The interview process is designed to be four stages- three screening calls and one in-person 'formal' interview. As I had previously talked about roles at the company with a recruiter, I only did two screening calls before my in-person interview. The screening calls were ~30 minutes each and focused on my overall research and why I chose to apply to Exponent. I was asked to give a short overview of my PhD research / resume in both. Questions included a time I had taken charge of a project and describing a project that I felt was successful. One of the interviewers ended up focusing entirely on my research background, while the other spent most of the interview telling me about the structure of work at the company. For the in-person interview, I was flown to Menlo Park. The interview lasted from 9-3pm. I was asked to give a 45 minute research talk with 15 minutes for questions in the morning, and had six or seven 30 minute one-on-one interviews, including one with the Principal Engineer of the group and one with HR. The PE interview focused on making sure I understood and would fit in well with the structure of the company. The one-on-ones with other researchers were primarily open-ended science questions – ‘This is the structure of a device, tell me about it’, ‘If you were trying to make this material, how would you determine your success’ – which were designed to see how you would approach potential client problems. Behavioral questions included discussions of times I had taken charge of projects and discussions of how I approached my current workplace environment. Lunch was with the group to allow more casual discussion, and I was also given a tour of the building and lab spaces.
