February 14, 2006
Post-Interview Reflections
A long time ago back in senior year of HS, back when I was young and stupid (or perhaps just younger and stupider), I unilaterally declared that Tuesdays were dress-up-in-nice-clothes day. So on Tuesdays, not necessarily every Tuesday but generally every other week at least, I would put on nice clothes, which generally involved a nice shirt and slacks and once in a while maybe even a tie. It never really caught on hugely, but within the people I knew there were a few people who'd do it for the hell of it on random Tuesdays. It was a fun diversion to keep my mind off the fact I was getting five hours of sleep a night on average I guess.
Anyway, I just bought a real suit this weekend. Went into Men's Wearhouse and got fitted and everything. It's mine. Yeah. And so today was the first day I had ever worn a suit that was for me. And I had to wear it around campus and get gawked at by passerbys 'cause I had classes right after my interview. Coincidences like these are probably just coincidences, and probably aren't really significant to anyone but me, but for some reason I get a kick out of this right now.
Anyhow, the interview. The interview was alright. It was just a one on one interview in these tiny-ass rooms on some new building on campus. The guy's name was Matt and he was really laid back. He'd let conversation wander during the interview and we'd just shoot the breeze for a little bit before returning back to business.
The questions he asked were pretty typical I think. The first was something like, "What do you know about NEC?"
Naturally, the first thing that came to mind for me was the PC Engine and the TurboGrafx, which he found amusing. Then I rambled off some stuff about the merging of the subsidiary back into the parent company and some other stuff I read in the news.
Then he asked about what my favorite electives were, my favorite engineering classes, what I considered my greatest accomplishments, my goals in further education, describing what projects I'd worked on, describing what other projects I'd worked on, and some other stuff. I did my best to answer in a non-hokey way, and all in all talked a lot about how I wish I could have studied more things, how I enjoyed classes, disciplines and projects which incorporated many branches of study together, and some other stuff about heuristics to guide actions given that humans can't exhaustively research all possibilities and stuff.
Now, the really confusing thing was the technical question.
Usually in engineering interviews they ask you questions about your particular area or the area that the job deals with. For example, for an IC design sorta job, they might draw up simple differential pair with a tail current and ask you to analyze it. Or ask you to draw an op-amp circuit with gain of positive ten. Or some other crap about circuits.
So, I was expecting to get something relating to any of the sub-fields of EE since the job seemed to require knowledge in all of those areas. As it turned out, I was thinking in the right direction, I just didn't take it far enough.
He put a piece of paper down in front of me with three drawings on it. He explained that one drawing was a top view, the other was a side view, and the other was the other side view. I was to draw an isometric sketch of the object; that is to say, draw a 3d-ish model of it.
"Uh..., I'm sorry, I need to think about this."
"No problem, take your time."
"I've never dealt with anything like this before."
"That's what all the EE majors say. I wouldn't give this to an ME since this is the very basics of what they do. I give them the circuit problems."
So yeah, it took me a bunch of sketches and what felt like a bazillion minutes, but I finally nailed it. Matt actually said something like, "Yeah, right on!" when I finished my final drawing. He mentioned the dude that I talked to at the internship fair (whom Matt had also interviewed and brought to the company) had done rather poorly on that part of the interview.
After that, he asked one or two more questions about miscellaneous things, and then asked me whether I had any questions for him. I asked about Roseville and what it was like there, and he went on at length on how it was alright, but that he preferred living in Davis and commuting. That of course it wasn't going to have a huge population of 18-24 year olds (seven percent! 7%!!!), especially when compared to a university town, and some other stuff.
Roseville though. Not exactly the kind of place I pictured myself living in.
Then I asked about the job itself, and he gave me a rundown of what Chery, the dude who talked to me at the intership fair, has had to do since joining the team. Chery apparently is the only EE major on the team, and the rest of the team is Mech Es, Chem Es, physicists, and some other random crap. Since joining the team, he's been spending a lot of time learning about plasma physics, mech e stuff, chem e stuff, and basically learning about all aspects of fabrication and manufacturing.
So Matt, the interviewer, stressed that an important part of the job was to be able to understand things beyond your own field so as to really be able to comprehend the workings of the entirety of the fabrication plant and to use that knowledge to come up with good solutions to problems.
This is a good thing I think. Not only do I really like learning about a lot of different things, I actually emphasized that sort of sentiment in describing my projects and favorite classes. So, I mean, he might think that I, like, am a good fit for the job and stuff. 'Cause I am interested in exactly the kind of thing the job requires. Yeah.
After the interview, he gave me a packet with some stuff and said that they would get in contact with me in two to three weeks. I'm trying not to get my hopes up, but I think I have a reasonably good chance of being called back for a second interview. I hope. Augh.
Altogether the interview went well though. I just need to deal now with the waiting and, well, mostly the waiting. Good thing I've got plenty of crap to deal with in school and life so I don't stress about things I can't really change anyway.
Speaking of which, the nervousness never really got to me during the interview. I mean, I got kinda shaky when I saw the interview question, and at other random times when I felt like I couldn't find the words to express what I wanted to say, but all in all I was pretty cool through it. At least, I think I was.
Anyway, it's over and done and now I just sit and hope.
Uf.
Anyway, I just bought a real suit this weekend. Went into Men's Wearhouse and got fitted and everything. It's mine. Yeah. And so today was the first day I had ever worn a suit that was for me. And I had to wear it around campus and get gawked at by passerbys 'cause I had classes right after my interview. Coincidences like these are probably just coincidences, and probably aren't really significant to anyone but me, but for some reason I get a kick out of this right now.
Anyhow, the interview. The interview was alright. It was just a one on one interview in these tiny-ass rooms on some new building on campus. The guy's name was Matt and he was really laid back. He'd let conversation wander during the interview and we'd just shoot the breeze for a little bit before returning back to business.
The questions he asked were pretty typical I think. The first was something like, "What do you know about NEC?"
Naturally, the first thing that came to mind for me was the PC Engine and the TurboGrafx, which he found amusing. Then I rambled off some stuff about the merging of the subsidiary back into the parent company and some other stuff I read in the news.
Then he asked about what my favorite electives were, my favorite engineering classes, what I considered my greatest accomplishments, my goals in further education, describing what projects I'd worked on, describing what other projects I'd worked on, and some other stuff. I did my best to answer in a non-hokey way, and all in all talked a lot about how I wish I could have studied more things, how I enjoyed classes, disciplines and projects which incorporated many branches of study together, and some other stuff about heuristics to guide actions given that humans can't exhaustively research all possibilities and stuff.
Now, the really confusing thing was the technical question.
Usually in engineering interviews they ask you questions about your particular area or the area that the job deals with. For example, for an IC design sorta job, they might draw up simple differential pair with a tail current and ask you to analyze it. Or ask you to draw an op-amp circuit with gain of positive ten. Or some other crap about circuits.
So, I was expecting to get something relating to any of the sub-fields of EE since the job seemed to require knowledge in all of those areas. As it turned out, I was thinking in the right direction, I just didn't take it far enough.
He put a piece of paper down in front of me with three drawings on it. He explained that one drawing was a top view, the other was a side view, and the other was the other side view. I was to draw an isometric sketch of the object; that is to say, draw a 3d-ish model of it.
"Uh..., I'm sorry, I need to think about this."
"No problem, take your time."
"I've never dealt with anything like this before."
"That's what all the EE majors say. I wouldn't give this to an ME since this is the very basics of what they do. I give them the circuit problems."
So yeah, it took me a bunch of sketches and what felt like a bazillion minutes, but I finally nailed it. Matt actually said something like, "Yeah, right on!" when I finished my final drawing. He mentioned the dude that I talked to at the internship fair (whom Matt had also interviewed and brought to the company) had done rather poorly on that part of the interview.
After that, he asked one or two more questions about miscellaneous things, and then asked me whether I had any questions for him. I asked about Roseville and what it was like there, and he went on at length on how it was alright, but that he preferred living in Davis and commuting. That of course it wasn't going to have a huge population of 18-24 year olds (seven percent! 7%!!!), especially when compared to a university town, and some other stuff.
Roseville though. Not exactly the kind of place I pictured myself living in.
Then I asked about the job itself, and he gave me a rundown of what Chery, the dude who talked to me at the intership fair, has had to do since joining the team. Chery apparently is the only EE major on the team, and the rest of the team is Mech Es, Chem Es, physicists, and some other random crap. Since joining the team, he's been spending a lot of time learning about plasma physics, mech e stuff, chem e stuff, and basically learning about all aspects of fabrication and manufacturing.
So Matt, the interviewer, stressed that an important part of the job was to be able to understand things beyond your own field so as to really be able to comprehend the workings of the entirety of the fabrication plant and to use that knowledge to come up with good solutions to problems.
This is a good thing I think. Not only do I really like learning about a lot of different things, I actually emphasized that sort of sentiment in describing my projects and favorite classes. So, I mean, he might think that I, like, am a good fit for the job and stuff. 'Cause I am interested in exactly the kind of thing the job requires. Yeah.
After the interview, he gave me a packet with some stuff and said that they would get in contact with me in two to three weeks. I'm trying not to get my hopes up, but I think I have a reasonably good chance of being called back for a second interview. I hope. Augh.
Altogether the interview went well though. I just need to deal now with the waiting and, well, mostly the waiting. Good thing I've got plenty of crap to deal with in school and life so I don't stress about things I can't really change anyway.
Speaking of which, the nervousness never really got to me during the interview. I mean, I got kinda shaky when I saw the interview question, and at other random times when I felt like I couldn't find the words to express what I wanted to say, but all in all I was pretty cool through it. At least, I think I was.
Anyway, it's over and done and now I just sit and hope.
Uf.
# posted by Yann : 23:58
