Harder Company Community Research interview questions

I was contacted by HR shortly after submitting an online application and scheduled a phone interview. Interview questions were very standard for a phone screen. After the interview, I waited a couple weeks to hear back and eventually decided to contact my interviewer. Shortly after I reached out for an update on the hiring process, a second on-site interview was scheduled. I interviewed with two members of the research team and had a friendly, engaging conversation about my experience and completed a short data analysis exercise in Excel. A few days later, I was invited for another interview on-site with two additional members of the research team and asked to submit a writing sample. Following the interview, I was asked to supply contact information for 3-4 references. It took a couple of weeks for HR to schedule conversations with my references and when I checked in for another update, approximately three weeks after my last interview in the office, I learned that I would not be extended an offer as they wanted a candidate with more research experience. They were kind and professional, but the hiring process was very slow.

I got the phone interview in the office headquarters, but did not move forward to the in-person interviews at the office I applied for. It was really strange because the interview started with "Why do you want to work here?" In my experience, interviews usually start with "tell me about yourself," which gives me a chance to mention significant work and education experience so it can be referred to when answering subsequent questions. Without discussing experience first, it was difficult to answer the questions, because I had to keep stopping the discussion of the question topic in order to go on a sidebar explanation of my education or work experience that was relevant to the question. It was frustrating as well because I had specifically prepared for the question "why do you want to work here," but the answer I had prepared did not make sense without any background information on me personally, so I couldn't use it.