I applied through an employee referral. The process took 2 months. I interviewed at Benchling (Zürich) in Apr 2020
Interview
Unnecessarily extremely long: 8 meetings around scientific and technical presentations and 1:1 interviews. For all scientific and technical presentations, I was (badly) evaluated by peers less experience than I was (2 years as Implementation Manager, and the interviewers were for 8-12 months in their role according to themselves ). For the 1:1 interviews with directors and leads, I had a very good time. In the end, the technical part played a major role in their decision to not extend the offer to me.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
HR: all the classical questions Technical: 1 presentation on CAR-T cells technology, 1 presentation on one cloud SaaS platform of my choice. Upper management: vision, how I see myself in my role, how complex were the studies that I implemented
Multi-stage process involving preparing and delivering a presentation on a set topic, and unseen technical work performed live in a zoom call. Calls with other implementation managers, HR, hiring manager and head of professional services
I applied through a staffing agency. The process took 6 weeks. I interviewed at Benchling (London, England) in Aug 2021
Interview
Headhunted by an external recruiter then had four interviews directly with Benchlings, two with internal recruiters and two with hiring managers all lasting approx. 30 mines. The interviews were general chats going through and asking technical questions and why you would fit into the company.
The feedback I got from the recruiter was i) They had a large pool of candidates ii) I didn’t show enough reasoning for making this career move. I read all the reviews on glassdoor, watched their presentations on YouTube, download the software, read all the blurb of expected IPO, and demonstrated that in the four interviews. This was contradictory to the feedback they gave the recruiter.
If someone has made an effort to attend four interviews, at least have the respect of giving credible feedback. It bring doubts to mind about the whole process, bearing in mind that the this was a headhunted application on my behalf.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
General questions about talkking through cv and what you would bring to the company, nothing they asked me was out of the blue.
The process took 6 weeks. I interviewed at Benchling in Jun 2021
Interview
Multiple rounds including phone interviews, two presentations and zoom interviews. It takes a lot of work to do well on the presentations, but I enjoyed the research it required. Overall, I think the hiring process at Benchling is intense, but I felt like it gave me a good view into the role I was applying for and a great opportunity to talk with people already on the team.
Interview questions [1]
Question 1
Mostly standard questions, but some curve balls like do you consider yourself a lucky person? And if you could repeat anything in this interview process what would it be?