I applied through a recruiter. I interviewed at Rakuten (Tokyo) in May 2023
Interview
The first stage was solving a problem on the Codility platform. Then after reviewing my CV, they invited me to the Interview. At the first Interview, there was only one woman, who is the manager. It seemed to me that she was not ready for an interview or was lazy to ask me questions. Instead of almost 40 minutes (the interview was for 45 minutes) I asked questions regarding the upcoming tasks, their goals and working process in a team, etc. In the end, she asked one statistical question- I answered and she said that it is correct. However, the result was negative with short feedback that I have less experience in Data Science, despite the fact that they already read my resume and invited me to the interview.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Tell me about yourself. Why do you interest in Japan? And one question on Statistics.
this interview process had 5 rounds
2 was a tech test
３ were conversational in nature
with various managers from direct and indirect to the department manager mostly in Japan but also outside Japan.
1st Interview was simple leetcode task and some questions about Kubernetes. 2nd interview - classical ML and DL questions, Final interview is mostly informal, but there may appear some questions about specific experience and problem solving
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
What is the difference between random forest and boosting?
Initial LeetCode coding test, hiring manager interview for profile and role fit, multiple technical rounds covering statistics, machine learning, SQL, Python, and case studies, concluding with behavioral interviews evaluating teamwork, communication, and cultural alignment.