Interviewing in Silicon Valley: an inside scoop

So what’s it like to interview in Silicon Valley?

As someone who worked in the startup world in Silicon Valley, I’m here to give the inside scoop on my experience.

I was interviewing for a role as a Sr Clinical Science Liaison and I would be joining the Clinical Operations team. This is the team that runs clinical trials in industry.

I got a call from the recruiter who left a voicemail on my phone letting me know they wanted to chat. They asked if I could call them back and if not I could schedule some time on their calendar to chat separately. I’m SO glad I opted to set up some time because it allowed me to prepare ahead of that first interview, which was my first impression I’d be making at the company. It also allowed me to get face to face time with the recruiter virtually which I felt like was more personable than a phone call.

That video call with the recruiter was 30 minutes and basically she gave me information about the role, and asked some basic questions like “tell me about yourself” and “why do you want to work here?” My biggest take away from that was I’m so glad that I had spent a lot of time preparing. I think the elevator pitch that I had rehearsed really made a good impression on her. She immediately told me she wanted me to speak to the hiring manager as a next step.

The interview with the hiring manager lasted about an hour and was honestly so laid back. She asked interview questions, but it was really a lot of conversation and just felt like a friendly chat. I find that the culture of startups are typically like this. Although it’s a high stress environment to work in, people are generally pretty laid back. If you’re lucky you’ll find a startup that values a positive workplace culture like I did.

Then I was given a homework assignment which was essentially creating a presentation and then editing a clinical monitoring report. It didn’t take too much time to complete which was nice- I think I got lucky. I’ve heard that some require extensive work.

Then came the fishbowl interview. This is basically a group interview. There were 3 panelists and my hiring manager. They went around and introduced themselves, then I did my elevator pitch for them. Then they went around asking questions. The questions all varied depending on what team that person was on. My interview had a senior lab scientist, leader in quality assurance, and a leader in alliance management(physician relationships). One thing I always did after answering a question was to follow up with a question so that it felt like more of a conversation rather than a one sided interview. It’s helpful to do some research on each person in your panel by searching them on LinkedIn so you know how to prep your questions for them.

Then I got to the final step which, typically is usually a formality with a senior leader. I met with the senior VP of clinical operations for this interview. Her questions were more about leadership; which I had wish I had prepped more for. But ultimately I was about to work around the questions she asked and made a good impression because I was given an offer right after that! If I were to redo that interview I’d probably have prepped a little bit differently. Senior leaders are very busy and their focus is different than others in that they are focused on leadership, management, metrics and performance. I’d probably have more questions prepped to ask that leader back.

The interview process typically is multiple steps but what helped me was just taking each one, one at a time and preparing for each one separately! You got this!

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