I applied online. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at ActiveCampaign (Chicago, IL) in May 2017
Interview
The process started with a short assessment. One part was technical in nature and focused on programming and data modeling skills; the other part measured creativity and the ability to reason about data in a business context.
After the assessment I had a phone interview and an in-person interview with the Director of Data Science. We mostly talked about my past experience and my approach to predictive modeling. There were a few technical questions about machine learning and a couple questions about basic data structures in R (my primary language).
After that I had 1-1 interviews with the CTO and with one of the engineers. These were mostly informal discussions and a chance for me to ask questions about the company.
The process moved quickly, at time a bit faster than I would have liked. That aside, everyone I interacted with was very respectful and straightforward with me.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
How would you deal with imbalanced classes in a machine learning context?
What kind of data structure would you use in R to store key-value pairs?
I applied online. I interviewed at ActiveCampaign (Chicago, IL)
Interview
The hiring manager sent me the Practical Test for the wrong position. Didn't find out until I got called for a phone interview.
Extremely adversarial interview. I was asked about a past project, and to describe the methodology that I used. As I tried to explain, the interviewer constantly interjected, condescendingly questioning why I did this or that.
He then asks me to change gears, and to think deeply and mathematically about a methodology with which I am most familiar. I state my method -- and expecting a deep mathematical question about it, he hits me with a high-level question, which I don't answer quickly enough for his tastes.
He accuses me of not answering any of his questions, being "more academic than practical" and abruptly terminates the interview.
Didn't hear one word about the job itself.
I applied online. I interviewed at ActiveCampaign (Chicago, IL) in May 2017
Interview
I applied online on the website. I received an email from the Director of Data Science himself. He gave me a short test to complete.
I did not complete the entire hiring process due to personal circumstances. Even so, the director invited me for a coffee and we chatted. He was very friendly and was keen on sharing his passion about the company and Data Science. I was very impressed. If it weren’t for my personal circumstances, I would have finished the process.
I applied in-person. I interviewed at ActiveCampaign (Chicago, IL) in May 2017
Interview
I met the Director of Data Science for coffee. We chatted about my previous experience and some of the Kaggle competitions that I was involved in. We discussed advantages and disadvantages of some machine learning algorithms like XGBoost, GBM etc. I walked him through what I was doing at my current role in detail. It was a very casual conversation. After the meeting, he forwarded me a time series analysis task to complete. Overall it was a great learning experience.
Interview questions [2]
Question 1
Advantages and Disadvantages of Gradient Boosted Models.
