General Mills Interview Questions & Reviews in Minneapolis-St. Paul, MN Area

Interviewed Aug 2008 in Minneapolis, MN (took a day)

I applied online for a position in the FLDP. Initial response came quickly and a phone interview was set up within about a week or two. After the initial phone interview with a sr finance manager (about 30 min. - all behavioral interviewing questions..."Tell me a time when..." or "In the pat, how have you handled..."), I received an email response quickly from HR stating the position had been filled. i figured I had bombed the interview and moved on.

About 2 months later I received a call from the HR director asking if I was still interested and looking for a position. Now, when a company says they will keep your resume on file, I never actually thought they did, but I am a case in point that it actually does happen. So I said yes, I was interested and was scheduled for a day at headquarters about 2 weeks later (it was summer and many people were gone on holidays, otherwise it probably would have been even quicker). I was emailed 2 seaparate personality questionnaires to complete prior to my interview day. I also took the Wonderlic test upon arriving on campus that morning.

My day consisted of 4 45 minute interviews (a director and two sr. managers in finance, and a sr manager in HR). All 4 were similar in that they were behavioral. Each one had a different focus - leadership, teamwork, etc. It wasn't super obvious that each was different as the whole process was about your leadership abilities and teamwork. Much less focus on current skills - thought is that if you are the right candidate and right person to hire, they will teach you everything you need to know. All in all they were fun interviews (well, as fun as interviews can be). It really was more conversation style than other companies I've met with and more focused on getting to know me and my abilities and desires, vs. where have I been, who do I know, etc.

After the 4 interviews I had lunch with someone in the finance program who was at the same level I was interviewing for. It was nice to see the entire campus as well as have a bit of a break from the interview, even though there is never really any break. the person who takes you to lunch does not report back to HR and is not in any way part of the discussion to hire you or not, so it was my chance to see what it was really like there. No company is perfect, but you can get a good sense of whether the culture is a good fit for you or not by meeting the people who work there.

After lunch i met with the HR manager again (not the same one i interviewed with) and did a min-interview and follow up of the day. Essentially just checking my interest after having met with people and spent the better part of a day at the company.

I of course interviewed right before this manager was going out of town for a week and so knew I would not hear back for at least 5 business days, and probably a few longer. I was pleasantly surprised to receive a call from the HR manager at the end of the 5th day apologizing for the delay and the fact that not everything had been worked out yet, but they felt so bad at making me wait that long to hear a response. This was much faster than most other company even think of getting back to a candidate, so I was not worried at all. But the manager wanted to make certain I knew as soon as he did that they would be making me an offer and he would come back to me in the next day with the final offer. I thought that said a lot about the company that they were concerned with leaving me hanging (and only for a week) so much as to call before everything was finalized just to make certain I knew they were still thinking about me and making it all work out.

After receiving the offer, I took a few days to review, decide, and negotiate. After the final acceptance, it was about 2 weeks while my background check and drug test were completed, then another 2 weeks to set me up and have me start.