to implement a mathematical formula solely using Numpy. Personality and Deductive reasoning assessment. The technical phone screen was related to past work. Technical case study onsite.
I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at General Mills
Interview
Recruiter was proactive and wanted to hire a SDS for their eCommerce division. She then scheduled the tech interview with someone who has about 2-3yrs of experience and also a Sr Data Scientist. It was obvious that he lacks experience. At the conclusion, he replied that he thinks that I am a fit for the role. A few days later, I received negative response concluding the interviews.
The hiring manger never spoke with me. I was told that they are hiring like crazy! My interview was similar to another review but mine did not make it to codality.
Waste of time.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Projects from current role. Challenges I faced. Explain PCA
Interview for Center of Excellence Data scientist.
Recruiter screen, hiring manager call, and then on-site with an assortment of interviews with the team and stakeholders. Very standard interview process. They really treat you well.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Walk through a pre-existing data science notebook and assess it.
The HR person sent me an email to set up the first screening interview. On the interview day, 5 mins before the interview, I got an email to cancel the interview because the HR’s dog was sick. I tried to reschedule the interview several times through email but never got a response. I then followed up by phone two weeks later and the HR told me that she completely forgot it and it was her mistake and she will send my resume to the hiring manager. I finally received no interview callback at all and got a rejection through email a week later.
The HR person was very disorganized in their selection process and failed to treat candidate with respect.