Cleo (United Kingdom) Interview Questions

There were 4 interview stages, one with the internal recruiter, followed by a portfolio/case study review with Design Lead and a Senior Product Designer, followed by a Design task and review of this task and finally a meet the team interview. Stage 1 - internal recruiter interview was really great, lovely to chat with very informal giving me information about the company asked me about my expectations and basically gauged if there was a next stage for us. Stage 2 - Case study review with Design Lead and Snr Product Designer, this went great, both members of the team seemed really easy to chat with and asked relevant questions which i was able to answer for them and I had an opportunity to ask a couple questions as well. Stage 3 - The task itself is fairly straight forward, and they give a suggested max time allowance which is nice. Design task review. Went well, I probably didn't fulfil the task completely as I spread out my time too thin trying to cover more ground to present what I felt I should. I did do a very quick visual mock up to show I can do visual but it wasn't backed by much research or validation because of the timeframe. One of the interviewers on the call really leaned into this and I didn't have a good answer because I done it so quickly. But over all it went well enough that I got through to the next stage. Stage 4 - Meeting some other Cleo team members. I met a customer champion and UX Writer, both were great and really enjoyed the conversation which seemed mutual again asked me relevant questions and shared stories with me about Cleo as well as answered my questions well. Overall the business seemed focussed on the right things and how they can really be user focussed.

I had a basic interview with a recruiter for the company. I thought they were very rude honestly. What is even worst I woke up early for the interview since it is based in England and I was very upfront that I wasn't currently located in England. Not sure how much detail to get into, but I remember in the first 5 minutes of the interview feeling like I didn't want to continue with the interview or work at the company. I got a bad first impression.

A phone interview, where we went through my background and responsibilities of the job. We discussed Cleo in general and if I would be a culture-fit, as well as the tools I use on a day-to-day basis.

Had the initial conversation with the recruiter which went well and left me feeling quite positive. Was sent a technical assessment to complete as a presentation, but was rejected based on a presentation I didn’t actually get to present. I understood from being told that I would get to talk about my submission that there would be this opportunity. So, beware, it needs to be 100% self contained because there is no other chance to explain yourself. Apparently I was told this, but what I took on board was also being told that at the next interview, I would get to talk through my submission. I did get detailed feedback on everything that was good and everything that resulted in the rejection. I appreciated the detailed feedback. However, all of the points I was rejected upon could either covered in elements of the deck that weren’t seen, were elements I chose not to include but had experimented with, or more to the point, could have easily been discussed in the presentation I thought I would be giving. Parts of the feedback felt very much “we wouldn’t do it that way”. Reflecting on the response that my submission was “marked” only goes to emphasise me that there was a particular set of expectations, rather than looking at how I processed data, visualised, and tried to answer the questions posed. I feel there’s no way to “win” in these scenarios if you don’t give the answer that matches internal mark sheet, even though reasoning for metric choice is asked for and I explained my choices. Essentially, my choices were also wrong despite being acknowledged as relevant to the question. The final point was that I was told I didn’t calculate a metric that there wasn’t actually any data for so couldn’t have calculated. Again, how can you win. On the plus side, I can bear in mind all these issues for my next technical assessment, and will know to clarify in future whether I get to talk through my submission or if it will be “marked” in absentia.

This was a long process: - 30min phone interview with HR - 1h interview with two engineers to talk abount engineering culture and values - Take home challenge. They mention it will take 3h, but it will definitely take more time. - 1h interview with 2 engineers to talk about your test submition + extend your code + Q&A - 1:30h interview with the engineering team that you will be joining - 30min interview with VP of engineering Everyone was super friendly, and I really though I was approved by the feedback I got from the take-home challenge and following interview. At the extension of your code challenge, try to implement at least half of what was requested. You may want to skip tests, otherwise you won't have enough time.

1. Initial call with a recruiter 2. Then a call with a PM - 30mins of culture and competency questions 3. Then a one hour case study - little information provided before hand so forced to think out loud 4. Then met other members of the team, including CEO and designers/engineers. 5. Then an offer!