Science & Technology Interview Questions & Answers

The interview was one of the strangest I have ever had. The director spent roughly 80% of the interview telling me about the company and reiterating how stressful the job would be. He then proceeded to ask if I had been put off of the job and when I said no, gave me a 10 hour project to complete over the weekend.

Asked very in depth questions relating the the project.

I took the job, which turned out to be okay. The company however, is in transition and I left soon after. Advice would be to not take the job and have a look on Glassdoor at some of the reviews before accepting.

na

I was e-mailed by an administrator after applying for the role (by completing an online application form, submitting my CV and personal statement) that I had been invited to interview in around 1.5 weeks' time. I arrived in plenty of time and thought I had prepared enough by revising my undergraduate dissertation and bits about my placement and postgraduate literature review. Unfortunately, I hadn't prepared enough and I spent too much time explaining the background to my project topic (Toxoplasma gondii, it's discovery and how it was eventually identified in many areas globally but that older misconceptions could not explain these occurrences as it was thought the parasite could only survive in the felid intestine, yet it turned out it could survive just as successfully outside of the felid in other secondary hosts), so overall I struggled through the interview as I was under-prepared. Yet I have since asked my undergraduate university for help with interviews and will hopefully soon go on to do well at interviews I have lined up very soon.

Sometimes it could be a very easy question (or in this case it should be for me who completed a Masters in Stem Cells and Regeneration) you weren't expecting: twice this happened to me.

1) I was asked on one occasion "so in layman's terms, what is a stem cell?" and although I knew what one was I couldn't put it succinctly and proficiently into a sentence, I replied with "it is a cell that can form many other cell types by differentiating along specific lineages" - so I really hadn't answered the question, it wasn't in layman's terms as the panel had to ask me later on "what is a lineage?" and I hadn't stated that there were different types of stem cells and that they don't always form many different bodily tissues e.g. somatic stem cells and progenitors are uni or oligopotent - so can only make a cell that is anatomically close to them i.e. a cardiac progenitor will make a cardiac cell. Moreso, I hadn't also said that stem cells can proliferate for extended periods in culture and are developmentally younger than residents cells whose biological fate has been decided.

2) Also I was asked "what techniques I might expect to need to learn or improve upon in order to fulfill my role?" - really this was all provided in the person specification of the advertisement e.g. fluorescence microscopy, qRT-PCR, cell culture etc. but I had focused my efforts on remembering all about my previous work rather than considering what was needed of me in this role, so I stumbled through by giving one example "fluorescence microscopy" followed by a lot of 'erms' which is no good at all!

Make sure you have a healthy knowledge in balance between your work/achievements and the work you are going to do with the company you apply for; don't get caught short either side by knowing too much about yourself but not enough about the company or vice versa

I arrived on my own and at the time was the only person being interviewed (I think this was purposely carried out so that only one person was called to be interviewed each day or at markedly different times). I notified reception of my arrival, waited for around 15 minutes, was taken upstairs by an administrator who seated me outside the interview room for a further 10 minutes, then I was called in and sat in front of an academic panel of 4 (3 of which were my supervisors, 1 of which was an external examiner), I was quite nervous - the interview was very formal and some appeared more friendly than others and I never really eased into it, though I was happier that my potential supervisors were actually present rather than a previous interview where I was being interviewed by unrelated academics; the interview lasted around 40 minutes (including me asking the panel questions).

I was e-mailed by an administrator after applying for the role (by completing an online application form, submitting my CV and personal statement) that I had been invited to interview in 16 days' time. I arrived in plenty of time and thought I had prepared enough by revising my undergraduate dissertation (which I had brought along with me as I was asked in the e-mail to bring a sample of my academic work, but unusually the panel didn't even look at this - they were more bothered about my motivation for PhD and my knowledge of regenerative medicine, immunology and my technical knowledge of previous experiments). I did extremely well in the interview as there were many difficult questions put to me e.g. [Question]: How would you make sure a certain receptor binds erythropoietin in experiments? [Answer]: Antibody blocking of all other receptors to show that only one receptor is vacant and is causing the effect (I actually said drugs but he wanted me to say antibodies). The interview conducted by 5 scientists (one external examiner, three of my potential supervisors and one collaborating scientist whom would be involved in the project) lasted around 45 minutes but I wasn't offered a place due to the fact that I didn't have enough laboratory experience in the areas that I would be investigating (which has been a major problem in many of my interviews).

I was asked a question about a lab protocol for flow cytometry which I had followed during my placement but since forgotten the exact details and so I answered the question they asked me wrongly (I should have said I lysed the red blood cells prior to analysing but I said I didn't think there was a step and that the whole blood just needed to be incubated with antibodies in the dark, I basically skipped an important step), it had been 4 years prior to my interview that I had conducted such a protocol but I was expected to remember it in this level of detail - I suppose I should have known really

Make sure you know the technical information of your placement research project well (as ), plus make sure you know about the interviewers' individual research publications and interests (I answered a question about this very well), and have plenty of lab experience (especially cell culture experience is wanted by many interviewers nowadays!)

I first arrived and waited around 30 minutes in an annexe room and read my notes whilst I waited; a little while before my interview I greeted and shook the hands of two of my interviewers who arrived around 15 minutes before the interview (both of which were my main supervisors) before they went into the interview room as I thought it might make a good impression and demonstrate my keenness and punctuality, then I was called through into the interview room via a cloak room which I was able to leave my briefcase in before I entered the interview room; the interview room was a small conference room with my 5 interviewers sat across a medium-sized table with my chair being the closest to me when I entered the room which was directly facing them. I was briefed firstly by the external examiner about the format of the interview and then questioned by each of the scientists in a clockwise fashion.

Online Application
Fill out form online. Read about Intel case studies to help you structure the answers. Contact people on Linkedin who work for Intel to get some idea about what type of things work. Main thing is to show an interest in technology and understand how Intel helps firms.

Online Situational Judgement Test
Consider what capabilities are liked by Intel. Look at all the information on the Intel recruitment website and try to make those qualities stand out. This is more based on your determination to work long hours, work independently, work collaboratively. Getting the balance right between leadership and team work is vital.

Phone Interview
Few competency questions and then case study. For competency questions just be sure about Why Intel? Why this position? Why you? Have your answers planned according to S.T.A.R - Situation - Task - Action - Result. The Case Study is all about showing you can think analytically and systematically. Analyse wider issues etc.

Group exercise was difficult for me. There were around 4 people in my group. All of them were quite confident. I was the only one who was a bit nervous but finally I managed to do well.

- Learn a lot about the company
- Be one of the main speakers in the group exercise
- Be able to talk about what you did right and wrong

There were 5 people in my assessment centre. We were first given a presentation by a senior member of staff about his career. Then we were presented with a video which described a case study. We had to as a team find the best solution in each of four different categories and it had to come under budget. It shouldn't be too hard to find a solution to this. The hr people ask you some questions at the end. My feedback said that I didn't defend my opinions enough during the exercise so if you disagree with someone do say something but just don't let it turn into an argument.

We were next given a project planning exercise based on the solution youve cone up with and you have to list risks and dependencies. You then have a one on one interview which is mainly focused on defending your project plan and then they go on to ask about your knowledge of Intel. They also ask you about how you performed on the exercise, it's important to go into a bit of detail here and I think they want to know that you're aware of your strengths and weaknesses.