I applied through college or university. The process took 1 day. I interviewed at MITRE (McLean, VA) in Dec 2009
Interview
HR folks seemed friendly enough, but several interviewers were late and clearly unprepared (or otherwise demonstrated that they just didn't care) for interviewing me. To top it all off, HR left me waiting for over four weeks after the interview. I ended up having to call them only to find out that they didn't want to "move forward." Not terribly impressed in hindsight.
Intial phone call with HR screen - basic behavioral questions. Then technical screen with 6-8 engineers from two different sites. Sounds more stressful than it was. Most questions pertained to projects I had done and results.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Describe the algorithm you used in this project and the decision process for selecting it.
I applied through an employee referral. The process took 2 weeks. I interviewed at MITRE in Mar 2011
Interview
Got a job referral through an Alumni association. He called a former boss as a reference then passed me onto the hiring manager, who gave me an initial phone interview. We worked out a date for in-person interviews. For this job I did have to do a 20 minute presentation, then a series of 6 -7 1:1 interviews. Having to do a presentation helped a lot, it gave those that attended something to talk about instead of the cold call that some interviews can feel like.